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Prep Time: 60 Minutes Cook Time: 1 Minutes |
Ready In: 61 Minutes Servings: 16 |
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This is my family's favorite Christmas cake. Ever since I started making it when the girls were babies, everyone who tastes it falls in love. You have to like ginger, though. Don't remember where I got the recipe, but it makes a lot, and the longer it sits, wrapped, in your fridge, the better it gets. Prep time DOES NOT INCLUDE time to soak the fruit in rum. Ingredients:
1 cup crystallized ginger, cut in small cubes |
1 cup ginger, preserved in syrup, diced |
1 cup currants |
1 cup walnuts, chopped |
1 cup dark rum |
3 cups flour |
3/4 teaspoon baking powder |
1/4 teaspoon baking soda |
1/2 teaspoon salt |
2 tablespoons fresh ginger, grated |
2 teaspoons cinnamon |
1 1/2 teaspoons nutmeg |
2 cups butter |
2 cups sugar |
6 eggs, separated, at room temp |
1 tablespoon vanilla |
Directions:
1. Place both kinds of chopped ginger, currants and walnuts in a large glass bowl. Pour in rum, mix together well. Cover with plastic wrap and let sit at least overnight, or up to three days.
2. After fruit has soaked, butter and flour the inside of a 10 fluted pan.
3. Heat oven to 300.
4. In large bowl, cream butter until light. Add the sugar in two portions and keep beating after each addition.
5. Add the egg yolks one at a time, beating well after each addition.Blend in vanilla.
6. Add the sifted dry ingredients in two additions, beating just until the flour particles have been absorbed.
7. By hand, stir in the marinated fruit and nuts, plus any rum in the bottom of the bowl.
8. Beat the egg whites till they are foamy, add a pinch of salt, and continue beating till firm, not stiff, peaks are formed.
9. Beat 3 large spoonfuls of the whites into the batter, then fold in remaining whites until no patches of white remain in the batter. This requires a VERY large bowl and a rubber spatula with some backbone.
10. Pour into prepared pan and bake on lower level of rack in oven for 15 minutes.
11. Reduce oven temp to 275 and continue baking for one hour and 30 minutes, or till cake tests done.
12. Cool cake on rack for 10 minutes, then remove to a wire rack to cool completely.
13. Store, well wrapped in an airtight container, in the fridge for at least a week.
14. Note: to avoid any problems with sticking, you might want to line the pan with parchment paper. Can also be baked in two loaf pans instead of one large pan.
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