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Christmas Fruit Cake

Christmas Fruit Cake | Christmas Plum Cake

No Christmas is complete without that sinful plum cake. With a decadent overload of rum-soaked fruits. Rich and moist, my plum cake guarantees an explosion of flavours that shall return you to childhood. Enjoy !!!!
Prep Time 30 minutes
Cook Time 2 hours
Total Time 2 hours 30 minutes
Course Dessert

Ingredients
  

Christmas Fruit Cake

  • 2.5 cup flour
  • 1.5 cup butter soft
  • 4 eggs at room temperature
  • 1/2 cup brown sugar
  • 1/4 cup molasses
  • 1/2 tsp baking powder
  • 1 tsp all spice powder freshly ground
  • 1 tsp vanilla essence

Soaking of Fruits

  • 1 lit rum or brandy or a mixture of two
  • 200 g dried prunes roughly chopped
  • 200 g pitted dates roughly chopped
  • 200 g sultanas or raisins roughly chopped
  • 200 g dried cherries roughly chopped
  • 200 dried apricots roughly chopped
  • 2 tsp orange zest
  • 3 tbsp orange juice

All-Spice Powder

  • 1.5 tsp cinnamon freshly ground
  • 1.5 tsp clove freshly ground
  • 1/2 tsp nutmeg freshly grated
  • 1.5 tsp ginger powder

Instructions
 

Soaking of Fruits

  • Pour the liquor in a mixing bowl. Add 3 tsp of the all-spice powder, give it a hearty mix. Now add the orange zest and orange juice to the spiced liquor and give it another good stir.
  • Soak the dry fruits in about 800 ml of the spiced liquor. Keep aside in an air-tight jar. Ideally, you would want to leave all the fruits soaked in the spiced liquor for at least 5-7 days; the longer the merrier.
  • If all the liquid has been absorbed by the dry fruits, feel free to add another slug of rum every so often.

Christmas Fruit Cake

  • Preheat the oven to 135C.
  • Sift the flour, baking powder and 1 tsp of the all-spice powder into a bowl.
  • In another large bowl, beat the butter and sugar with an electrical beater till light and fluffy. Then add the eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition. Add the vanilla extract and molasses. Mix well.
  • Add the flour mixture to the egg batter. Fold gently to mix well.
  • Now take 4 cups of the soaked dry fruits along with a bit of soaking liqueur and 2 tbsp of spiced rum and add to the batter. Give it a gentle mix.
  • Line a 9 inch spring-form cake tin with parchment paper, lightly grease. Pour the batter into the cake tin, gently level the top with a spatula.
  • Put the cake tin in the middle rack of the oven, bake for close to 2 hrs or till a skewer inserted into the center of the cake comes out clean. If the skewer doesn't come out clean, bake for an additional 5-7 minutes more and check again.
  • Remove the cake from the oven, poke holes in the cake with the skewer, spoon over 2 tbsp of your spiced rum. Cover with an aluminium foil.
  • Allow the cake to cool to room temperature. Remove carefully from the spring-form tin. Peel off the baking parchment, wrap well in cling film and store in a cool, dry place for at least 24 hrs before slicing the cake.

All-Spice Powder

  • Take all the ingredients listed under the All-Spice powder ingredients and mix well. Store in an air tight container.

Notes

Recipe Note: To get a rich and dark Christmas cake, you need to bake it at least 15 days prior to Christmas. And feed it a little drizzle of spiced rum every week until Christmas.