Christmas isn't Christmas without this classic fruit cake. Made with rum or brandy soaked dried fruits, it's festive, flavourful and absolutely delectable. Famous for it's dark color, unique dense texture and rich full bodied taste, this cake is highly revered and admired by one and all.
Here's how this beauty is made.
Ingredients:
Step 1. Soaking the dried fruits in your favorite liquor. Usually rum or brandy is used.
Raisins - 100 grams
Pitted dates - 150 grams
Dried Apricots - 100 grams
Crystallised dry ginger - 100 grams
Orange peels - 125 grams
Tutti Frutti or Glazed red and green cherries chopped - 100 grams
Rum or brandy or whiskey - 180 ml
Step 2. For the cake batter.
Plain Flour - 280 grams or 2 1/3 cups
Unsalted butter - 226 grams at room temperature
Brown Sugar - 225 grams
Eggs - 4 at room temperature
Orange Zest - 2 tablespoons
Orange Juice. - 1 tablespoon
Cashews chopped - 125 grams
Walnuts chopped - 75 grams
Almonds chopped - 75 grams
salt - 1/4 teaspoon
Molasses - 1 tablespoon
Vanilla Extract - 1 tablespoon
Spice Mix - 2 tablespoons (Nutmeg - 4 shavings, Cloves - 8, Cinnamon stick - 4 cms long, allspice berries - 15 pieces grounded to fine powder)
I used a 8x8x3 inch cake pan and lined it up with parchment paper from all the sides and sprayed it cooking spray.
Method:
Step 1: Soaking the dried fruits
Firstly, take all the ingredients (except Rum) mentioned in the step 1 and chop them in small pieces.
Mix all of them and add them in a clean clear airtight jar.
Now pour Rum or Brandy over the chopped dried fruits and close the jar and keep it at a cool and dry place.
Do not refrigerate. Shake every after two days.
Best would be to soak the dried fruits for 15-20 days but can also be soaked for as little as a day. I soaked the dried fruits for 20 days.
Your Step 1 is complete.
Step 2: The Baking day
Preheat your oven to 140 degree celsius.
Strain the soaked dried fruits in a bowl and set the strained rum for later use for coating the cake.
In the mixing bowl add softened butter and brown sugar and beat it at low speed for about a minute.
Once combined, beat the mixture at the medium speed for about 4-5 minutes until the mixture turns pale and fluffy.
Now add the eggs one at a time and beat until well incorporated.
At this stage add vanilla extract, molasses and orange juice. Blend it well. Adding molasses keeps your cake moist and gives a distinct flavour. If you can't find the molasses, you can as well skip using.
Now for the dry ingredients. Sift in plain flour, Spice mix and the salt.
Add the sifted flour mix to the mixing bowl of butter sugar mixture and blend until well combined.
Do not over mix. Just enough for the dry ingredients to combine with the wet ingredients.
Once the mixture is well incorporated, it's time to add the soaked dried fruits and dry chopped nuts. With the help of the spatula combine all the nuts and the fruits.
Your cake batter is now ready.
Pour the batter into your prepared cake pan.
Now because this cake is going to be baked for roughly 3 to 3.5 hours, we need to cover the cake batter with a parchment paper so as to avoid burning the top of the cake. Hence, before placing the cake pan in the oven, cut the parchment paper and place it on top of the cake pan.
Bake the cake for 3 hours at 140 degree celsius. Check after 3 hours by inserting the toothpick into the cake. If it comes out clean, it means the cake is done. My cake took 3 hours 10 minutes.
Once done, bring the cake out of the oven and place it on the wire rack to cool down for about 25-30 minutes.
After cooling down, with the help of a skewer, poke holes into the cake. Now with the help of a basting brush coat the strained alcohol and orange juice over the baked cake.
This will ensure the cake is moist and rich.
Done. The Christmas cake is baked. Wrap the cake with a cling film tightly and leave it overnight a room temperature.
You can leave the cake at room temperature for about 10-14 days due to the use of alcohol. The longer it sits the better.
Whenever you feel the cake is a little dry, baste it with more orange juice or alcohol.
Hurray!!!! The cake is now ready.
