Boiled Fruit 'n Whiskey Cake.

This fruit cake will make an excellent Christmas or wedding cake. It keeps for up to three months, mine didn't 'cos I have hungry men in the house. But I shall do another one for Christmas this year. Use any fruit that you have, or go and do a special shop just for this. As long as you end up with around six and a half cups of mixed fruit. Ingredients....
2 1/4 cups Sultanas.
1 1/2 cups Raisins. (chopped)
1 1/2 cups Currants.
1/2 cup mixed Peel.
1/2 cup Glaze Cherries. (halved)
1 cup tinned Pineapple. (chopped)
1/4 cup Apricots (chopped)
250g Butter.
1 cup Brown Sugar.
1/2 cup Whiskey. (or Brandy)
1/2 cup water.
5 Eggs (lightly beaten)
1 tablespoon Treacle.
1 3/4 cups Plain Flour.
1/3 cup S.R. Flour.
1/2 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda.

Method....

Sift dry ingredients (flours) together and set aside.

Combine butter, fruit, sugar, whiskey and water in a large saucepan and simmer until sugar has dissolved, stirring all the time. Bring to the boil, reduce the heat and simmer with a lid on for ten minutes. (Stirring now and then) Set aside to cool. This is very important as the next step is adding the eggs and we don't want them to cook.

When the fruit is at room temperature, add the eggs and treacle and stir to combine. Then stir in the flours. Spread the mixture in to a greased and lined 23cm round tin. Bake at 150c for about 2 and a half hours. Test with a cake skewer, if it comes out clean, it is ready.

My cake tin was not that large so I had mix left over. So I quickly got cupcake cases ready and put those in the oven at the same time. These were done first of course, but it gave me an excuse to open the oven door and take in the beautiful aromas.

Alpine White Chocolate Mud Cake.

This is my first attempt at making a mud cake and also my first go at icing and decorating a cake too. Yes, okay, it was a Bakels cake mix that I was trying out. The lovely Gail from http://vipantrywedonthaveablogblog.blogspot.com sent me a kilo of the mix from her 15 kilo bail to try. Who said ready mixes are not any good? This is moist, easy, and very tasty.
Once you get over the original panic stage and work out the weights and measures (weighing eggs and water in grams for instance) it really is easy.
Then there's the choosing of chocolates to use. Some are so yellow, I ended up using Nestles as this was the palest of them all once melted and the cream added to it.


Top picture is square on.




This one is side on showing the ribbon on the side.










And this is after it had been syrup basted and
crumb iced.


















Just out of the oven. It did rise a little and cracks appeared, but these soon settled once it had cooled.
This is a truely delightful cake, and I will be buying some more mix once the Christmas holidays are over. Freezes well too.

Christmas/Boxing Day Menu.

5 kilos of King Prawns (Lemoned finger bowls to rinse the pinkies)
Assorted savoury biscuits and a couple of dip.
1 whole leg of Ham.
1 5.4 kilos of Turkey breast with streaky bacon and cranberry sauce.
New potatoes salad with light sour cream and chives.
Green leaved salad.
Black tomatoes. (No fiddling with these, too good as they
are) KUMATO.
Alpine white mud cake (Still have to do the final icing layer
and decorate)
Glazed fruit cake. Mr. Kiplings Mince pies. (We adore only these)
Fruit salad. (Mangoes, Pineapple, Kiwifruit, Strawberries
and green Grapes.
Fruit and marshmallows kebabs with dipping chocolate.
Assorted cheeses (Triple creamed Brie, Strong Cheddar and
a blue of some sort)

This is sort of a buffet, it will be all out in the BBQ area,
yes there is a fridge out there and a couple of eskys filled with ice too.
Also doing cocktails, Grossmutters over ice, Sex on the beach,
Between the sheets, and Death in the afternoon.
There will also be beer, red wine and white wine.
Oh, and my cuppa PG Tips.
Have I missed anything?
YES, Mince pie muffins and cherry and
coconut mini loaves. PHEW

Christmas Lights Fruit Cake.

Not too much effort put into this cake, as I am making a white chocolate mud cake for Christmas. So this is a shop bought cake by Fowlers Vacola. A deliciously moist fruit cake filled with Spiced Apples, Apricots, Peaches and Pears. I glazed it with warmed Apricot jam and decorated with glazed Oranges, glazed Pineapple, glazed Peaches and a green Cherry.
Now to get on with the over cake.

MERRY CHRISTMAS

Special Fruit Cake

Ingredients

1 cup water

1 cup sugar

4 eggs

2 cup dried fruit

1 teaspoon baking soda

1 teaspoon salt

1 cup brown sugar

Juice of 1 lemon

1 cup nuts

1 bottle whisky

Method

Sample the whisky to check its quality. Take a large bowl.

Check the whisky again.

To be sure it is of the highest possible quality, pour 1 level cup and drink.

Repeat. Turn on the electric mixer.

Beat 1 cup of butter in a large fluffy bowl.

Add 1 teaspoon of sugar and beat again.

Make sure the whisky is still okay. Cry another tup.

Turn off the mixer. Break 2 leggs and add to the bowl and chuck in the cup of dried fruit.

Mix on the turner. If the fried druit gets stick, pry it loose with a drewscriver. Sample the whisky to check for tonisticity. Next, sift 2 cups of salt. Or something. Who cares? Check the whisky. Now sift the lemon juice and strain your nuts. Add 1 table. Spoon. Of sugar or something. Whatever you can find. Grease the oven. Turn the cake tin to 350 degrees. Don’t forget to beat off the turner. Throw the bowl out of the window, check the whisky again and go to bed.

Merry Christmas everyone and a Happy New Year too.

Thank you for the recipe Lesley! (lol)