"It's the most wonderful time of the year"....
Yeyyy... Christmas is here... the year is going to end with a happy note for me and I wish for all of my friends, too. In this festive season, how can I stop myself from baking more and more cakes... No I could not...
Actually in last few months I shifted to my new apartment and I took some time to organize everything, particularly the kitchen - because that is one of my favorite places at my home. But baking was on - with 2 school-going kids, I really cannot afford to stop baking. As I said earlier, I always prefer to slide in a slice of home-baked cake instead of the store-bought ones. So, I have my stock full now to share with you - more recipes, more cakes and more stories...
This time, I am back with a bang... And that is the easiest Christmas Cake recipe with dry fruits. I can tell you, this is going to be a show-stopper for sure.
So, I was searching for a tested Plum cake recipe, which is also going to be comparatively easier for a baker like me - and I found a bunch of them. The most important part of baking a Christmas cake is soaking the dry fruits in alcohol (rum or wine or brandy). I could make this out from the experts, that the more you soak, the better the flavor. My expert baking teacher told me that she keeps the dry fruits soaked for almost an year or so. This time, I got less time so could soak it only for 2 days.
The second important thing is to use caramel sauce or brown sugar or molasses. I have prepared the caramel sauce myself and used it, along with some part of sugar powder. But I later realized, use of molasses or brown sugar powder would have given my cakes more dark shades. Anyway, will surely try more experiments, next year.
To start with I took 2 packs of mixed dry fruits, nuts and cherries - and I sliced them neatly. It was around 2 cups of mix.
I had red wine in my stock, so I have used red wine. Ideally you should use rum. So, I poured 1 cup of Dindori Sula Red wine into it, covered the bowl and kept it in a dry, cool place for 2 days. You might need to pour some more alcohol into it, if the mix soaks all of it and gets dry.
So, keep checking once daily the status and every time you open the lid, don't forget to smell the beautiful aroma of the mixture. It's just heavenly....!!!!
Prepare the Caramel Sauce the day before you bake. I had baked 2 Christmas cakes (7 inches round), so I took 1 cup of regular granulated sugar to prepare the Caramel Sauce. The process is simple but long.
In a saucepan, pour the sugar and place it on low flame. Keep the sugar stirring continuously and let it melt slowly. While melting gradually it will change the color - from light brown to dark brown.
When the sugar is completely melted, add 1 cup of water to it. The sugar will immediately turn to crystal. At this point, you can remove the saucepan from the flame. Keep on stirring and slowly the caramelized sugar will start melting into water. Get the saucepan back on top of low flame and allow the caramelized sugar to dilute into water.
Now baking the cake - which is the easiest part of all. Here are the ingredients -
Flour or Maida - 1 cup + 1 tablespoon
Baking Powder - 1 teaspoon
Powdered Sugar - 1/2 cup
Eggs - 2
Oil - 1/2 cup
Vanilla Essence - 1 teaspoon
Caramel Sauce - 3/4 cup
Soaked Dry Fruits - 1 cup
Here is the process -
Preheat your microwave oven to 160C and keep it ready. Also, grease and dust a 7" round cake pan and keep aside.
In a large bowl, add 1 cup flour and baking powder. Mix well and keep aside.
In another large bowl, add powdered sugar and break 2 eggs into it. Using an electric mixer, mix it nicely till fluffy and double in volume. Gradually add oil, vanilla essence and caramel sauce to the mixture one by one and keep on mixing.
Finally add the flour mix into the egg mixture, in parts and keep mixing until consistent batter is ready.
Sprinkle 1 tablespoon flour on top of the soaked dry fruits and mix well. Keeping 1/4th of the fruits for topping, add the remaining part into the batter. Slowly fold in using a spatula. Don't use electric mixer anymore. The final batter will be thick in consistency, but you can use a ladle to pour into the pan. Sprinkle the 1/4th part of fruit on top of the batter now.
Place the pan inside the oven and let it bake for 50-55 minutes. The cake will be nicely brown on top and soft inside, when done. Keep it in the pan for 10 minutes before removing.
Store in a dry and cool place before serving and time to time, you can brush the top with red wine or rum or brandy (whatever alcohol you are using). This will make the cake softer and richer in flavor.
The other one...
However, my cake was finished within couple of hours and I didn't get any chance to brush it nicely with more red wine. Wish me luck - for next time...
Wish you all a Merry Christmas and Happy New Year, in advance!
Happy baking...
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