Christmas Cake

With 6 days until Christmas, believe it or not there is still time to make a traditional, rich and boozy Christmas cake.  Yes, you could have made them in September and had one less thing to do at this busy time but, it's no bother really! 3 days to soak your fruit, a day to bake it , a day to ice and decorate and you'll still have a day to spare!

I seem to have done a lot of Christmas Baking this year but none of it is for me! After already making 5 Christmas Genoa Cakes one of the final things I needed to make was a proper, brandy filled Christmas Cake packed with fruit and nuts. So, yet again I turned to Mary Berry for a recipe that would fit the brief.

Mary's recipe makes one large 23cm cake or you could, like I did last year make lots of little individual serving cakes that make perfect gifts for friends and family. If you are making individual cakes one batch will make approximately 12 cakes if you are using the Lakeland individual sandwich cake tin.

To make this Christmas cake you will need:

• 175g raisins
• 350g glace cherries
• 500g currants
• 350g sultanas
• 150ml brandy
• The zest of 2 oranges
• 250g butter
• 250g light brown muscovado sugar
• 4 medium eggs
• 1 tbsp black treacle
• 75g blanched almonds
• 75g self raising flour
• 175g plain flour
• 1 1/2 tsp ground mixed spice

You will also need:

• Apricot jam
• Your chosen decoration

 Three days before you want to bake:

• Put the cherries (quartered, washed and dried), currants, sultanas, raisins and the zest of 2 oranges in a large container. Add 150ml of brandy (or your preferred spirit). Seal the container and leave the fruit to soak, stirring / shaking the tub every day.

The day you want to bake:

• Double line a large 23cm cake tin.

• Preheat your oven to 140c fan.
• Add the butter, sugar, eggs, treacle and chopped almonds to large mixing bowl. 
• Mix until all the ingredients are combined.

• Add the flours and mixed spice. When this is fully integrated into the mix you can fold in the fruit that has been soaking for the last 3 days.

• Transfer the mix to your lined tin, flattening the top.

• Bake for around 4 hours. After about 2 hours you will need to put a little foil 'hat' on the cake to stop it from going too dark in colour.
• The cake is ready when it is firm to the touch and a cake tester / skewer comes out clean.
• Allow the cake to cool completely.

• Heat 3 large spoonfuls of apricot jam and brush over the top and sides of your cooled cake to glaze it.
• Now its time to decorate - it is completely up to you how you want to decorate it. I decided to put marzipan and fondant icing on the top only and make a holly wreath out of  coloured fondant icing.  Go as simple or as extravagant as you dare!

And that's all there is too it. I always thought making a Christmas / fruit cake was really complex when in fact they are really simple as long as you remember to leave a few days for your fruit to soak!

Let me know how you get on - happy festive baking!

Rach x