From Sainsbury’s
Creating this beautiful cake isn’t as hard as you may think. The secret is choosing the right ingredients…
Serves: 16
Preparation time: 12 Hours
Cooking time: 180 – 210 Minutes
Cooling Time: 15 – 60 Minutes
Ingredients
100g glace cherries
100g mixed peel
400g currants
100g blanched almonds
225g raisins
225g sultanas
1 teaspoon Silver Spoon lemon flavouring
¼ teaspoon Nielsen Massey orange extract
¼ teaspoon Nielsen Massey vanilla extract
100ml brandy, plus more to “feed’ the cake
225g Allinson’s plain flour
¼ teaspoon salt
½ teaspoon mixed spice
½ teaspoon ground cinnamon
200g unsalted butter
200g Billington’s dark muscovado sugar
2 tablespoons Tate & Lyle black treacle
1 tablespoon marmalade
4 large Happy Eggs
2 tablespoons apricot jam
500g Professional Quality Silver Spoon Create Ready to Roll marzipan
500g Professional Quality Silver Spoon Create Ready to Roll white icing
Professional Quality Silver Spoon Create lustre powder
Silver Spoon Create silver balls
Method
Chop glace cherries, mixed peel and almonds and place in a large bowl with the dried fruit, lemon, orange and vanilla extracts and brandy. Stir well and soak overnight or for at least 12 hours.
Heat the oven to 150°C, 130°C fan, Gas 2. Grease a deep, 18cm square tin or a 20.5cm round tin and line the base and side with baking parchment.
Sieve the flour, salt, mixed spice and cinnamon into a bowl.
In a large bowl, cream the butter and sugar together until light and fluffy, then mix in the treacle and marmalade. Add the eggs a little at a time, adding a tablespoon of flour if necessary to stop the mixture splitting.
Fold in the flour mixture until well mixed, then add the soaked fruit and nut mixture. Put the cake mixture into the prepared tin and make a shallow hollow in the centre.
Bake on the lowest shelf of the oven for 3 – 3 and a half hours or until a skewer comes out clean. Remove from the oven and cool for 15 minutes, then turn upside down on a wire rack to cool.
When cool pierce the cake with a skewer and pour over 3 – 4 tablespoons of brandy and let it soak into the cake. Repeat this every week until you are ready to ice the cake.
Wrap the cake in a sheet of baking paper and then in foil, and store in a cake tin.
To decorate the cake, place it on a plate or foil board. Brush the cake all over with warmed apricot jam. Dust your hands and the work surface with a little icing sugar. Shape the marzipan into a ball, then roll out with a rolling pin into a circle large enough to cover the top and sides of the cake (about 34cm depending on the depth of your finished cake). Lift the marzipan over your rolling pin and then drape it over the top and sides of the cake, smoothing out the icing with the palm of your hand. Trim the edge with a knife.
To ice the cake. Knead the Ready To Roll icing into a smooth round ball, then flatten slightly. Dust the work surface with a little icing sugar and roll out the icing to a circle large enough to cover the top and sides of the cake (about 34cm depending on the depth of your finished cake). Lift the icing over your rolling pin and then drape it over the top and sides of the cake, smoothing out the icing and any creases or folds in the icing, with the palm of your hand. Trim the edge with a knife.
Why not finish off the cake with some stars cut out of the rolled white icing trimmings, brush with lustre powder and some edible silver balls.