We found a National Trust WWII recipe for carrot cake - from their website entry for Croome Park at: www.nationaltrust.org.uk/croome/recipes/wartime-carrot-cake

Here's the recipe. We had to use dried cranberries instead of sultanas. We imagined that we were making it during an air raid in an Anderson shelter at the bottom of the garden. So we used a slightly floppy old carrot because we didn't dare go into the garden to get a fresh one. We think it should be alright because it got grated anyway (along with the tips of my fingers because it was bit dark in the shelter). We took it back into the house to cook it once the air raid was over.

Ingredients

•230 grams self-raising flour

•85 grams margarine or cooking fat

•85 grams sugar

•115 grams finely grated carrot

•55 grams sultanas

•A little milk or water

•1 reconstituted dried egg or 1 fresh egg

Method

1. Preheat oven to 220˚C / 200˚C (fan) / gas mark 7.

2. Sift the flour into a mixing bowl.

3. Rub in the margarine or cooking fat.

4. Add sugar, carrot, sultanas and egg. Mix well and then add sufficient milk or

water to make sticky.

5. Pour mixture into a lined baking tin and cook in the over for

40 - 45 minutes or until golden in colour.