Recipe Name – Christmas cake Part 1 – Time to soak your dried fruits
Introduction – First and the most important step to make authentic Christmas cake is to soak your dried fruits in alcohol or fruit juice. So in this part of the recipe, I will tell you about this important step of the recipe.
What all do we need?
Ingredients to soak:
- 100 gm raisins
- 150 gm chopped dates
- 150 gm chopped mixed berries
- 100 gm chopped crystallized ginger
- 150 gm tutti frutti
- 25 gm dried sultana’s
- 180-200 ml fruit juice or alcohol of your choice
Method –
- Take a glass jar and soak all chopped dried fruits in alcohol or fruit juice.
- I have used apple juice here, you can use orange juice, cranberry juice or grape juice.
- If using alcohol, preferred is rum or you can also use brandy, whisky or vodka.
- Ensure dried fruits are chopped well (approx. ½ cm in size). This is important for even cake.
- Do take a good shake after you pour juice or alcohol in the dried fruits and let them soak.
Tips –
- Traditionally dried fruits are soaked in alcohol for 1 year. But you can soak for 1 month, 1 week or at least for 2 days.
- I suggest to soak your dried fruits at least for 2 days to get that rich, deep authentic flavor of Christmas cake.
- Do stir soaking dried fruits once in day to ensure all get soaked properly.
- You can also use dried apricots, candied peals etc for soaking but ensure that all these ingredients weight is approx. 675 gm.