How to Make a Christmas Cake: Fruit, Feeding and Timing

A homemade Christmas cake is one of the easiest festive bakes to get right, as long as you give it time. Most of the work happens before the oven goes on: choosing the fruit, soaking it, and lining the tin properly. After baking, the cake sits quietly in a tin for a few weeks while the flavours settle. This guide walks you through each stage, with the ingredients we stock for every part of it.

If you would like a full recipe to follow, our Christmas cake with dried fruits is a good place to start. Read on for the why behind each step.

Where the Christmas cake came from

The rich fruit cake we eat in December grew out of the Twelfth Cake, which was cut on Twelfth Night at the end of the Christmas season. Seventeenth-century English recipes for it used expensive ingredients such as raisins, almonds and candied peel, and were raised with yeast like a fruit bread. During the Victorian era, Twelfth Night customs faded and the celebrations moved to Christmas Day. Food historians credit Mrs Beeton with the first English recipe to carry the name "Christmas Cake".

Step 1: Choose your dried fruit

A classic cake uses around a kilo of dried fruit for a 20cm round tin. You can buy a ready mix or build your own blend.

• Mixed Fruit with Peel is the simplest option, with the vine fruits and peel already combined.
• Currants are small and intense, and give the cake its dark, traditional look.
• Turkish Sultanas and Jumbo Black Raisins add juiciness.
• Glacé Cherries bring colour. Rinse and dry them, then toss in a little flour so they do not sink.
• Chopped Mixed Citrus Peel gives the bitter-sweet citrus note that balances all that sugar.

For something a little different, swap part of the vine fruit for chopped figs, apricots, cranberries or dates. Keep the total weight about the same and the recipe will still work.

Step 2: Soak the fruit

Soaking plumps the fruit so it does not pull moisture out of the cake as it bakes. Put the fruit in a large bowl, pour over about 150ml of brandy, rum, sherry or cold black tea, cover and leave overnight. Stir it once or twice. Orange juice works too if you are baking for children or anyone avoiding alcohol, but the cake will not keep quite as long.

Step 3: The rest of the ingredients

The standard proportions for a 20cm tin are roughly equal weights of butter, sugar and flour, about 225g each, with four eggs.

• Sugar: Dark Muscovado Sugar gives a deep, treacly flavour and a moist crumb. Soft Dark Sugar is a slightly milder alternative.
• Flour: plain flour such as our Organic Plain White Flour. A little almond flour in place of some of the flour makes the cake richer and helps it keep.
• Nuts: Flaked Almonds, walnut pieces or blanched almonds for the top if you want a Dundee-style finish.
• Spice: two teaspoons of Organic Mixed Spice, plus a grating of whole nutmeg and a pinch of cinnamon.
• Flavour extras: grated orange and lemon zest, a spoon of blackstrap molasses for colour, and a few drops of vanilla extract.

Step 4: Line the tin well

A Christmas cake bakes for a long time at a low temperature, so the edges need protecting. Line the base and sides of the tin with a double layer of baking paper, letting the paper stand a few centimetres above the rim. Some bakers also tie a band of brown paper or newspaper around the outside of the tin. This stops the outer edge from drying out before the middle is cooked.

Step 5: Bake low and slow

Cream the butter and sugar, beat in the eggs one at a time, then fold in the flour, spices and soaked fruit. Spoon the mixture into the tin, level it and make a slight dip in the centre so it bakes flat. Bake at around 140°C (120°C fan) for four to four and a half hours. Check from three and a half hours. A skewer pushed into the centre should come out clean, and the top should feel firm.

Leave the cake to cool completely in the tin before you take it out.

Step 6: Feed and store

Once cool, prick the top with a skewer and spoon over a tablespoon or two of brandy or rum. Wrap the cake in baking paper and then foil, and keep it in an airtight tin somewhere cool. Feed it again every week or two until a week before you ice it. Stop feeding at that point so the surface is dry enough for the marzipan to stick.

When to bake

Many families bake in late October or November to give the cake six to eight weeks to mature. That is not a rule. A cake baked in early December will still taste good, it just has less time to mellow. If you are late, soak the fruit for longer and skip the feeding.

Short on time?

If baking is not going to happen this year, the GF Iced Christmas Cake from The Foods of Athenry is ready to serve, already finished with marzipan and icing, and made without gluten.

FAQ

How far ahead can I make a Christmas cake?

Most bakers make it six to eight weeks before Christmas. A well-wrapped, fed cake keeps for a long time in a cool, airtight tin.

Can I make a Christmas cake without alcohol?

Yes. Soak the fruit in cold tea or orange juice and skip the feeding. Keep the cake in the fridge once it is cut and eat it within a couple of weeks.

Why did my fruit sink to the bottom?

Usually because the fruit was wet or the batter was too loose. Drain any excess soaking liquid, dry glacé cherries well and toss them in a spoon of flour before folding them in.

Can I use different dried fruit?

Yes. Keep the total weight about the same. Figs, dates, apricots and cranberries all work well alongside the traditional vine fruits.

Find festive food, gifts and baking ingredients on our Christmas page.