MadeStuff » The world’s best christmas cake … ever! ~ Part 4

The world’s best christmas cake … ever! ~ Part 4

Finally, it’s time to decorate the cake! It’s only been two months but now is the moment we’ve been waiting for, it’s time to finish it in advance of the main event … the eating!

First thing you need to do is turn your cake onto an appropriately sized cake base or plate, I use one of the thicker bases rather than the flimsy cardboard jobs you can buy.

Adding the marzipan

Some people don’t like marzipan, and some freaks even remove it from the cake before eating it. This is sacrilege of the highest order and you must not be tempted to skip this step! The sweet almond flavours are an essential part of the cake and serve to combine with the rich fruity and rummy goodness of the actual cake to set the taste buds into overdrive!

Personally I’m not making my own marzipan or icing this year, although I have done in the past, it’s not entirely essential. If you do want to make your own marzipan (and it really is worth it) then you can find the recipe in Part 2, here. No, this year I’m using the supermarket stuff for speed and simplicity (although I’ll give you the Royal Icing recipe below if you want to try your hand at it).

You’ll need:

c. 600g marzipan
Apricot Jam
Icing Sugar

Thinly spread the jam over the top and sides of your cake, this is the ‘glue’ that’s going to bind your marzipan to the cake.
Dust your surface, rolling pin, and marzipan with icing sugar to stop the marzipan sticking to everything.
Roll your marzipan to the desired depth, I normally aim for c. 2mm in thickness, although it’s not a huge issue.
Using a sharp knife and the base of the cake tin in which you baked the cake cut a circle out of the marzipan and place it on top cake.
Roll out your remaining marzipan into manageable sized rectangles the height of your cake and apply the around the sides, pinching the edges together so that your entire cake is covered.
Using any left over marzipan roll some thin sausage shapes to pack out the inevitable gaps around the bottom, remember it doesn’t need to be pretty we’re just looking to get a good shape so that when we cover it with the icing it does look good!
Dust your hands with some icing sugar and run them over the marzipan to smooth any lumps and bumps as best you can.

Adding the icing

For me Christmas Cake means royal icing, indeed, the royal icing we had when I was little was fairly inedible due to it’s concrete consistency … honestly, you could have used it for home building! Fortunately icing has never been my strong point so I tend to opt for the shop bought stuff which is a lot softer.

If you’re making your own icing you might like to try the recipe below for which you’ll need:

3 egg whites
c. 750g / 1.5lb / 5 cups of icing sugar
1 tbsp lemon juice
1 – 1.5 tsp glycerine (optional)

Whisk the egg whites until they’ve gone nice and frothy but not so much that they go stiff (remember it’s not meringue we’re making!).
Gradually beat in half of the icing sugar.
Add the lemon and glycerine and gradually beat in the remaining icing sugar until it stands in peaks.
Cover your bowl with a damp cloth and leave it for a couple of hours before using.

As I’ve said I tend to use shop bought icing, although avoid the pre-rolled stuff like the plague, honestly it’s more trouble than it’s worth. We’re essentially looking to do the same with the icing as we did with the marzipan except in a single piece.

Think calm thought, remember, there’s no point ruining your day by stressing about a cake. If you have any minor decorating cock-ups I’ll give you a clue at the end on how to hide them.
Thinly spread some more apricot jam on top of the marzipan, again this is your ‘glue’, you could also use a thin solution of sugary water if you prefer.
Roll out your icing so that it’s large enough to cover the top and sides of the cake when draped over it.
Carefully centre your icing on top of the cake and smooth the top.
Starting at a single point begin smoothing the icing down the sides of the cake slowly and carefully working your way around the cake avoiding any creases.
A point will come when a crease is inevitable, make a vertical cut at the peak of the crease folding one part under and trimming off the excess. Smooth the edges together. Do this for the remainder of the sides of your cake.
Dust your hands with icing sugar and smooth the icing down aiming to get rid of any obvious lumps and bumps.
Add any decorations you may wish to have on your cake. If any need stuck on make up some thin icing using water and icing sugar.

As you can see, I’ve kept things simple with a light dusting of icing sugar, a couple of wee decorations and a cake ribbon around the sides.

The ribbon hides any rough edges where the creases got the better of you and the icing sugar hides the fact that the evil pre-rolled icing I was landed with came apart in the middle! Personally I’m not overly concerned about how the cake looks, so long as it’s vaguely Christmas cake like. For me it’s all about the flavour and from that point-of-view this really is The best Christmas cake in the world .. ever! as proven by the self-confessed Christmas cake haters who even enjoy a bit of it’s fruity, rummy, Christmasy goodness!

I hope you and yours enjoy the cake you’ve made as much as me and mine will enjoy this one … Merry Christmas!

Parts 1, 2, and 3 can be found here, here, and here.

Tags: baking, cake, christmas, craft, handmade, marzipan, royal icing