Quick and easy Christmas cake
Prep time: 20 minsTotal time: 
Quick and easy Christmas cake
Prep time: 20 minsTotal time: 
Sainsbury's magazine
Our team of trained chefs and skilled food writers love cooking up everything from innovative seasonal recipes or clever shortcuts, to step-by-step guides and classic recipes for friends and readers alike.
Sainsbury's magazine
Our team of trained chefs and skilled food writers love cooking up everything from innovative seasonal recipes or clever shortcuts, to step-by-step guides and classic recipes for friends and readers alike.
Ingredients
- 150g ready-to-eat dried figs
- 225g stoned, soft prunes
- 100g skin-on almonds
- 225g soft butter
- 185g dark brown soft sugar
- 250g self-raising flour
- ½ rounded tsp ground cinnamon
- ½ rounded tsp ground ginger
- a generous pinch of ground cloves
- 4 large eggs, lightly beaten
- 225g raisins
- juice and zest of 1 large lemon
- 3 tbsp black treacle
- 4-5 tbsp dark rum
For the icing
- 3 tbsp apricot glaze, warmed in the microwave or a small saucepan, until runny
- 500g rolled-out marzipan
- 750g rolled-out white icing
Step by step
You can freeze the cooled, uniced cake. Once iced, it will keep for 3-4 days in an airtight container.
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Preheat the oven to 150°C, fan 130°C, gas 3. Line a 7cm-deep 20cm square tin with buttered baking paper.
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Snip the figs and prunes into small pieces. Roughly chop the almonds. Put the butter and sugar in an electric mixer and beat until fluffy.
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Sift the flour into a bowl with the cinnamon, ginger and cloves. Add this and the beaten eggs alternately to the butter and sugar in the mixer, beating on a low setting all the time.
TipYou can also bake this cake in a round 20cm tin; cook for 2-2½ hours.
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Stir in the fruit, almonds, lemon juice and zest, treacle and 3 tablespoons of the rum by hand. Tip into the tin and even out with a spatula. Bake for 1 hour 30 minutes or until golden and a skewer comes out clean. Leave to cool in the tin.
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When cold, make small insertions in the surface and drizzle over a little extra rum. To ice your cake, brush the cake with a little warmed apricot glaze, then cover it completely with 500g rolled-out marzipan, trimming off the excess. Brush the marzipan with cooled boiled water. Cover with 750g rolled-out white icing and trim off the excess.
