Fast Food and Carrot Cake

First, I wrote a little love letter to Pret a Manger. You know, a cutesy thing of how a casual acquaintance (rushed tomato, cheese and bacon croissant in the morning) grew into a full-fledged love affair (hoisin duck wrap and chocolate mousse pot for lunch). The back story here is that since I started working at my current company, whose London offices were just two blocks away from a Pret store, I've eaten the chain's food consistently for the last 5 years. Not only do I love their food, I am fully 'sold' on their aesthetics and their advertised brand values.

However, before putting my little note out into the world, I became a little hesitant. I am very aware of my weakness for ecomarketing - I will absolutely purchase a product that's packaged in a brown and green container, over a brightly coloured one. That is what my brain equates with concious consumerism.

Of course it is not. Concious consumerism requires much more than that. It requires an awareness of how the things are made and where they are shipped from. If it is food we're buying, a basic understanding of how it is grown is needed. What pesticides were used on my lettuce? What hormones were pumped into this chicken?

Problem is, I don't have all the facts and realistically, what I end up basing decisions on, is pure emotion. Even when I eat at a restaurant as questionable on all of those points as McDonalds, I can still forget the nasty bits by focusing on my emotional response. How happy I am that my salt and fat cravings can be quickly, and cheaply satisfied. How the never changing texture of the food takes me right back to eating that same burger as when I was a kid. Visions of Happy Meal My Little Ponies start crowding in my head.

So if I can be lulled into the red and yellow fantasy land of Micky D's, did I get duped into promoting (to my VAST and varied audience) what could amount to just another deceitfully unhealthy, ethically ambiguous, albeit cleverly branded fast food store?

And here's where I get to the end, and this week's recipe. When I was moving from London to San Francisco for work, I wrote an email to Pret's customer service. I professed my love, urged them to consider a swift expansion into Northern California and I asked for two recipes for my favorite Pret desserts - their double chocolate mousse and their carrot cake.

Within days I received a lovely note and my two recipes.

I will not question the online customer service skills of the good people at McDonalds Corp, since I have not had the pleasure. I will however, question their willingness to provide me with their Filet o' Fish recipe and my ability to recreate it faithfully.

I have made the below carrot cake several times. By no means can it be considered 'healthy', but it is absolutely delicious, the best carrot cake I have ever had and it tastes exactly the same homemade as in the store. This makes me feel very good about Pret, for a good reason.

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The recipe is reproduced faithfully, just as I received it from Pret. My only hope is that no legal action will be taken.

Pret Carrot Cake

Icing

400g (14oz) icing (confectioners) sugar

100g (3 ½ oz) cream cheese

50g (1 ¾ oz) unsalted butter

Cake

2 eggs

200g (7 oz) soft brown sugar

150ml (5 fl oz) corn, sunflower or vegetable oil

200g (7 oz) grated carrot

50g (1 ¾ oz) walnut or pecan pieces, roughly chopped

75g (2 ½ oz) diced pineapple, fresh or tinned, roughly chopped

50g (1 ¾ oz) desiccated coconut

200g (7 oz) plain (all purpose) flour

1 tsp ground cinnamon

1tsp bicarbonate of soda (baking soda)

1 tsp salt

Preheat the oven to 150oc (300of/gas2). Line a 21cm (8 ¼ inc) baking tin with baking paper.

The icing needs to be prepared in advance so that it can be chilled before spreading over the cake, so make this first. Beat the cream cheese and butter together thoroughly- easiest with a electric whisk, but strong hand beating would also work. Add the icing sugar to the mixture in three equal batches, beating well between each addition. Put in the fridge to set.

In a large bowl, using an electric beater, whisk the eggs at a high speed until doubled in volume. Add the sugar and continue beating until pale and fluffy. With the whisk still on high speed, add the oil in a  slow steady stream. Keep beating until the mixture holds the shape of any trail across the surface.

Gently fold the carrot, walnut or pecan pieces, pineapple and coconut into the cake mixture with a metal spoon in a figure of eight technique. Sift the flower into the bowl with the cinnamon, bicarbonate of soda and salt, and fold them in gently too.

Transfer the mixture to the baking tin – again with care, so that the air you’ve taken care to whisk in isn’t whacked out. Bake for 1 hour, or until a skewer comes out clean when poked into the centre of the cake. If the top of the cake seems to be browning too much before the centre is ready, balance a piece of baking paper or foil across the top of the tin and it will protect the cake from burning.

Leave the cake to cool for 10-15 minuets before turning it out onto a wire rack. When it is completely cold, slice the cake in half horizontally and spread a third of the cream cheese mixture on to the bottom half. Put the top back on and cover the whole cake with the remaining icing. It doesn’t need to be completely smooth- in fact you could design any surface pattern you like.