Fruit Slice (Fly Cemetery)
Fruit Slice – also known as “Fly Cemetery” – is a deliciously rich pastry traybake, filled with a generous amount of spiced currants. Can you guess where it gets its somewhat unappetizing pet name?
There’s something about us Scots and our love of questionable foods. Haggis is the obvious one (love it), Lorne sausage, macaroni pies, deep-fried Mars Bar and even Irn Bru cupcakes – Scotland is famed for it’s love of “unique” foods. And it could only be the Scots who would come up with a pet-name such as “Fly Cemetery” for a sweet little pastry treat like Fruit Slice.
Ever-so simple and a lot more tasty than it’s pet-name may suggest, Fruit Slice is a melt-in-the-mouth short crust pastry treat, loaded with currants and lashings of sugar.
It gets it’s pet-name from it’s appearance, rather than it’s flavour. Not for the weak stomached; it’s simply because of the currants resemblance too, well, lots of dead flies! Our Granny can even recall when her own Papa would pick out the currants and joke that they were delicious little flies! Yum…?
I was quite surprised just how many people were chuffed to receive a piece of Fruit Slice when I made it recently. I didn’t used to be a huge fan of currants myself, so I was unsure of how many people would be happy to take some off my hands. But it turns out there’s already been requests for another batch!
Tips for Fly Cemetery:
• Traditionally speaking, Fly Cemetery uses currants but you can mix it up to suit your own taste. Raisins, sultanas, cranberries, mixed peel…all can make a nice addition.
• If you want your Fruit Slice to be a little sweeter and little more special, instead of dusting with caster sugar after baking, wait until it is completely cool and spread a layer of water icing (icing sugar, mixed with a little water or lemon juice).
• Why not mix things up (and make eating messier) by trying Fruit Slice with puff pastry for a change?
• Some bakers have suggested in the comments to add a spoonful of jam or marmalade to the filling mixture. It’s not something I have personally tried but an intriguing idea!
Fruit Slice (Fly Cemetery)
INGREDIENTS
For the Pastry
- 300 g Plain Flour
- 150 g Butter or Margarine ((chilled))
- 50 g Icing Sugar
- 1 Free-range Egg
- 2-3 tsp Cold Water
For the Filling
- 200 g Currants
- 75 g Sugar
- 50 g Butter or Margarine ((softened))
- 1 tsp Mixed Spice
INSTRUCTIONS
- Pre-heat your oven to 180°c (or 160°c for a fan assisted oven or Gas Mark 4) and grease a 20cm by 28cm baking tray with a little butter. Set aside.
- In a large bowl, using your fingers, rub the flour and butter together until it resembles breadcrumbs. Stir through the sugar before adding the egg. Mix until combined, adding a teaspoon of cold water as required and knead into a soft pastry dough.
- Wrap the dough in cling film and place in the fridge to cool and firm up, whilst preparing the filling.
- In a bowl mix the currants, sugar, butter and mixed spice until combined.
- Remove the pastry from the fridge and roll to 0.5cm thickness and cut into two large rectangles, about the size of your tray. Place on pastry rectangle onto your pre-greased tray.
- Spoon the currant mixture evenly onto the pastry on the baking tray, leaving a small gap around the edges. Wet the edges with a little water. Place the other sheet of pastry on top of the currants and gently press the edges together with your fingers, before finishing with a fork.
- Brush the top pastry with a little milk or beaten egg, before pricking a few holes on the top of the pastry
- Bake for 25-30 minutes until a light golden brown colour.
- Remove from the oven and sprinkle a little sugar on top to finish. Once completely cool, cut into squares or slices of your desired size.
Video
IMPORTANT NOTE:
All my recipes are developed using a digital scale and the metric system (grams and millilitres). Cup measurements are available as a conversion but these, unfortunately, won’t always be as accurate. For best results, I always recommend baking with a digital scale.
Haven’t baked since I worked in bakers 1979 hated it now I’m 63 had bad accident it’s all I do now is bake and I would not have gave it a second thought if I didn’t have the jury’s I got thanks now just need to try remember great recipe john
I don’t want to rate this because I think what lowers it for me might be my errors. My raisins/currants were dryish, so I soaked them in boiling water to revive them a bit. The filling was still dry (keep tea nearby) and the short crust shattered to bits when I cut it. Any idea what I might have done wrong? Still tasty, but under whelming.
Just made these. I had a bag of currants since the supermarket had run out of sultanas and realised they wouldnt absorb liquid for homemade chutney so googled currant recipes and ended up here. In my part of scotland its a fruit slice that only the most traditional bakers still do. im looking forward to taking them over to my mums later as a variation on my rotation of scones or fudge. Will be bookmarking your page for other recipes now. Thanks for keeping the traditional recipes discoverable and alive!
I’ve made this recipe loads of times. It’s so quick, easy and most of all yummy, wonderful slices at the end that everybody loves to eat. I use ready rolled puff pastry, that’s my favourite. Thank you for sharing your recipe for people like me who want something quick, easy and tasty.
My local British bakery just closed down. I was just getting in the habit of having a fruit slice with my twice a week tea calls, which meant I could eat a restrained amount of it. Making it for myself seems like a slippery slope to eating the whole damn thing. But thanks for the recipe nonetheless.