Christmas Cake

Finally! Granny’s secret recipe for the perfect Christmas cake! Beautifully rich fruit cake, filled with all your favourite dried fruits, glace cherries, almonds… And of course, booze! If you want – there’s a no-booze option too.

I’ve been saying I would publish our Christmas Cake recipe for years now, and finally decided to make it happen in 2022, just in time for Stir Up Sunday!

In preparation, both Granny and I have been making Christmas Cakes (yes, plural – we are now drowning in fruit cake!) this past fortnight to test the recipe and baking times. And funny story…I asked her last week to decorate one for me to photograph.

“Just something simple, like a holly leaf, or a snowman.”

This, THIS, is what she presented me with. This, ladies and gentlemen, is what Granny considers a “simply decorated” Christmas Cake! And yes, every little detail – from the snowman to the snowflakes – Granny made from scratch.

You understand now why her Christmas Cakes are somewhat famous around here. As well as why I had wanted to start Baking with Granny to preserve some of these home-baking masterpieces!

Don’t let Granny’s insane skills for decorating cakes mislead you. This classic fruit Christmas cake tastes just as good as it looks, if not better. It also reminds me of my childhood, in particular the early summertime – the smell that your home fills with whilst baking a Christmas cake, is the smell of our family home when I was growing up, and Granny was baking cakes for the wedding season!

Oodles of dried fruit, soaked in brandy or orange juice. Combined with a soft dark brown sugar, giving the cake that familiar hue. And a healthy dose of cinnamon and mixed spice for that warming taste and scent.

No Christmas Cake would be complete without a layer of marzipan and some white icing to finish. We’ve opted for a fondant icing in this case, purely for ease. However, you can of course go old school and use a royal icing instead.

Ingredients for traditional Christmas Cake:

Dried Fruit
The most important element in Granny’s Christmas Cake! As this is a rich fruit cake, a lot of dried fruit is required. I have listed these in individual quantities in the recipe card. However, you can of course use a bag of Mixed Dried Fruit for convenience – just make sure you have the same total amount of dried fruit for your cake size.
Generally speaking, your dried fruit will consist of currants, raisins and sultanas (some bags of mixed dried fruit will also contain your mixed peel), but you can be quite flexible and swap out these dried fruits in varying quantities, or for alternatives if there’s something in particular you aren’t too fond of. I personally love to add some dried cranberries to my Christmas cake!

Glace Cherries
I always think glace cherries look like little jewels when mixed in with the rest of your dried fruits. They add a slightly different texture to your fruits, as well as a complementary candy-like sweetness.

Mixed Peel
What I’ve found from my time using mixed peel in recipes is that it’s a bit like the Marmite of the baking world – you either love it or you hate it. Personally, I love it. And I think it’s a great addition to a rich fruit cake, as it helps add an extra depth in the flavour, whilst also tying in nicely with the orange zest flavours too.

Ground Almonds
I’ve often opted for flaked or blanched almonds in a Christmas cake, but Granny maintains that ground almonds will always reign superior, in terms of overall texture; that’s because they help the cake retain its moisture while it bakes. There’s nothing worse than a dry fruit cake, after all!

Orange Zest
Ok, so. Granny has previously opted for lemon zest in fruit cakes, which I can’t dispute because it does work great too. However, when it comes to Christmas, I feel like orange is always the winning flavour, hands down! (But if you’d prefer lemon zest you can still use that too).

Brandy or Orange Juice
Perhaps the most debated part of a classic British Christmas cake! Now, I have listed Brandy as the alcohol of choice in this recipe, purely because it’s what was written in the recipe Granny gave me. However, that’s not to say it is your only option. Granny will often swap between Brandy, Port, Rum and even Whisky. Basically, you can use whatever your alcoholic beverage of choice is.
But if you want to be somewhat controversial – like me – you don’t have to use alcohol at all.
I’m not really an alcohol drinker, so the idea of buying an expensive spirit, purely to soak some dried fruit for a cake, seems absurd to me. Instead, I use orange juice. And much to my delight, Papa tells me I have made some of the best Christmas cakes (and Black Bun) he’s tasted with this method. And Papa strongly believes whisky should be used in both…and everything.
Also, the amount listed is for soaking your fruit. Should you wish to “feed” your cake after baking, more of your liquid of choice will be required.

