Christmas Cake!
One of the most iconic bakes that exists, the christmas cake... homemade and scrumptious filled with fruit, and soaked in brandy!
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Servings: 12 slices
Ingredients
- 200 g raisins
- 200 g sultanas
- 200 g currants
- 200 g dried cranberries
- 200 g glace cherries
- 75 g mixed peel
- zest of 2 lemons
- juice of 2 lemons
- 175 ml alcohol (I used brandy) (* see notes)
- 250 g unsalted butter
- 200 g light brown soft sugar
- 50 g treacle
- 200 g self raising flour (* see notes)
- 100 g ground almonds (* see notes)
- 2 tsp mixed spice
- 1 tsp ground ginger
- 1 tsp ground cinnamon
- 1 tsp ground nutmeg
- 5 medium eggs
- 2 tsp vanilla extract
Instructions
- Add the raisins, sultanas, currants, dried cranberries, glacé cherries, mixed peel, lemon zest, lemon juice, brandy, butter, light brown sugar and treacle to a large bowl
- Mix these together, and then heat in the microwave for 5 minutes on high, letting the butter melt, and stir together well.
- Alternatively, add all of the ingredients to a large pan, bring to the boil, and simmer for 10 minutes.
- Leave the mixture to cool for 30 minutes. During this time, preheat the oven to 150ºc/130ºc fan
- Once cooled, add the self raising flour, ground almonds, mixed spice, ginger, cinnamon, nutmeg, eggs and vanilla to the bowl and mix until combined
- Pour into a deep 8" cake tin that is lined on the based and sides well. You don't want any tin showing as it may get stuck
- Pour the mixture into the lined tin, and bake for 2 hours. Keep an eye on it towards the end, if its browning too much, cover lightly with foil
- Once baked, remove from the oven and prick with a fork. Spoon over 2-3 more brandy and cool completely.
- Once cooled, wrap in clean baking parchment, and foil, and store for 2 weeks and feed with 2-3 more tbsps of brandy. Repeat every two weeks until Christmas.
Notes
- I make my Christmas cake 12 weeks before Christmas, but it can be done nearer to the time or even earlier
- I feed my cake every 2 weeks
- You can freeze the cake, wrapped in baking parchment and then tin foil, for 3+ months
- I use brandy, but you can use any rich spirit (read the blog post) or you can substitute for tea/apple juice for alcohol free
- Try to store the cake wrapped well in baking parchment and then foil, in a cake tin. Sealed tubs can make it sweat.
- You can sub the self raising flour for plain flour + 1 tsp of baking powder
- The ground almonds can be replaced with more flour, but this will change the texture