Kirstie and Phil's Perfect Christmas

An easy Christmas cake that can be whipped up quickly from Kirstie and Phil's Perfect Christmas

Makes a 20cm cake

• 900g mixed dried fruit (dates, prunes, apricots, sultanas, currants etc – whatever dried fruit you like), well washed
• 300ml dry cider
• 225g butter
• 225g soft brown sugar
• Finely grated zest and juice of 1 lemon and 1 orange
• 2 tsp black treacle (optional, but great for colour as well as taste!)
• 170g nuts, such as almonds, hazelnuts and pecans (plus extra almonds to decorate the top of the cake if you aren’t going to ice it)
• 4 large eggs, beaten
• 225g plain flour
• 1 tsp mixed spice
• ½ tsp ground nutmeg
• 6 tbsp apple brandy

1. Chop up the bigger pieces of dried fruit so it’s all to the size of a raisin. Put all the fruit in a pan with the cider, bring to the boil and cook for 2-3 minutes. Allow it to get cold. The fruit should absorb all of the liquid, but if there’s any left, drain it off.

2. Cream the butter and sugar with the finely grated zest of the orange and lemon. Add the treacle if you are using it. (A great tip is to grease your spoon with a little vegetable oil so the treacle doesn’t stick to it.) Add in the beaten eggs and mix well.

3. Sieve the flour with the spices and fold into the mixture with the soaked dried fruit, the chopped nuts some of the juice from the orange or lemon to produce a soft dropping consistency.

4. Line an 8”/20cm cake tin with two layers of greaseproof paper. Wrap a thick layer of brown paper or newspaper around the tin and secure with string. Place the tin on a baking sheet with more brown paper between the baking sheet and the cake tin.

5. Spoon the mixture into the tin, smooth it down with a wet hand (that will stop your hand from sticking to the mixture) Shape a shallow hollow in the middle so that as the cake cooks it will rise evenly giving a flat even top. If the cake is not to be marizpaned and iced decorate the top with almonds and add a sprinkling of demerara sugar.

6. Put in the oven and bake for 3-4 hours at 150°C/gas mark 2, checking half way – if the top is getting too brown, cover the top of the cake with a layer of brown paper.

7. When the cake is cooked prick it all over with a fine skewer and pour over the apple brandy. Leave for a further 2 hours to completely cool before removing from the tin.