Tuesday, November 06, 2007

Transformation



This bowl of fruit has now absorbed almost a pint of brandy. It has been sitting in the kitchen for rather longer than I planned because I haven't had time to deal with it. Yesterday, however, I mixed it with butter, eggs, flour, treacle and spices and put it in the slow oven of the Aga overnight.


And now it looks like this. (The cakes are actually both the same shade of brown but my skills as a photographer are somewhat limited.) When they have cooled thoroughly, I will wrap them and then 'feed' them on the rest of the brandy over the next few months until it is time to decorate them.

8 comments:

  1. The "rest" of the brandy being a cask, a hogshead, a firkin.

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  2. Something of that order, e! It certainly smells good.

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  3. Is this wonderful confection a fruit cake or a pudding? I say this as if I knew the difference. I don't.

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  4. e, they are cakes for special occasions. I always make the smaller of the two for Christmas. This year we have an extra party.

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  5. Mmmmm, yum! Mine are way behind this year and the fruit is still soaking (which I'm 'testing' from time to time, naturally, so they will be quite small cakes, I fear!). How did you get on (if at all) with the American g-bread?

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  6. I think one of the reasons I was so late in baking the cakes was my reluctance to lose the boozy fruit!

    Gingerbread is next on the agenda - we decided we wouldn't get into our party clothes for our Guildhall date if I made it for just the two of us. I'm going to make some to take to London so that daughter and son-in-law can help us eat it. I'll let you know how it turns out.

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  7. When I see pictures like this, accompanied by a mouthwatering description, I do wish I liked fruit cake, Christmas cake, Christmas pudding etc etc but I don't. And I have tried. There is, I fear, no hope for me when it comes to cakes and puddings of the fruit variety. Thankfully, no-one in my immediate family likes them either, so I haven't made any for years and years and years . . .

    But you could tempt me, very easily, with a coffee and walnut cake, thickly filled and topped with coffee butter cream. Or a perfect vanilla-flavoured New York cheesecake. Or, if anyone ever reinvents it, a Fuller's (of teashop fame) chocolate layer cake. Only those of a certain age will remember the absolute scrumptiousness of this cake and, as you might expect, Nigel Slater is one of them. This is what he had to say on the subject (Observer, April 18, 2004): "My mother occasionally reminded me that they cost six shillings apiece and therefore counted as luxury food but, in my prep school prime, I could demolish a two-pound Fuller's cake single-handed, at one sitting."

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  8. I do remember Fullers' chocolate cake but by the slice, not whole! The only place to beat Fullers was the Coffee House in Oxford.

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