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Thursday 6 December 2007

Last Minute Chocolate Christmas Cake

This is a last minute Christmas cake and would be a huge hit with any chocoholics out there. It’s a moist light chocolate fruity sponge with marzipan and chocolate fondant. For the white chocolate I used Green & Blacks. The marzipan of course need not be added if you don’t like the flavour just ice the top with chocolate fondant or plain fondant icing. I used homemade boozy mincemeat in my cake but a good jar of mincemeat from the shop would be adequate. It’s an easy cake to decorate and if you don’t have any gold stars you could cut a few out of fondant icing or marzipan and colour them with edible colour paste.

Just out of the oven


In all its glory

Sliced cake showing the texture


Last Minute Chocolate Christmas Cake

Ingredients
150g (5oz) soft butter
150g (5oz) light muscovado sugar
2 eggs, lightly beaten
1 tsp chocolate extract (optional)
185g (6½oz) self-raising flour
40g (1½oz) cocoa powder
400g (14 oz) jar of luxury mincemeat
80g (3oz) each of sultanas and raisins
50g (2oz) blanched almonds, chopped
100g (4 oz) white chocolate, chopped
For Marzipan & Icing
225g (8 oz) marzipan
225g (8 oz) fondant icing
A little icing sugar
A little cocoa powder
1tbsp apricot jam
3 tbsp water
For decoration
Edible glitter Gold mini dagrees
9 - 10 edible gold stars
Gold ribbon, wide enough for the outside of the cake
Cake board 20cm (8 in)
A small star cookie cutter or make a card template to cut around.

You will also need a 20cm (8 in) springform round cake tin – greased with butter and then double lined with greaseproof paper on the base and sides. Baking paper to line the outside of the tin and tie with string leaving it higher than the greaseproof paper as in the picture *see method*

Method

Preheat the oven to 160°C/fan 140°C/Gas mark 3.

In a large mixing bowl add the butter and sugar and beat until light and fluffy. Add the beaten egg and chocolate extract (if using) a little at a time, beating in between additions until fully combined. Fold in the luxury mincemeat, sultanas, raisins, almonds and chocolate. Sieve the self-raising flour and cocoa powder together then fold into the mixture until all combined.

Spoon into the prepared cake tin and level leaving a little indentation in the centre, this will give the cake a flat top when baked. Place the double thickness of baking paper around the outside of the cake tin and tie tightly with string. Place into lower part of the preheated oven for 1¾ - 2 hours or until cooked and firm to the touch and a skewer inserted into the centre of the cake comes out clean. Leave in the cake tin to completely cool before removing from the tin to decorate.

In a saucepan place the apricot jam and 3 tablespoons of water and heat gently stirring until full incorporated to make a glaze to “glue” the marzipan, fondant icing and decorations onto the cake.

Roll the marzipan out onto a surface dusted lightly with icing sugar, use the base of the cake tin to cut around for the correct size. Take a pastry brush and with the apricot glaze lightly brush over the top of the cake. Take the circle of marzipan and place on the top of the cake and smooth down. Take the fondant icing and work cocoa powder into it until it’s coloured fully brown and blended in. Roll and cut out as for the marzipan but using cocoa powder for dusting the work surface instead. Lightly brush the top of the marzipan with the apricot glaze and place the cocoa fondant icing on top of the marzipan and again smooth down.

Place the cake carefully onto the cake board and with a little star cutter or template cut through the middle of the fondant, making sure not to cut through the marzipan. Sprinkle the gold mini dagrees into the star then with a little apricot glaze, stick the golden stars around the outside of the cake. Sprinkle over the top of the cake with edible glitter. Finally, tie a golden ribbon around the outside of the cake for that finishing touch.

Note, if the cake top appears to be browning to quickly in the oven, place a circle of baking paper over the top to help prevent the cake top from burning. The stars could also be made out of marzipan or fondant icing, cutting around small star templates or using small star cutters.

12 comments:

The Bhandari's said...

looks wonderful... am vegetarian so going to skip mincemeat, rest is great. Seems easy too...
Query where do we get this Gold mini dagrees, do we get in tesco/asda
and one more thing do you bake daily as I can see so many baking posts that too regularly :D
preeti

Abitofafoodie said...

Rosie - this looks fantastic. What an interesting twist on the traditional Christmas cake. I bet I would love this (chocoholic that I am!).

Maria♥ said...

I love your Chocolate Christmas Cake and the decoration has a festive glamorous touch, very up my street ;o) I knew you would love this cake and after seeing yours i am looking forward to making this again and adding my touch of christmas glamour, lol.

Maria
x

Rosie said...

Hi preeti,
I fully understand about the mincemeat. I use vegetable suet in my homemade mincemeat no complaints so far *touching wood* lol… Yes I have been baking more frequently this month, I must have festive fever heehee…..
Also I managed to buy silver dagrees from Asda and I’m sure other supermarkets must sell them too. The mini gold dagrees can be found on line link below

http://www.cakescookiesandcraftsshop.co.uk


Hi Antonia,
This is a lovely change to a Traditional cake I must admit and with an added bonus of chocolate I was totally sold on this idea. I still have my traditional cake lapping up the brandy on its feeding programme for Christmas heehee. I don’t normally bake two cakes but I think I’m a little somewhat carried away here with festive baking.

Hi Maria,
How could I resist chocolate in any shape or form lol. I'm pleased you liked the glam and glitter and I can’t wait to view your wonderful creation too……

Many thanks everyone for calling by and also for your very kind comments :)

Rosie x

Chef Jeena said...

Hi Rosie This chocolate cake looks fantastic. I love the marzipan topping it's great. I wish I could come round to your house and sample all of these beautiful cakes.. :)

Finla said...

Wow wonderful cake. I love chocolate and never had chocolate christmas cake.
Here i have never seen mince meat in shops, years back when they had a Mark and spencer in Brussels we used to buy frm there, but they have stopped the shop a long time back.

Rosie said...

Hi Jeena,
Wouldn't that be lovely to share our cooks & bakes, pity it's virtual on Blogs!!......

Hi happy Cook,
Oh it's my first time too for Xmas chocolate cake and it is delicious. Pity about the mincemeat but there's a lovely one that I always use on BBC Good Food site called Boozy Mincemeat by Mary Berry.

http://www.bbcgoodfood.com/recipes/1157/boozy-mincemeat.jsp

Link above if you'd like to give this a go.

Thanks ladies for your very kind comments and also for calling by my Blog.

Rosie x

Finla said...

ok thankx rosie, i will check it out tommorow.

Finla said...

oh and i love the cake recipes from mary berry ;))))

Rosie said...

Hi Happy Cook,
I totally agree with you about Marry Berry's cakes and her mincemeat is delicious too :)

Rosie x

Chibog in Chief said...

hey thanks for this recipe, my husband is a chocoholic..its his birthday next week..im searching for a good cake recipe :-)hmmm im sure he will love this

Rosie said...

Hi dhanggit, If your hubby is anything like me with chocolate he'll adore this cake too *smile*

Happy birthday Mr dhanggit for next week :)

Rosie x