Pirates of the Carribean Christmas Cake

Today I baked my Christmas cake! Whoopee..doo dah..the first one in over 10 years

It's a cake that would have Captain Henry Morgan and his mateys screaming for more. A rich dark fruit cake, it is a recipe I got from my Granny, and have used for years. I have tweeked the recipe a bit to suit my own taste, substitueting candied peel for preserved gineger for instance

Back in the days when I did wedding cakes and christening cakes for friends and family, this cake was a hit, and it can keep for years in a sealed tin..no jokes.

My old uncle Chris, God bless his cotton socks, loved fruit cake, and would buy all the ingredients and have me make him one. Today when I was mixing up the ingredients, I couldn't help thinking of him, he would have been so chuffed to see how good it turned out.

But the secret of my fruit cake is that I use a special ingredient..!

Captain Morgan's Spicy Gold Rum..!
Yip...beats the pants off using traditional brandy any day.

First off, if you want to try baking this cake for Christmas, you had better get cracking, as it needs to mature for 3 months. So go out there and buy all the goodies that go into it asap.  It will make a very big cake, or two medium ones, or one large cake and one small one. I have made a large cake and a small little one which I will give away as a gift once they are decorated. Here is what you will need.

The fruit mixture

6 1/2 cups of fruit mix, (raisins, sultanas and currents, in SA you can buy the big packet of fruit cake mix ready mixed with all the fruit you need, just measure out the 6 1/2 cups).
1 cup of glace cherries left whole
1 cup of whole almonds, skinned, if you buy unskinned ones, soak them in hot water till the skins peel off easier...it's still a mission to skin em...just do it!
1 cup glace pineapple (or you can substitute ginger if you prefer)
1/2 a cup candied orange/lemon peel
1 bottle Captain Morgan Spiced Gold Rum
1 glass Tawny Port

Soak and peel the almonds. Drink the glass of Tawny Port while you do so.Wash all the fruits in warm water and drain off well.  Pick out any raisin stalks if you find any. Chop the pineapple (or ginger) and then mix all the prepared fruit together. Pour over 2/3 of a cup of rum, and mix well, then cover and let stand over night or for a day or so, to let the fruit really soak up that rum!

Prepare the baking tins

Line the bottom of the baking tins with at least 3 layers of brown paper, then make a paper collar to fit around the inside edge of the tins. This is to prevent BURNING...Grease the tin with butter, then stick the paper down to the base and up the inside side of the tin. Grease the paper too...don't be stingy with the butter..gee hom vet..!

The Cake Mixture 

1 1/2 cups butter...(not flippen marg!)
6 eggs
2 cups brown sugar
3 cups white flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon ground ginger
1/2 teaspoon ground cardamom
1 glass Tawny Port

Take a sip of Tawny Port. Pre-heat the oven to 300°F (220°C). Sift together flour, baking powder, salt and spices. Cream the butter, and gradually add the brown sugar a bit at a time. Add the eggs one at a time to the creamed butter and sugar mixture, beating in well after each egg is added. Give the fruit mixture a good stir, then add the whole lot to the butter and egg mixture, and mix thoroughly. Take another swig of Tawny Port. Now add the dry ingredients to the fruit,butter,egg mixture, slowly,...just a bit at a time, mixing thoroughly, so as to work in any dry lumps. It is a very stiff mixture, so call for back up if your arm gets tired. Take another sip of Tawny Port.
Pack into the prepared baking tins, and push down into the form, smoothing the top with a spatula. Cover lightly with a piece of baking paper to prevent burning..don't push the paper down onto the cake batter, just let it rest on the collar/tin edge. Bake for 2 1/2 to 3 hours. Down the rest of the Tawny Port...and relax..keep an eye on the oven, turn in down a notch to about 250°F (180°C).

Once done, take out the oven and let the cakes cool a bit. When warm to the touch, sprinkle with rum on the top. Then turn the cakes over onto a bread board and sprinkle rum over the bottom. Line a cake tin with a tight fitting lid with Alu foil. Once the cake is completely cool, seal in the cake tin. Once a week take the cake out of the tin and give it a generous sprinkling of rum, top and bottom..A week or so before Christmas the botti of rum should be almost finished, and the cake ready for decorating...

Happy baking!