Festive Fruity Christmas Cake
150 g (5½ oz) light soft brown sugar
250 g (9 oz) softened butter
50 ml (2 fl oz) apple or orange juice
3 large eggs
1½ tbs golden syrup
250 g (9 oz) self-raising flour
60 g (2¼ oz) ground almonds
1 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp mixed spice
1 tsp nutmeg
5 x 16 g packs Fruit Bowl Blackcurrant Peelers
5 x 16 g packs Fruit Bowl Strawberry Peelers
5 x 16 g packs Fruit Bowl Raspberry Peelers
100 g (3½ oz) mixed peel 200 g (7 oz) raisins 10 x 18 g packs Fruit Bowl Strawberry Fruit Flakes 10 x 18 g packs Fruit Bowl Raspberry Fruit Flakes
10 x 18 g packs Fruit Bowl Blackcurrant Fruit Flakes 1 tsp jam or marmalade 1 Pre-heat oven to 170 deg. C., 325 deg. F., Gas Mark 3. Grease and line the base and sides of a 20 cm (8 in) high-sided cake tin with two layers of greaseproof paper, leaving additional paper sticking out the top to protect the cake when it rises.
2 Cream the sugar and butter in a bowl.
3 In a jug, mix the apple juice, Serves 15 Cook time:
Skill level: 3 hours
medium eggs and golden syrup together. 4 Gradually add the wet mixture to the butter and sugar until combined. Now gradually add the flour, almonds and spices until combined.
5 Chop your Fruit Bowl Peelers into 6 pieces each. Add to the mixture, along with the Fruit
Bowl Fruit Flakes, mixed peel and raisins. Combine until well distributed throughout the mixture.
6 Spoon the mixture into the cake tin and bake in the pre-heated oven for 1 hour.
7 After an hour, reduce the oven temperature to 150 deg C.,
300 deg. F., Gas Mark 2 and cook for another two hours.
8 Keep checking on the cake; if the top is going a little too
Prep time:
25 mins
dark then cover with a piece of greaseproof paper. After the three hours, check the cake is cooked by inserting a skewer into the middle; if it comes out clean the cake is cooked. Remove the cake from the tin and cool on a wire rack.
9 If you’d like to decorate your cake, then once it is cool, take a piece of baking parchment and cut out a star stencil by folding it in half and cutting half a star along the fold, leaving paper at the top and bottom. Place the star over the cake and brush the star shape very lightly with jam. Mix together a tablespoon of caster sugar with a teaspoon of cinnamon and sprinkle over the jam. Remove the stencil to uncover a sparkling Christmas star.