The Cake that Took 3 Months to Finish: The Making of an English Christmas Cake

A photo-journal of the process + recipe

I am loving all the festive newsletters this month. Christmas is my favourite holiday and I relish all the joyful traditions. This year we have began a new one at home honouring my husband Ross’ heritage, though we actually started it 3 months ago.

According to the Great British Bake Off, the show that actually made us decide to try to make this cake this year:

Christmas cake actually started life as plum porridge, designed to line people’s stomachs after a day of religious fasting. Soon, other fruits and a dash of honey joined the plums and became the good old Christmas pudding.

Around the 16th century, people began to use richer ingredients so the oats were removed and flour and eggs were added. The pudding started to resemble the kind of fruitcake we’d recognise today. Spices that had started to be brought over from the east were incorporated into the cake to symbolise the three wise men. Richer families could also afford to wrap their cakes in marzipan, making them look much like the Christmas cake we eat today.

These days, most Christmas cakes are made in advance, with festive bakers ‘feeding’ their cake with brandy, sherry or whisky until the big day.

It’s fundamentally a fruitcake (a dense batter filled with dried fruits) that is fed with alcohol during several weeks and finished off with a layer of marzipan and icing.

We followed Mary Berry’s recipe for the cake itself and the royal icing and Simply recipes for the marzipan (+ some drops of almond extract).

So, here’s the visual documented process of the cake. I hope you enjoy it!

Macerating the fruit. Oct.11

Combining all the dried fruits with brandy and letting it soak for 3 days.

Baking the cake. Oct. 13

Grinding spices and combining everything to make the batter. Adding the fruit. Baking the cake.

First feeding. Oct. 29

Poking holes in the cake and feeding it with brandy.

Second feeding. Nov. 16

More brandy.

Last feeding. Dec. 2

One last time.

Making the marzipan. Dec. 7

Making the marzipan and laying it on the cake with some apricot jam as a sticking agent. Letting it dry overnight.

Icing the cake. Dec. 8

Making the royal icing and putting the last layer on the cake. Letting it air-dry.

Decorating the cake and eating it. Dec. 17

Decorating it and getting to try the first slice with a cup of tea!

I wish you a very Merry Christmas! See you next week for the last newsletter of the year!