This is a fabulous Guest Recipe, featured and supported by Country Products.
We all want to know how to make fabulous cake when Christmas comes around, and the Caribbean Christmas Cake looks and sounds like a worth cake to try out for special days. I hope you enjoy it.
Carol’s Caribbean Christmas Cake
Author: Carolann
Ingredients
- 300 ml Apple Juice
- 100 ml Rum
- 225 g Butter
- 225g Soft Brown Sugar
- 1 tbls Treacle
- 4 Large Eggs
- 225 g Plain Flour
- 1 tsp Mixed Spice
- ½ tsp Ground Ginger
- ½ tsp Nutmeg
- 170 g Chopped Nuts
- 900 g Mixed Fruit
- 1 Orange Zest
- 1 Lemon Zest
- Assorted Glace Fruits
- Brazil Nuts
- Almonds (Blanched)
- Apricot Glaze
Instructions
Cake
- Soak all the fruit in a bowl the day before in the apple juice and rum. This plumps up your fruit and will make your cake wonderfully moist.
- Grease and line a 20cm tin.
- Weigh out your dry ingredients into a bowl (Flour, mixed spices) and set aside.
- Cream butter and sugar and add treacle and mix well.
- Add the orange and lemon zest.
- Add the eggs a bit at a time. If you get curdling add some flour between pouring in your eggs.
- Drain your fruit and add to the mix with the chopped nuts.
- Pour mixture into your tin. And line the outside with brown paper or newspaper and secure with string. This stops the sides burning.
- Bake at 150 degrees for about 4 hrs. After 3 hrs check by pricking with a skewer and if it comes out clean then it’s done. Leave to cool in the tin and then turn out, prick the base and drizzle rum over.
- Wrap in baking paper and foil and store in a tin.
Icing and Decorating
- Place cake on a cake board.
- Arrange all of your glace fruits and nuts on top. Be creative!
- In a pan place your apricot jam (about 4 tbsps) and a tbsp of water.
- Bring to the boil stirring all the time until it is smooth then take off the heat. Add a tbsp of rum and stir well.
- Using a pastry brush, brush over the fruit with the glaze. The glaze helps preserve your fruit, nuts and cake.
- Brush the sides of your cake with your glaze.
- Now roll out your marzipan in a long roll and make a collar to go around your cake making sure it goes about ¼” above the top of the cake.
- Roll out your fondant icing and again make a collar to go around the cake to cover the marzipan. Be sure to dampen the marzipan before adding the icing so that it sticks to the marzipan. I always use a measure when doing this procedure so as to get the right size of collar around.
- With the extra ¼” push down towards the cake. This is the lip where you will add your holly leaves.
- Make a small amount of royal icing for piping your leaves on.
- Cut out your holly leaves. Make sure you cut out plenty in large and small size.
Notes
Depending on when you make your cake feed it with rum but if you make it 2 or 3 months before Christmas then just feed it once or twice a month. Too much feeding and your cake will become soggy.
claire Toplis says
December 22, 2012 at 7:27 pmmmmm looks yummy
Scottish Mum says
December 31, 2012 at 1:41 amIt really does look good. Am tempted to do it in the morning for a new year cake…