Hairy Bikers Christmas cake is a last-minute fruit cake of dried pineapple, apricots, cherries and cashews soaked in white port, in a cardamom-spiced batter. So from British Classics you get 12 slices in about 10 hours, soaking and cooling included, at my estimate of 985 calories each.
A Christmas cake traditionally “has to be made weeks ahead”, Si and Dave write, but this one “can be made at the last minute”. So the dried fruit needs one night in port rather than weeks of feeding, before it meets the rosewater and five warm spices.
Drop the oven to 150°C after 1 hour, then give it 2 hours more before testing with a skewer in the centre. Since with almost 1kg of fruit and nuts in the tin, I’d expect the middle to need that long, low finish while the crust sets.
Hairy Bikers Christmas Cake
Description
Everything starts with the fruit steeping overnight, or at least for a few hours, before each egg goes into the creamed butter with spiced flour. Once cold, it’s dressed in marzipan, fondant icing, sugar-dusted orange slices and frosted rosemary.
Ingredients
For the fruit
For the cake
To decorate
Instructions
- Soak the fruit: Chop the apricots, pineapple and candied peel, then put them in a large bowl with the raisins, sultanas, currants, cherries, cashews and citrus zest. Pour over the white port or rum and leave overnight, or for at least a few hours.
- Line the tin: Line a deep 20cm round or 18cm square tin with baking paper. Then tie a double layer of paper round the outside, at least 10cm higher than the tin, and preheat the oven to 170°C/Fan 150°C/Gas 3½.
- Make the batter: Cream the butter and sugar until very pale and fluffy, while you mix the flour, ground almonds, spices and salt in another bowl. Add the eggs one at a time, each with a tablespoon of the dry mix, then stir in the rest of the flour.
- Bake: Stir in the soaked fruit and the rosewater, scrape the mixture into the tin and smooth the top with a palette knife. Bake for 1 hour, then at 150°C/Fan 130°C/Gas 2 for 2 hours more, until a skewer in the centre comes out clean. After about 10 minutes in the tin, move it to a cooling rack.
- Marzipan and ice: Once the cake is completely cool, roll the marzipan to about 1cm thick and lay it over the cake. Then brush the marzipan with a little water and cover it with the fondant icing.
- Decorate: Heat the oven to 120°C/Fan 100°C/Gas ½, slice the orange 2mm thick, pat it dry and dust with icing sugar on a lined tray. Bake for 10 minutes, then at 100°C/Fan 90°C/Gas ¼ for 20 minutes more, until dried and starting to brown. Once cool, brush the slices with apricot jam and dust them again. Then dip the rosemary in whisked egg white, shake off the excess and dust with icing sugar, ready to decorate the cake.
FAQs
How is the BBC spiced Christmas cake different?
The cake itself is almost the same, from their BBC Christmas series, though the BBC Food and hairybikers.com version uses 100ml of port. And they allow mace instead of nutmeg, and orange blossom water instead of rosewater.
But the finish changes completely, because 900g of marzipan is toasted under the grill and set on a layer of apricot jam, with no fondant. Then the top becomes a wreath of dried orange slices, sugared rosemary and citrus leaves, gilded cinnamon sticks, star anise and crystallised rose petals.
Is there a mistake in the recipe?
Two things look off to me, starting with the juice of ½ an orange, which both versions list but no step ever uses. So I’ve left it off the card, though I’d add it with the rosewater if you want it in, which is my guess.
Then there’s the marzipan, since by my maths 500g won’t stretch to 1cm thick over the top and sides of a 20cm cake. So I’d either roll it nearer 5mm or buy about 1kg, which adds roughly 170 calories a slice.
Can I make a vegan Christmas cake?
Yes, their Vegan Christmas cake in Veggie Feasts is a separate recipe, with dairy-free spread and almond or soya milk instead of butter and eggs. And it also serves 12, baking at 150°C for 1½ to 2 hours with a triple layer of foil round the tin.
They test it with a skewer and an internal temperature of 98°C, which I’d borrow as a second check here too. Then its royal icing is 75ml of aquafaba, the liquid from canned chickpeas, whisked with cream of tartar and 300g of icing sugar.
What other fruit cakes could I make instead?
Their Caribbean fruit cake in Brilliant Bakes is the long-haul one, with fruit and prunes soaked in rum and Marsala for at least six weeks. And they call it “a beautiful alternative to a trad Christmas cake”, with the fruit pulsed to a purée with treacle and Angostura bitters.
Or for a quicker, easy fruit cake started in a saucepan, their boiled fruit cake simmers its fruit in stout before baking. And their Dundee cake in British Classics brings marmalade, whisky and circles of blanched almonds on top.
How long does it keep, and can I make it ahead?
Keeping times aren’t given for this cake in British Classics, since it doesn’t need maturing. So I’d keep it in an airtight tin somewhere cool and eat it within a week of cutting, which is my own rule.
If you bake ahead, their vegan cake is wrapped in baking paper in an airtight container and fed with rum or brandy at least twice. So I’d do any feeding before the marzipan goes on, which is my reading of their order. And their Christmas pudding is the one to start early, since it steams for 3½ hours.
