Courgette & lime cake with lime cream cheese icing - recipe

When we moved to 'the sticks'** a couple of months ago I came over all Good Life and, before we'd even finished unpacking (still haven't - oops), had planted up the garden with herbs, chillies, tomatoes and courgettes.

The herbs are doing well and I get very excited when I can just pop into the garden to pick them when I need them.  The chillies and tomatoes are doing ok - but yet to produce anything.  The courgettes on the other hand are a roaring success - yippee!  I've only had a couple off the plants so far but reckon I might have a glut on my hands before long - so expect to see plenty more courgette recipes over the next few weeks.

This cake is extremely more-ish - surprisingly light and very moist.

**Ok, so Richmond is exactly the most rural place in the world but it's a hell of a lot more 'sticky' than Wapping, where we used to live practically next door to naughty Uncle Rupert!

Ingredients:
1 large courgette, grated
150g caster sugar
100ml vegetable oil
Good pinch of salt
Half a teaspoon bicarbonate of soda
Pinch of baking powder
Zest of 1 lime

For the cream cheese icing:
100g cream cheese (I used Philadelphia)
1 tablespoon caster sugar
Juice of 1 lime

Lavender petals to decorate


Method:

Preheat oven to 160 C . Grease a loaf tin.

In a large mixing bowl, mix together the courgette, sugar, egg and oil.

In a separate bowl, sift together the flour, salt, bicarbonate of soda and baking powder; stir in the lemon zest. Gradually stir the flour mixture into the courgette mix, until they are blended.

Pour the batter into the prepared loaf tin.

Pop in the pre-heated oven and bake for about 45 minutes.  When it's done, a skewer inserted into the middle should come out clean.

Remove from heat and cool for 10 minutes or so in the tin, before turning out onto a wire rack to cool completely.

Once the cake is cool, beat together the icing ingredients until fluffy.  Spoon the icing over the cake and sprinkle with lavender petals.