Christmas Cake!

Ingredients

• 200 g raisins
• 200 g sultanas
• 200 g currants
• 200 g dried cranberries
• 200 g glace cherries
• 75 g mixed peel
• zest of 2 lemons
• juice of 2 lemons
• 175 ml alcohol (I used brandy) (* see notes)
• 250 g unsalted butter
• 200 g light brown soft sugar
• 50 g treacle
• 200 g self raising flour (* see notes)
• 100 g ground almonds (* see notes)
• 2 tsp mixed spice
• 1 tsp ground ginger
• 1 tsp ground cinnamon
• 1 tsp ground nutmeg
• 5 medium eggs
• 2 tsp vanilla extract

Instructions

• Add the raisins, sultanas, currants, dried cranberries, glacé cherries, mixed peel, lemon zest, lemon juice, brandy, butter, light brown sugar and treacle to a large bowl
• Mix these together, and then heat in the microwave for 5 minutes on high, letting the butter melt, and stir together well.
• Alternatively, add all of the ingredients to a large pan, bring to the boil, and simmer for 10 minutes.
• Leave the mixture to cool for 30 minutes. During this time, preheat the oven to 150ºc/130ºc fan
• Once cooled, add the self raising flour, ground almonds, mixed spice, ginger, cinnamon, nutmeg, eggs and vanilla to the bowl and mix until combined
• Pour into a deep 8″ cake tin that is lined on the based and sides well. You don’t want any tin showing as it may get stuck
• Pour the mixture into the lined tin, and bake for 2 hours. Keep an eye on it towards the end, if its browning too much, cover lightly with foil
• Once baked, remove from the oven and prick with a fork. Spoon over 2-3 more brandy and cool completely.
• Once cooled, wrap in clean baking parchment, and foil, and store for 2 weeks and feed with 2-3 more tbsps of brandy. Repeat every two weeks until Christmas.

Notes

• I make my Christmas cake 12 weeks before Christmas, but it can be done nearer to the time or even earlier
• I feed my cake every 2 weeks 
• You can freeze the cake, wrapped in baking parchment and then tin foil, for 3+ months
• I use brandy, but you can use any rich spirit (read the blog post) or you can substitute for tea/apple juice for alcohol free 
• Try to store the cake wrapped well in baking parchment and then foil, in a cake tin. Sealed tubs can make it sweat. 
• You can sub the self raising flour for plain flour + 1 tsp of baking powder
• The ground almonds can be replaced with more flour, but this will change the texture