Thursday 19 November 2009

Christmas cake



My lovely lovely Christmas cake. I love you already. Do you think people will mind if I take a slice off you and serve you up slightly wonky on one side? Do you think they'll notice? It's so tempting to try you out, I mean, I wouldn't want to poison anyone... ;-) But I'm a good host, a nice polite host and I can't serve up a half eaten cake. I just can't. So I'm going to have to wait patiently to sample your lovely sherry goodness. Oh yes. You're definitely Not a child-friendly cake. But don't you worry about that, it really doesn't matter, there are no little children to feed. I promise all us adults will be very pleased to taste you :-)

 


 
If you want to go mental like me and start talking to your very own Christmas cake, here's the recipe I followed. It's a mix of several, because I don't like things like candied peel so it's been tweaked to *perfection*. Here it goes:

 
Ingredients:

  • 100g blanched almonds roughly chopped
  • 250g sultanas
  • 200g glace cherries
  • 250g chopped dried figs
  • 75g dried cranberries
  • 250g chopped dried prunes
  • 200g chopped dried apricots
  • 350g plain flour
  • 1/2 tsp bicarb of soda
  • pinch of salt
  • 1 tsp ground cinnamon
  • 1 tsp almond essence
  • zest and juice of an orange and lemon
  • 4 tbsp sherry
  • 4 large eggs
  • 200g brown sugar
  • 225g butter at room temperature
  • 2 tbsp honey
Method:
  • Place all the fruit in a large bowl and add the sherry, zest and juice of the orange and lemon. Cover and let the fruit soak overnight.
  • Preheat the oven to 150 degrees  C. Line a 23cm round tin with a double thickness of brown paper and again with baking parchment, both to come up a good 10cm above the rim of the tin.
  • Cream the butter and sugar in a large bowl. Add the almond extract and honey.
  • Add eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition. Sift the dry ingredients together then mix the fruit alternately with the dry ingredients into the creamed mixture. Combine thoroughly.
  • Put the cake mix into the prepared tin and bake for 3-3 1/2 hours, until cake tester comes out clean.
  • When the cake is cooked, brush with a couple of tablespoons extra of liqueur. Wrap immediately in its tin using double thickness foil. When completely cold, remove cake from tin and rewrap in soil, storing in an airtight tin.
Here's the one I made a couple of years ago. I hope this year's is just as nice.



8 comments:

The Girl said...

You are too clever by words missy.

Don't think I'm ready to tackle the ULTIMATE BAKING CHALLENGE (a christmas cake) just yet but maybe next year....

But I do know that if I did make one I'd almost definitely talk to it.

Marie said...

That looks beautiful, and i'm sure it's delicious too!

Maddi Makes... said...

OOooooooh thank you times a squiillion!!! This cake is the epitome of cakey goodness and i'm sooooooo gonna make my own now! RIGHT NOW!!! Been looking for that perfect recipe for aaaages!
Maddi(Makes) xxx

Jan said...

Hi...it's 6am and raining cats and dogs here on the Oregon coast....I stumbled upon your blog and loved the photos of the cake,especially the one with the ribbon around it. Yummm.....I love seasonal cakes. Thanks for sharing.

Emilie said...

Bonjour Petit Filoux !
Un mot pour te dire que tu as gagné à mon petit concours ! Merci de m'envoyer par mail ton adresse postal, via mon profil google. A bientôt !
The French Frog

Jennifer said...

It looks fantastic, and I'm not a big candied peel person either, so definitely more up my alley. Thanks for sharing the recipe.

Unknown said...

This looks just tooo yummmmmie to even eat. I don't have a clue about the measurement, but I'm sure my waist does....he-he

PinkCat said...

Mmm, it looks fabulous and tasty too! I love to see the different recipes that people use for Christmas Cakes. On the surface it seems like such a generic recipe but it always differs to people's tastes. I like the idea of dried cranberries. Yum! x