Normally my main effort at Christmas baking is the plum pudding. It's already stored and maturing but, this year, I decided to try a Christmas cake. Most of the family are not big on fruit cake so I am hoping to convert them with a nice moist one. The recipe I am trying is courtesy of Aly on the Cottage Smallholder forum (www.cottagesmallholder.com).
First step was to soak the fruit (2 1/2 lbs. of it) in rum. Unfortunately I only had Tequila but it still smelled pretty fruity in my kitchen!. After a few days I beat, stirred and folded in all the ingredients, spooned it into my one and only cake pan, and baked it in a warmish oven for 4 hours. It came out much as expected except I think, next year, I will omit the prunes and dates (they made the cake a bit too dark and sticky) and add more glace cherries as they are my favourite part of a fruit cake. Now all that remains is to let it mature for a few weeks with the addition of more alcohol (probably Marsala), then add marzipan and icing and decorate with some more dried fruit. Can't wait for the end result!
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