Lorna's Carrot Cake Bars

For our "Not the Olympics" theme, i decided to go with; not 5 (4), not round (rectangular), raaaaandomly coloured (red, blue, yellow and green) cake bars. And because i haven't made a carrot cake in a while i chose that. I was also inspired by the fact that i spent a good 30 minutes aww-ing over some mini loaf tins in a shop and my boyfriend finally gave in and bought them; i had them for about 3 months still in the shrink wrap. Oops. Anyway, on with the show.

Ingredients:

150g plain flour/wholewheat flour mix

2 eggs, separated

175g caster sugar

85ml rapeseed oil (or vegetable oil)

125ml buttermilk

1tsp baking powder

1tsp baking soda

2tsp cinnamon

2 medium carrots, grated

Method:

Preheat the oven to 175C and grease 4 mini loaf tins.

Beat the egg whites until fluffy. Add 75g of the sugar and beat to stiff peaks. In a separate bowl beat the buttermilk, egg yolks, oil and remaining sugar together. Mix in the flour, baking powder, baking soda and cinnamon. Stir in the carrot and then finally fold in the egg whites. Don't be scared of folding; the carrot will weight the batter down a fair bit so you'll lose some air. Try to be gentle but thorough until the mix is well combined.

Spoon into the individual tins and bake for 30 minutes until well risen and a toothpick comes out clean. Let them cool in the tins then tip them out. I cut each loaf in half and put a layer of maple buttercream in the middle (each of a different colour).