Plain Flour
For those who are familiar with any of our other cake recipes, you’ll be used to me saying self-raising flour is generally preferable in cakes. Not for Christmas Cake! This is a rich fruit cake recipe, and so the majority of the mix is made from the dried fruit. Everything else is really just there to bind it together. With that in mind, no raising agents are required, and plain flour is ideal.

Mixed Spice & Ground Cinnamon
These don’t really need any explanation, other than they are the smell and taste of Christmas in a tiny little jar.

Butter or Margarine
Either is fine, it’s just down to personal preference. I like margarine as it’s cheaper and an easy way to omit the dairy from this recipe. Just be sure to use a block margarine as opposed to the spreadable kind – the latter has a higher water content and may alter your baking times.

Soft Dark Brown Sugar
I have decided to list our sugar choice as Soft Dark Brown Sugar; however, this can be flexible to a degree. Granny’s personal favourite sugar for Christmas cakes is a Dark Muscovado, both for flavour and a darker colour. However, Soft Dark Brown Sugar is a cheaper and more convenient option. You can, of course, use a Soft Light Brown Sugar, or even caster sugar; these will change the colour and flavour of your cake quite noticeably, though.

Free-range Eggs
It may seem like this recipe calls for a lot of eggs, but that’s because it makes a lot of cake. Plus, they do a lot of ground work in binding your ingredients together, and with the amount of fruit we are using, a lot of binding is required. The size of your eggs isn’t of great importance, but be sure to use free-range when possible.

Preparations:

There are a few bits of prep work required when making your Christmas Cake. Firstly, the soaking of your dried fruit.

The purpose of this is to add some moisture, as well as flavour. A fruit Christmas Cake is baked at a low temperature for a number of hours, meaning your cake could easily dry out. “Feeding” your cake over a number of weeks after baking can help remedy this to an extent, but it’s much better to avoid a dry Christmas cake than it is to fix one.

You want to soak your fruit for a day or two before you plan to make your Christmas cake. Using a large bowl, weigh out your dried fruit before pouring your orange juice or brandy over the top of it. Give it all a good stir, cover your bowl with cling film, and leave it somewhere safe. When you come to bake your cake, your fruit should look a little plumper, and the majority of the liquid will have been absorbed.

And before you move onto the next stage of baking your Christmas cake, you’ll want to prepare your tin. Our recipe card has the quantities for an 8-inch round cake tin, but you can use our Christmas Cake Quantities Guide if you are using a different-sized tin. A loose-bottom tin is preferable, and since this is a tall cake, you’ll want quite a deep cake tin too – if you only have shallow tins, you can use the quantities for a smaller cake, or simply make two cakes.

You’ll start by greasing your tin and lining it with some greaseproof paper. You also want to have some brown parcel paper (or something along those lines) ready to use. This is to wrap around the outside of your tin whilst it bakes, so be sure it is a sufficient length of paper, and you ideally want to be able to fold it over itself and still be a couple of inches taller than your cake tin. You will also need some string to tie your paper in place, and a spare piece of greaseproof paper – big enough to cover the top of your cake.

When you have your cake mixed up, you will spoon it into your pre-lined tin. Once you have smoothed your cake into the tin, you want to wrap your parcel paper around the outside of your cake tin. Use your string to secure the paper in place. Dampen your spare piece of greaseproof paper (either by gently holding it under a slowly running tap, or dipping it into a tray of water), and carefully wring out any excess water, before draping it over the top of your cake.

But why do we wrap a Christmas cake tin in brown paper and top it with some extra greaseproof paper?

Wrapping the tin in brown paper helps slow the baking of the cake to a more steady temperature, avoiding the outside of the cake being overdone (or worse, burnt) while the inside is still raw. And the wet greaseproof paper on top works in a similar way, whilst also trapping some steam within the top of the cake, meaning a moister finish, a lower chance of burning and less cracking on the top.