Courgette Cake

My colleague brought in these beautiful courgettes (zucchini) from his garden. It's not unsurprising then that I decided to make a cake with it. I've always wanted to try making a courgette cake and I'm really glad I did as it was really delicious. It's very similar to a carrot cake. The courgettes made the cake moist and the orange icing in this recipe went very well with it. I'd like to try it with lemon or other fruit or chocolate. Have you baked anything with courgettes? How did it turn out? 

Look at the size of them! 

adding grated courgette to the cake batter 

ready to go in the oven

fresh from the oven

with icing on top 

I added some crushed walnuts as it looked a little plain

For the cake 

250g butter

250g caster sugar or brown sugar

4 eggs

350g self raising flour

juice and zest of 1 orange

1 teaspoon cinnamon

1/2 teaspoon mixed spice

350g courgette, grated  (I used 1 large one as shown in the picture above)

50g walnuts, roughly chopped

80g sultanas

Orange Cream Cheese Icing 

125g cream cheese

50g unsalted butter

300g icing sugar

juice and zest of 1/4 orange 

• Preheat oven to 180C.
• Grease and line a 25cm deep cake tin. 
• Beat butter and sugar until pale and creamy. 
• Add the eggs one at a time while mixing until the eggs are well incorporated. 
• Sieve the flour with the cinnamon and mixed spice. 
• Fold in 1/3 of the flour, followed by 1/2 of the orange juice and zest, repeat this using the remaining flour and orange so that all the ingredients are well combined. 
• Stir in the courgette, walnuts and sultanas and mix well. 
• Pour the mixture into the prepared cake tin and place on the centre shelf in the preheated oven.
• Bake for approximately 1 hour or until the cake is firm to touch. 
• Turn the cake out on a rack and allow to cool completely.

To make the icing: 

• Beat the cream cheese and butter together until creamy. 
• Gradually beat in the icing sugar and orange juice and zest until you have a smooth creamy icing.
• Spread over the cooled cake.