Christmas cake is a specialized cake served at Christmas time in most countries around the world. These cakes are available in different colors, tastes, shapes, weights and ornaments. Even have a traditional Scottish Christmas cake called Whisky Dundee, which uses Scotch as one of the ingredients. People prefer these cakes because they are not rich and moist, like other varieties of fruitcakes. Even some of the ingredients like nuts and almonds are purely optional, and you can make a Christmas cake without these ingredients.

Ingredients

225g/8oz of flour

¼-teaspoon salt

½ teaspoon mixed spice

½-teaspoon ground cinnamon

200g/7 oz butter

200g/7 oz dark brown sugar

2 tablespoons molasses

1-tablespoon marmalade

¼ tsp vanilla essence

4 free-range eggs, lightly beaten

800 / 1 ¾ lb mixed dried fruit

100 / 3 ½ oz chopped mixed peel

150g/5 oz of glace cherries, twice

100 / 3 ½ oz blanched almonds, chopped

Brandy

For decoration

200g/7 oz marzipan

1-2 tablespoons apricot jam, warmed

royal icing

3 egg free-range eggs

600g/1lb 5 oz of powdered sugar, sifted

1 ½ teaspoons liquid glycerin - optional

1-tablespoon lemon juice

Instructions

Preheat oven to 150 degrees Celsius or 300 degrees Fahrenheit. Grease the baking dish with 8 inches round and 7 square inches. Line the bottom and tin with baking parchment.

Put flour, salt, spice mix and cinnamon in a bowl.

Make a cream by mixing the sugar and butter in large bowl. Mix sugar, syrup, marmalade and vanilla essence until mixture becomes light and fluffy.

Break eggs and add to mixture in small amounts at a time. When you add, mix a tablespoon of the flour mixture to the amount of eggs. Add the remaining flour mixture and mix ingredients well. Add dried fruit, mixed peel, candied cherries and almonds into the mixture and stir again. Place the mixture inside the line for baking and make a small indentation in center of mixture.

Put baking dish in oven and bake about 3 hours. When baking, use a skewer to test the completeness of the process. A cake is baked fully, when a skewer comes out clean. If the skewer comes out clean, bake for another hour checking on a regular basis with the tool.

Icing a Christmas Cake. After baking, remove the tin from the oven and let cake cool for about 15 minutes. Make a few holes in a cool cake with a skewer and pour 3-4 tablespoons of brandy into the holes. Allow some time to be soaked in brandy cake. Store the cake until the icing is not applied, wrapped in foil in an airtight container. When storing, make sure the hidden hand is kept up.

Before applying the glaze, roll marzipan to cover the entire top and sides of baked cake. Take the heated apricot jam in the brush and apply it across the cake. Place marzipan on top and around the cake. Cover the cake with a clean towel beams to keep it in a cool place for at least one day.

To prepare the glaze, beat egg whites lightly and add sugar on a regular basis. Keep beating the eggs and sugar until icing is obtained by soft peaks. Add lemon juice and glycerin to icing. Apply icing, spreading around the cake. You can give a flat cake icing using a ruler or a clean soft peaks form using your hands. Decorate the cake icing covered with Christmas decorations and serve guests.