Rich, fruity, and ever so boozy, a good Christmas cake is the epitome of the festive season, but how did this tradition come to be?
The Christmas cake has its roots in plum porridge, eaten on Christmas Eve to line stomachs after a day of fasting. After a while, the porridge mixture included dried fruit, spices, and honey, to create a Christmas pudding. By the 16th century, oatmeal was replaced with butter, wheat flour, and eggs, holding the mixture together in a boiled plum cake. Richer families with ovens began making fruit cakes with marzipan, an almond sugar paste, for Easter, and for Twelfth Night, they made a similar cake using seasonal dried fruit and exotic spices, which represented the eastern spices brought by the Magi.
With increasing industrialisation during the Victorian period and shifting working patterns, people enjoyed a shorter Yuletide holiday, ensuring the slow decline in popularity of the Twelfth Night. Christmas Day became the focus of festive celebrations, and with this shift, the bakers of the Victorian era started to decorate the cakes with winter snow scenes. They became very popular at Christmas parties and by the 1870’s the modern Christmas cake had developed. None recognisable from its plum porridge roots.
Like most things in life, a Christmas cake tastes better when baked at home. This recipe is for a round cake tin, approximately 18cm diameter. You can use a different sized tin and vary quantities accordingly.
