However, not everyone is familiar with how to make one. So, if this is your year to shine and you’re not sure what to do, you’ve come to the right place because we’ve got you covered!
How To Make A Traditional Christmas Fruit Cake
Serves – makes one 20cm round or 18cm square cake
Prep time – 40 minutes
Cooking time – 5 hours
How To Make A Traditional Christmas Fruit Cake
Ingredients:
– 200 g treacle sugar (sticky brown sugar)
– 125 g butter
– 1 cup water
– 75 g stoned dates, broken into small pieces
– 170 g raisins
– 140 g currants
– 170 g sultanas
– 100 g candied peel
How To Make A Traditional Christmas Fruit Cake
– 60 g nuts, chopped
– 100 g crystallized fruit
– 100 g cherries, halved and washed under hot running water then drained and dusted with flour
– 1 t bicarbonate of soda
How To Make A Traditional Christmas Fruit Cake
– 2 eggs, well beaten
– 240 g cake flour
– 1 t baking powder
– ¼ t salt
– 2 T brandy, plus extra for dousing the cake
– medium-cream sherry
How To Make A Traditional Christmas Fruit Cake
For the marzipan layer and icing:
– 1 sheet marzipan big enough to cover the top and sides of the cake
– icing sugar
How To Make A Traditional Christmas Fruit Cake
– apricot jam, for brushing
– 2 egg whites
– 500 g icing sugar, sifted
– sugar decorations
How To Make A Traditional Christmas Fruit Cake
To make the cake:
Preheat the oven to 150°C.
In a heavy-bottomed saucepan, gently heat the sugar, butter, water, and dates until melted. Bring the raisins, currants, and sultanas to a boil.
How To Make A Traditional Christmas Fruit Cake
Simmer for 7 minutes before adding the candied peel, nuts, crystallised fruit, and cherries and continuing to cook for 3 minutes (or until the fruit has plumped up and the dates have disintegrated).
How To Make A Traditional Christmas Fruit Cake
Remove from the heat and stir in the bicarb while it is still warm. Add the well-beaten eggs once the mixture has cooled enough not to cook them.
How To Make A Traditional Christmas Fruit Cake
Sift the flour, baking powder, and salt together and fold into the mixture. Finally, stir in the brandy and pour into a foil-lined tin.
How To Make A Traditional Christmas Fruit Cake
Fold at least 12 sheets of newspaper to a height of 30cm, wrap around the tin’s circumference, and tie with string. Place the tin on 24 layers of newspaper and cover the top with a sheet of foil that has been sprinkled with water on the underside.
How To Make A Traditional Christmas Fruit Cake
Bake for an hour, then reduce to 120°C and continue to bake until done (up to four hours), sprinkling the inside of the foil lid with water every 20 minutes.
How To Make A Traditional Christmas Fruit Cake
Remove from the oven, allow to cool from hot to warm, and then drizzle with a mixture of 1/3 brandy and 2/3 sherry. To store, remove the foil and wrap the cake in plastic wrap.
How To Make A Traditional Christmas Fruit Cake
After a week, gently douse the cake’s underside with proof alcohol and rewrap it. Continue to feed the cake lightly with brandy at weekly intervals, alternately on the base and then the top, until the cake is ready to decorate.
How To Make A Traditional Christmas Fruit Cake
Read More
Recipe For Spicy Raw Thai Salad
Recipe For Paleo Almond Crusted Chicken Salad
32 Best Crockpot Recipes & Slow Cooker Meals for Dinner