Scottish Whiskey Dundee Cake

3 oz mixed raisins

5 oz dried sour cherries

4 oz dried apricots, chopped to same size as raisins

3 oz mixed candied peel, chopped finely

3 Tbs whisky

5 oz butter at room temperature

5 oz brown sugar

3 eggs at room temperature

8 oz flour

1 tsp baking powder

¼ tsp salt

2 Tbs ground almonds

Grated rind of one orange

Grated rind of one lemon

8 inch springform pan. Grease it and line bottom and sides with parchment paper.

One package of marzipan paste

Icing sugar/confectioners sugar

Food coloring

Your favorite recipe for American buttercream frosting

Delia’s instructions: Begin the night before by weighing the fruit and peel into a bowl and sprinkling it with the 3 tablespoons of whisky. Mix well, cover and leave overnight.

Pre-heat the oven to gas mark 3, 325°F (170°C). Put the butter and sugar in a mixing bowl and beat with a wooden spoon until light and fluffy – or use an electric mixer for more speed. Whisk the eggs separately, then, a little at a time, beat them into the creamed butter and sugar. Next, using a large tablespoon, carefully fold in the sifted flour and baking powder. Your mixture needs to be of a soft, dropping consistency so, if it seems too dry, add a dessertspoon of milk.

Now, carefully fold in the ground almonds and then the currants, sultanas, cherries, mixed peel and orange and lemon zest. Then spoon the mixture into the prepared cake tin, smoothing it out evenly with the back of the spoon. Place the cake in the centre of the oven and bake for 2-2½ hours or until the centre is firm and springy to the touch. Marcia’s note: I start checking the cake at one hour. In my memory, my cakes have never taken 2 hours. Must be that American ovens stay hotter. Main thing to consider is that the cake should not dry out!

Let the cake cool in the tin for 30 minutes before taking it out to finish cooling on a wire rack. Then 'feed' it – make small holes in the top and base of the cake with a cocktail stick or small skewer, then spoon over a few teaspoons of malt whisky – wrap it in double silicone paper and store it in foil or an airtight container till needed. Marcia’s notes: You can also wrap it in cheesecloth soaked in whisky while you are maturing it.

A day or maybe 8 hours before serving, you need to ice and decorate the cake. Sprinkle icing sugar on your counter and cut off about three quarters of the package of marzipan paste (can use almond paste too – very little difference between these). Using a rolling pin dusted with icing sugar, roll out the marzipan paste into a thin circle about 14 inches in diameter. You will need to dust this a few times with icing sugar as you roll it out. Take your cake out of all of its storage wrappings and set it on a cake stand. Then carefully take the rolled out marzipan and drape it over the cake. It may not reach to the very bottom of the cake all the way around, but that is ok. Press the marzipan “pleats” on the sides of the cake together to make it lay against the cake and cut off any excess. Leave this to dry for a couple of hours.

While that is happening, start making your decorations. I always make holly and berries to decorate my cake because this is easy. Take a portion of the left over marzipan and add food coloring to it. Obviously, you need a larger amount of marzipan for the holly than the berries, so plan accordingly. Knead the food coloring into the marzipan and add enough food coloring to get as bright a color as you want. If the marzipan gets too tacky, just knead in more icing sugar. You can roll out the green and cut it with a holly leaf cookie cutter, but I just form it by hand and use a table knife to put the veins in the leaves. For the berries, I roll those out by hand, trying to keep them a similar size. Let these dry for several hours. These are edible, by the way.

Make about a half recipe of your favorite American buttercream icing recipe. The recipe you make for icing cookies is fine here. Once the marzipan has dried for a few hours, ice the cake as you normally would. Then, arrange your decorations on the cake. You can then store the cake for a week or so, wrapped carefully in plastic wrap. Serve with a cup of tea!

Notes: Based on recipe in Delia Smith’s Christmas

Apologies folks: This recipe requires a scale for all the dry ingredients. I make it every year for Christmas and enjoy every bite of it! You can feed the cake with anything you like. I use single malt whisky. You can also substitute the dried fruits that you like. I use homemade candied peel, which these days I make in January from my own trees that are unsprayed and freeze in the syrup for 11 months. That saves time at Christmas time when I have lots of baking to do. One thing to note is that you make this Christmas cake several weeks before Christmas to allow it to mature and to be able to feed it several times. Honestly, I only manage to make it during Thanksgiving weekend, but it can be made earlier than that.

-Marcia.