I haven’t made a Christmas cake for a few years now as I am the only person in the house that likes it, but I really miss the tradition of making it, the aroma wafting around the house conjuring up that first excitement of Christmas and I miss decorating the cake.
I love the Children coming out to the kitchen and giving the cake a good stir and making there wishes and I miss the excuse to play Christmas carols as early as I can. I use to love Christmas, but as the Children have become adults and since Hubby and I have been together, who just doesn’t get Christmas and all the fuss, it has been very hard to keep up the enthusiasm.
Anyway, I found this really interesting article by Dan Lepard http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/food/2010/11/making-christmas-pudding-and-c.shtml about Stir-up Sunday, which this year is the 20th November and it has inspired me to bake a cake this year, even if I end up eating it all myself! Hopefully it will inspire my Family to get into the festive spirit and feel the excitement of Christmas that how ever old I get, I never seem to lose.
The recipe below is the cake I always use to bake, this year I may try a Delia recipe, but for now, for those of you that also need inspiring, here is a great recipe, for a really lovely moist cake.
So a very early buon natale to you all and buon appetito
200g butter , softened to room temperature
200g dark muscovado sugar
200g plain flour
4 eggs , beaten
50g ground almonds
100ml sherry , sweet or dry, whatever you have in the cupboard
85g candied peel , roughly chopped (I leave this out, YUKKY stuff, LOL)
85g glacé cherries , roughly chopped
250g raisins
250g currants
100g pack pecans nuts, broken into big pieces
finely grated zest 1 lemon
1½ tsp mixed spice
1½ tsp rosewater
½ tsp vanilla extract
½ tsp baking powder
Heat oven to 160C/fan 140C/gas 3.
Line the base and sides of a 20 cm round, 7.5 cm deep cake tin.
Beat the butter and sugar with an electric hand mixer for 1-2 mins until very creamy and pale in colour, scraping down the sides of the bowl half way through.
Stir in a spoonful of the flour, then stir in the beaten egg and the rest of the flour alternately, a quarter at a time, beating well each time with a wooden spoon. Stir in the almonds.
Mix in the sherry (the mix will look curdled), then add the peel, cherries, raisins, cherries, nuts, lemon zest, spice, rosewater and vanilla. Beat together to mix, then stir in the baking powder.
Spoon mixture into the tin and smooth the top, making a slight dip in the centre. Bake for 30 mins, then lower temperature to 150C/fan 130C/gas 2 and bake a further 2-2¼ hrs, until a skewer inserted in the middle comes out clean.
Leave to cool in the tin, then take out of the tin and peel off the lining paper. When completely cold, wrap well in cling film and foil to store until ready to decorate. The cake will keep for several months. If you want to, feed the cake once a week with booze to make the cake lovely and moist)
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