Christmas Fruitcake

An elderly lady who baked this cake every year kindly passed this recipe onto me many years ago. I would assume this recipe would be at least forty years old if not more! It has all those wonderful ingredients for making a good rich fruitcake. Black treacle brown sugar, and a little cocoa powder give this cake its lovely dark colour. Brandy adds that little extra special touch to the flavour and texture after “feeding” the cake for several weeks. You can see the brandy on top of the cake after its first feeding in the above pic.

I would advise a little time is spent preparing the cake tin to ensure its lined and greased well before starting on the cake mixture. I always have a hand written list of ingredients to tick off as I follow the recipe with it being such a long list, I wouldn’t want to miss adding anything!

Christmas Fruitcake

Ingredients
225g (½ lb) plain flour
1 tsp mixed spice
½ tsp cinnamon
½ tsp freshly grated nutmeg
1 tsp cocoa powder
175g (6 oz) soft butter
175g (6 oz) soft dark brown sugar
2 tbsp black treacle
Grated zest 1 lemon
Grated zest 1 small orange
4 medium eggs
500g (1lb ¼ oz) mixed dried fruit, currants, sultanas and raisins
100g (4 oz) chopped mix peel
100g (4 oz) chopped flaked almonds
50g (2 oz) chopped glace cherries, washed and dried
4 tbsp of Brandy
2 tbsp milk
Brandy for “feeding” the cake
2 tbsp of brandy for feeding after baking
Extra brandy for “feeding” the cake every week

Method

You will need 20cm (8 in) round cake tin or 18cm (17 in) square cake tin. Brush the cake tin with melted butter. Line the base and sides with double thickness if greaseproof paper. Grease the greaseproof paper with more melted butter.

When the cake mixture is in the tin, you will need to tie double thickness of baking paper or news paper around the outside of the tin, allowing it to stand proud 2.5cm (1 in) above the tin.

Preheat oven to 150°C/fan 140°C/300°F/Gas mark 2.

In a large mixing bowl add the butter and sugar and beat together until light and fluffy. Add the treacle, lemon zest and orange zest and beat in well. Add an egg one at a time beating in until all combined into the mixture.

Stir in the mixed fruits, chopped peel, nuts and glace cherries making sure they are all coated in the mixture well.

Sift the flour, mixed spice, cinnamon, grated nutmeg and cocoa powder. Fold into the mixture alternately with the brandy and milk.

Place all the mixture into the prepared cake tin; smooth the top with a spatula leaving a small indentation in the middle to help prevent the top from doming.

Place the brown paper tied around the outside of the tin as instructions above.

Place into the preheated oven for about 3¼ - 3 ½ hours or until a skewer inserted into the centre of the cake comes out clean. If the top is browning to quickly cover loosely over with a circle of baking paper.

Leave in the cake tin until completely cooled then remove the greaseproof paper, make little holes into the top of the cake and pour the 2 tablespoons of brandy over.

Wrap the cake in clean greaseproof paper and foil and store in an airtight tin. Every week unwrap the cake and feed it with a little brandy then wrap the cake back up and store as before.

Note. This cake will keep well wrapped and stored for 3 months.