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     Post subject: Re: THE IRISH TOPIC
    UNREAD_POSTPosted: Tue Dec 22, 2015 10:29 pm
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    Jennifer s christmas recipe on Quick Honey Christmas Cake Ring. 

    Ciste Nollag from “Irish Traditional Food” by Theodora FitzGibbon

    Attachment:
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    This is a family recipe dating from 1860, it is a very rich and toothy fruitcake

    Quote:
    Nice idea to post the recipe for the Cake – it’s from a good Irish Cookery Writer called Theodora Fitzgibbon, now passed away. I’ll change it into metric. 

    From Theodora Fitzgibbon:

    Quick Honey Christmas Cake Ring.

    250 gms. butter, softened slightly.
    200 gms soft brown sugar.
    2 rounded tablespoons set honey.
    5 medium eggs.
    125 gms chopped mixed peel (do you know what that is – candied peel?)
    75 gms blanched almonds slightly chopped.
    125 gms halved glace cherries,
    250 gms each of currants, raisins and sultanas (or can leave out the currants & increase the other amounts.)
    270 gms plain flour.
    1 level teaspoon baking powder.
    1 level teaspoon ground nutmeg
    1/2 level teaspoon cinnamon.
    1-2 tablespoons whiskey, brandy or dark rum.

    Grease a 30 cm ring tin (Bundt tin).. Preheat the oven to 150 degrees C.
    Put all ingredients except the spirit into a large mixing bowl and beat with a wooden spoon for 3 minute (or slowly in an electric mixer) Then add spirit.
    Sprinkle the greased ring tin with a little flour, shaking out any excess, then put the mixture in carefully, smoothing the top over well.

    Bake in the centre of the oven for about 2 hours, covering the top loosely with paper or foil if it’s getting too brown. Switch off the oven and leave for about 30 minutes before turning out carefully onto a wire rack. Then put on a plate, prick with a skewer and sprinkle over more spirit. (I used brandy). When well soaked, wrap in foil and store in an airtight tin.

    And no J, not a clue what that is
    I doubt those ” two tablespoons of dark rum” will be the end of it …might expand a bit..but that just a guess on my part :D
    google to the rescue
    yep found it, we have a word for it too but if you would pronounce it you d break your tongue
    cant have that can we 8018
    some sort of sugary fruit thingies it seems
    often used in that sort of thing, bakery of that sort at christmas , here too.
    merry christmas guaranteed hehehe

    patriciasheachristmascake.jpg
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    Fruitcake is an excuse and a method for eating fruit plump with whiskey, rum or brandy. In a traditional Irish or British fruitcake like this one, the fruit outweighs and outshines the minimal amount of cake that holds everything together. The cake is baked weeks before Christmas so that it can be “watered” with spirits. A finished 10-inch cake, covered with almond paste and royal icing, will weigh over 10 pounds.

    In Ireland and Britain, different recipes of fruitcake are baked and eaten throughout the year. There’s the lighter Dundee Cake, and Halloween’s Barm Brack, which is more of a yeast bread. Fruitcake in its current form dates back to the late 1700s, although its ancestors stretch back to the late Middle Ages. Then, as now, lighter, less fruity cakes were for everyday, and richer cakes for special occassions.

    This recipe makes an excellent Irish wedding cake. It was for Anne’s wedding that I first made this cake. In Ireland, a friend bakes the couple’s wedding cake. Her mother (her “mam”) mailed me her own recipe, based on one by Theodora Fitzgibbon. Anne brought the hard-to-find ingredients like mixed peel and sultanas from Ireland. The cake received the stamp of approval from her native Irish family and the groom’s native Philadelphian family.

    One secret is that Anne makes her own candied fruit peel. The fruitcake mix sold in American groceries horrifies her (as it does me). Rather than the stale, unearthly flavor of fruitcake mix, the home-candied peel has a strong, fresh citrus aroma and flavor. Genuine Irish “mixed peel” is an acceptable substitute (but homemade is best). The homemade peel made me a fruitcake devotee.

    Fruitcake should be served in small pieces.

    Measurements
    •4 oz dried apricots
    •6 oz glace cherries, rinsed and chopped
    •1 lb raisins
    •Either:
    ◦1 pound sultanas
    ◦1 pound golden raisins
    •Either:
    ◦8 oz currants
    ◦8 oz raisins
    •6 oz candied citrus peel (“mixed peel”), chopped
    •4 oz nuts
    •3/4 c whiskey
    •2 oz candied ginger, chopped
    •1 1/2 c butter, softened
    •3/4 c sugar
    •1/2 c brown sugar
    •6 eggs
    •3 1/4 c flour
    •4 oz almonds, ground
    •1 tsp pumpkin pie spice
    •1/2 tsp nutmeg
    •1/2 tsp salt
    •rind of 1 orange, grated
    •rind of 1 lemon, grated
    •1 apple, cored and grated coarsely