What's a Fruit Cake!

Illustrated by waiChing

It's the time of the year again to be enjoying a good old Christmas Fruit Cake! But hold on, what's the difference between a Christmas fruit cake and a normal fruit cake, you may ask? And we shall answer. The decorations. Yes, the decorations. Put some Christmas decoration to it and it's a Christmas fruit cake. Just in case it's not finished by Chinese New Year (which happen to fall in January this year), glam it up with some red and gold decorations along with mini mandarin oranges and WHAM, a Chinese New Year Fruit Cake. Tadaa!!! Genius. We know.

Jokes aside, fruit cakes traditionally, contain a healthy dose of alcohol but one may make a non-alcoholic version by replacing the alcohol with more lemon juice or anything citrusy for a tangy taste. Perhaps even try some mix spices to add some zest to it. There are a few variety of fruitcakes in the world and the contents of fruits and nuts vary according to the country and available spices. Some are light while others are richer. Pick one that floats your boat. 

As this is the season of sharing, below are the ingredient and methods for a basic non-alcoholic fruit cake. Just so we can share our love around in this multicultural community.

Ingredients:

•      225g self-raising flour
•    110g butter
•    110g sugar
•    225g mixed fruit (almond/ raising/walnuts/cherries/etc)
•    1 egg
•    5 tablespoons milk
•    1 teaspoon mixed spice (optional)

How to:

1. Rub the butter into the flour until it looks like fine breadcrumbs.
2. Add sugar and dried fruit as well as mixed spice.
3. Add egg and milk to make a soft dropping consistency.
4. Put into lined 2 lb loaf tin or 6" round cake tin. 
5. Sprinkle demerara sugar over the top and pat down with the back of a spoon for a nice crunchy top
6. Bake for approximately 1hour in a preheated oven at 180 C. Check by inserting in a skewer. If it comes out clean, then it is done.

Make ahead:

Mix the flour, sugar and butter in a mixer with the blade attachment until the breadcrumb stage and then freeze.Remove from the freezer add the rest of the ingredients and bake.

Credit: Ingredients and recipe are slightly altered from allrecipe.co.uk.