Winning over the French with carrot cake

Working for 10 months in France led me to have a lot of more than pleasant food experiences, both in and out of work.  Cakes were brought in often as people displayed their patriotic urge to cook (and show off), much to my benefit.  

We English are stereotyped for being bad at making food (despite my protests, the French still held a grudge) and so the first time I made a cake for work, our whole reputation was on the line. I remembered that my sister had recently made a particularly nice Ottolenghi carrot cake and so I decided that this was suitably english and made it using this recipe from their website http://www.ottolenghi.co.uk/recipes/carrot-cake. 

The result; sucess! Although slightly time consuming to prepare it definitely paid off; people were desperate for the recipe and intrigued by the topping as apparently they are unaware of philadephia.  The oil used instead of butter makes it much easier to blend (living in a tiny apartment there was DEFINITELY no mixer with beater attachment) though I never added the bicarbonate of soda (it didn't seem to matter) and I often added more than the recommended honey in the icing. I also did particularly like the recommendation of walnuts sprinkled on top. 

Conclusion: The answer to impressing any foreigners with ill-conceived notions of our British cooking abilities.