Christmas Cake Spices
- A brandy-soaked, marzipan-wrapped festive treat!
- Ingredients: coriander, cinnamon, ginger, allspice, bitter orange, nutmeg, cassia, cloves, green cardamon
- Contains 1 portion (3 tbsp) - serves 12
- Download the colourful recipe card below
Christmas cake has its roots in the Middle Ages, from plum porridge and the Twelfth Night cake (eaten on the 5th of January). Over time dried fruit and spices were added (symbolic of the exotic gifts from the East brought by the Wise Men), and it eventually became the classic cake we know and love today!
CHRISTMAS CAKE SPICES (1 portion = 3 tbsp): coriander, cinnamon, ginger, allspice, bitter orange, nutmeg, cassia, cloves, green cardamon
May contain CELERY, MUSTARD and SESAME. Allergens are listed in CAPITALS
Christmas Cake Recipe:
You Need:
- 225g butter plus extra for greasing - softened
- 4 large eggs
- 900g mix of sultanas, raisins and currants
- 100g glacé cherries
- 100g mixed peel
- 200ml brandy, sherry or marsala plus extra for "feeding" the cake
- 200g soft dark brown sugar
- 300g plain flour
- 80g whole blanched almonds
- Marzipan and fondant icing to cover the cake
Method:
- Soak the dried fruit, glace cherries and mixed peel in 125ml brandy overnight
- The next day preheat the oven to 170°C/gas mark 3
- Grease and line the cake tin with baking parchment
- Beat the butter with the sugar until paler in colour and fluffy. Add the eggs one at a time, mixing until well combined
- Fold in the flour, almonds, a pinch of salt and CHRISTMAS CAKE SPICES then stir in the soaked fruit until evenly distributed
- Scoop the mixture into the tin and bake for 1 hour. Turn the heat down to 150°C/gas mark 2 and bake for a further 30 minutes or until the top is firm and a knife inserted into the centre comes out clean (cover the top with foil if it’s turning too dark before the centre is cooked)
- Leave to cool then remove from the tin, turn upside down and spoon over the remaining 75ml brandy
- ‘Feed’ the cake by spooning over a couple of tbsps of alcohol once a week right up until Christmas (keep it covered with baking parchment and tinfoil so it doesn’t dry out)
- Allow the cake a few days without any additional brandy before turning right side up and decorating with marzipan and icing
Product Rating (2):
Hello my Spicery guys! I want to thank you for the Christmas cake spices. Christmas cake has long been one of my favourite elements of Christmas, yet every year my mum insists on making it, leaving me to only decorate it (she lost the spark for decoration years ago). Well, last year, as has happened every year for a good wee while, we were still eating our Christmas cake in March, and my mum said she might not bother next year. I was aghast. I have never known a Christmas without Christmas cake being [to me, at least!] the absolute centrepiece. It sits on the sideboard in my mum's dining room, and everyone admires it (often without eating it, because it looks too nice just sitting there - and let's face it, there is so much else to be eaten). It is an object that symbolises Christmas as much as the tree, or the Nativity scene (which also sits on the sideboard in my mother's dining room!). So, I smelt the opportunity. I said, "if you don't want to make it, LET ME!!!!" - and this year, [FINALLY!], she did! I used your spices, and I AM SO HAPPY WITH IT! I read a review beforehand saying that the spices didn't come through strongly enough, so I bought an extra pack, and used perhaps 5 tbsp (rather than the 3 in a single pack), and fed it, fed it, fed it, for 3 weeks (not using my Mother's requisite Brandy, but actually a stollen-flavoured Rum I received free from an M&S Sparks perk the year before) and "though I say it but shouldn't" (as my dearly departed Grandad would always say) it is THE MOST moist and delightful Christmas cake we have had in many a year! Thank you for the inspiration, because who knows, if I hadn't seen these spices on thespicery.com, our family may not have had a Christmas cake at all this year, for the first time in my 37 years of life! Thanks - and here's to hoping the success of this year's cake allows me the opportunity to be making it for the family for many years to come!
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Thanks Joanna - what a wonderful story. We're so happy to hear this and you've really made our Christmas with this fantastic feedback! Great job with the decoration and we hope it tastes as good as it looks. Best Wishes from everyone here, and we look forward to seeing this masterpiece appear on the Wall of Fame every Christmas for the next 37 years!