Archive for Downsizer For an ethical approach to consumption
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gil
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Yule/Xmas/Midwinter cakeHave you made yours yet ? If so, when ?
What kind did you make ?
Are you feeding it with brandy or summat ?
What are your plans for decorating it ?
This year, I have departed from the usual rich fruit cake, cos I found and adapted a recipe in a friend's very old recipe book, which sounded interesting, pretty similar to fruit cake in many ways, and which only calls for covering with almond paste (no icing, royal or other). It's just come out of the oven - took 2.5 hrs to bake - and it looks great and smells fantastic.
It should go really well with the Winter Solstice wine [ginger, mandarin and spices]
Ginger and Orange Cake
The cake :
6oz butter or marge
5oz soft dark sugar
8oz flour
1/2 tsp bicarb of soda
1 tsp ground ginger
6oz crystallised ginger [I used 6 oz finely chopped, fresh root ginger]
2oz ground almonds
4oz candied orange peel [I used 4 oz chopped up leftover peel from making marmalade earlier in the year]
4oz crystallised orange [I used 4 oz chopped up leftover peel from making marmalade earlier in the year]
8oz sultanas [I used dried mixed fruit]
4oz chopped dates [I used chopped dried apricots]
3 eggs
rind of 1 orange [I used a lemon]
1.5 fl oz ginger syrup*
2 fl oz golden syrup
1. Grease and line a round 7"** cake tin with greased greaseproof
2. Set the oven to heat at 150 C
3. Sieve together flour, bicarb and ground ginger; mix in ground almonds; add the orange rind/zest into a smaller mixing bowl
4. Beat the eggs in a small bowl; warm the golden syrup, and add it to the egg, beating well
5. Add the different kinds of dried fruit to the flour mix and stir in.
6. Cream the butter/marge and sugar in the biggest mixing bowl
7. Add the flour, ground almonds and dried fruit mix
8. Add the eggs/syrup mix, and stir well
9. Finally add the ginger syrup
10. Put in tin and bake for 2.5-3hrs till done
* ginger syrup : I made some by whizzing up 2 knobs of ginger in the liquidiser with about 4fl oz water, then heating up the resultant ginger paste in a pan with 4oz+ sugar till it looked syrupy. This gives you far too much syrup, but you could always find another use for the extra...
ETA : ** I used an 8" tin, and the cake is a little bit wide and flat. A 6" tin would really give you the height, I guess.
The Almond paste etc
Marmalade to stick the almond paste to the cake
+
8oz ground almonds
12oz icing sugar
2 egg whites
orange essence
Makes the marzipan.....
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Chez
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I use the traditional Christmas cake recipe from the Aga Cookbook - need to get on to it this, week, thank you for reminding me, Gil!
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alice
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I made mine last Sunday. Traditional rich fruit cake and I make two big ones. I start cutting one early december for 'elevenses' - gives me a rest from baking for a couple of weeks - and the second one is the 'christmas cake' proper.
I've made mincemeat this year too, first time ever. Can't wait to try it 
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mochyn
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I need to make something like that soon. My son and his fiancee are (hopefully) coming from Hungary for mid-winter, otherwise I wouldn't bother!
What shall I make? Don't feel like the traditional this year.
Apart from stollen, of course.
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wellington womble
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Himself loathes dried fruit, so I always make a chestnut chocolate truffle cake as well as a traditional pudding and a cake (assuming we are having company to eat it) I'll start on the traditional stuff next weekend, I think. This year we are going to MILs so I will also make a lemon tart and a pork pie (not quite the same)
Or you make a yule log. Or a lemon roulade (lemon swiss roll, filled with lemond curd and marscapone cheese) Assuming you could find a good lemon curd recipe, of course 
Blast, now I'm hungry!
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mochyn
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I can't have anything chocolatey  so the lemon roulade is a poss I suppose.
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lottie
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This year I made a vegan one for my eldest son to take back to Leeds as well as the normal recipe--hopefully he'll tell me what it's like.
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wellington womble
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| mochyn wrote: | | I can't have anything chocolatey so the lemon roulade is a poss I suppose. |
The lemon roulade is amazing. I'll dig out the recipe, but broadly speaking it was only lemon sponge, swiss rolled with lemon curd and half and half marscapone and (I think) creme fraiche (could have been fromage frais, though) Delia also has some cake alternatives in her Christmas book. There was a creole one that looked interesting.
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earthyvirgo
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Gil, that sounds pretty damn yummy, think I might have a go at it.
No calories in it are there? 
EV
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wellington womble
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No, it's completely calorie free. In fact, as it has fruit in it, it's counted as one of your five a day
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gil
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| earthyvirgo wrote: | Gil, that sounds pretty damn yummy, think I might have a go at it.
No calories in it are there?
EV |
Just to mention, the chopped up citrus peel left over from making marmalade had already been boiled, so it was soft. I don't think I'd want to use raw citrus peel. The alternative would be to use bought candied peel to replace both the crystallised orange and the candied orange peel.
If you had a jar of that stem ginger in syrup, you could maybe use the ginger in place of the crystallised ginger, and the syrup left in the jar as the ginger syrup.
It looks pretty much like a normal rich fruit cake from the outside.
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