Georgia’s Traditional Christmas Cake

Method

The night before.

• Place the dried fruit in a saucepan with the alcohol and bring to a simmer. Pour into a bowl, cool, cover and leave to soften.

The following day.

• Preheat the oven to 150C/gas 2 and line the base and sides of a 23cm round tin or a 20cm square tin with a double layer of greaseproof paper.
• You’ll need the side lining to be a good 8cm higher than the tin.
• If you’d like your cake to be particularly moist, blitz half the soaked fruit in a food processor to make a paste, and stir back into the rest of the fruit.
• In a large bowl, cream the butter and sugar until light and fluffy.
• Beat in the eggs, one at a time.
• Mix in the treacle.
• Sift the flour and combine with the spices and ground almonds.
• Mix into the butter mixture, alternating with the soaked fruit.
• Finally, fold in the walnuts.
• Spoon the mixture into the lined tin and bake in the oven for about 3 hours.
• Check after 2½ hours and then every 20 minutes, or until a skewer comes out clean.
• As soon as the cake comes out of the oven, brush with a little more booze.
• Leave to cool in the tin for 5 minutes and then remove, placing it directly onto a large sheet of tin foil.
• Wrap it up twice to retain the heat for as long as possible.
• After a few hours, remove the foil and wrap the cake up again in a double sheet of greaseproof paper and a double sheet of tin foil, making sure you can access the cake from the top.
• Store in an airtight container for 2–12 weeks.
• During this time, feed the cake the alcohol of your choice by gently pouring it over the top and rewrapping.

Marzipan and Icing.

• Follow the instructions on the packet.