Foodie Friday - Alan's Boiled Fruit Cake

Morning Everyone

It's a long time since I did a Foodie Friday post - not because we haven't been baking and cooking, but because I keep forgetting to take photographs :) Time to put that right and here, by popular request, is the EM's recipe for boiled fruit cake - a war-time recipe he has adapted and now bakes for all and sundry.

Ingredients:

350g mixed fruit

110g caster sugar

110g margarine (Stork)

225g self-raising flour

1 egg, beaten

275mls water

2tbs runny honey (optional)

Method:

1. put margarine, water, sugar, fruit in pan. Bring slowly to the boil, turn down heat and simmer for 20 minutes.

2. allow to cool, preferable for a minimum 4 hours, overnight is ideal. When cool, stir in egg and flour. (as an extra nice touch 2tbs of runny honey can be added here). Mix well in the pan.

3. press into a well-greased 18cm cake tin and bake for 1½ hours at 150°C.

4. When baked, remove from oven and leave to cool in the tin. Once cool it can be removed from the tin and eaten  - enjoy!

Delicious!

Angie, aka Shozzy, has already given the cake her seal of approval. She says that it is moist but not stodgy, and I can second that. It must be the boiling of the fruit that keeps it moist. My daughter makes an eggless version, made with tea instead of water, and I'm told that's good too.

Notes:
After the first 30-45 mins, you might want to cover the top with a couple of circles of baking paper to prevent over browning. The need for this really depends on what kind of oven you have ... ours is a very temperamental fan-assisted oven which waits for us to turn our back for a moment and then burns the top.

Because I have impaired glucose tolerance, I have to ration the amount of cake I eat (sigh). The EM has no such problems so can enjoy as much as and whenever he likes. However, our lovely niece, Louise, is insulin dependent diabetic and my brother has also developed diabetes so experimentation is going on - well the EM is a retired chemist so he would experiment anyway.

So, for the latest cake, he has substituted Half-Spoon for sugar hoping that it won't spoil the texture or taste. I can't tell you yet how successful this has been because I'm not getting to try it :(  No, this time it's Louise who is going to be chief tester. As soon as she has reported back, I'll let you know whether the experiment has been successful or not :)

Should you now abandon your craft desks and rush to the kitchen to try this recipe ... how likely is that ... do let me know what you think - I'm sure the EM would appreciate the feedback :))

Right, I'm off to have a very late breakfast ... I've been up since 5.30am, almost 5 hours, fed the cat, had a cuppa and started to put together a scrap layout, but only just started to feel hungry ... must be all that talk of cake :))

Take care and happy baking,