Warning: Baking this cake is a long drawn out process and you need a lot of patience for it. The cake disappears in less than one-fourth the time it takes to create it... or faster.
I love the taste of what’s popularly known as plum cake. Made at home with rum and homemade butter, the flavour is an altogether divine experience. I tasted homemade Fruit Cake for the first time at my sister Jayashree’s place, fresh out of her oven. She hadn’t used rum in the cake though. Taking her recipe and adding a few modifications, I arrived at the final version of Fruit Cake With Rum that’s finger-licking good.
Part I: Soaked Dry fruits & nuts
Advance Preparation (at least 4 to 30 days before the cake is baked)
Ingredients:
Walnuts – 4
Cashew nuts – 6
Dates – 4
Black kishmish – 10
Brown kishmish – 15
Dry fig – 2 slices
Dark Rum – 1 quarter (180 ml)
Soak chopped dry fruits and nuts in rum. Mix it well and keep the mixture stored in a glass container, sealed tight. Stir the mixture every two days or so.
NOTE: You can add the fresh juice squeezed from one orange for flavour. But then the mixture should be used within 4-5 days. Otherwise, it might get spoilt.
Part II: Spice Mix
(To make into fine powder)
Ingredients:
Cardamom – 2
Cloves – 2
Cinnamon Bar – 1/2” piece
Nutmeg – ¼
Sugar – 2 tsp
NOTE: Sugar is added to help make the powder as fine as possible.
Part III: The Cake
Ingredients:
1. Maida (self-rising flour) – 185 gm (measure 1 cup from 125 ml scoop + 1 cup from 60 ml scoop)
2. Wheat flour – 90 gm (measure 1 cup from 60 ml scoop + 1 cup from 30 ml scoop)
3. Baking Powder – 1 tsp
4. Spice Mix (refer Part II)
5. White Butter – 250 gm (Cooking Oil can be used as an alternate)
6. Demerara Sugar – 185 gm
7. Milk (room temperature or cold) – 250 ml
8. Apple Cider – 2 tbsp (White Vinegar can be used as an alternate)
9. Baking Soda – 1 tsp
10. Vanilla Essence – 2 tsp
11. Soaked dry fruits and nuts (Refer Part I)
Method:
1. Grease a baking dish suitable for making 1 kg cake with butter and dust it with flour. This ensures that the cake doesn’t stick to the sides when done. I use a bread tin as I find it most convenient.
2. Pre-heat the oven at 250 degrees for ten minutes on ‘Toast’ setting.
3. Sieve Ingredients 1, 2 & 3 together through a fine sieve and mix well with a dry ladle.
4. Melt the butter on low flame for 1 minute and switch off. Wait till the butter is in liquid form before adding the Demerara sugar and mix well.
5. Add soaked dry fruits to the butter-sugar mix.
6. Take the milk in a bowl and add the apple cider to it. It will curdle almost immediately. Add the baking soda to this. Stir and add to butter-sugar mix.
7. Stir in the flour, mixing gently but fast. Mix well to avoid lumps.
8. Add Vanilla essence and mix again.
9. Pour into the cake dish. Tap the dish to make sure the cake mixture is evenly spread.
10. Bake it in the pre-heated oven at 200 degrees on ‘Bake’ setting for 40 minutes.
11. When the oven timer pings after 40 minutes, remove the cake dish carefully and cover it with aluminium foil and bake again for 20 minutes.
12. When the timer pings again, leave the cake alone – for at least 4-5 hours.
13. After that, loosen the sides with a knife and tilt it gently on a tray.
14. The cake is ready to eat. It tastes best 24 hours later.
This yummy Fruit Cake With Rum lasts at least a week outside the fridge, that is, if it’s not polished off by then.
NOTES:
a. I have done my best to break down the measurements for easy understanding. It wasn’t easy to fathom them out all by myself. Hope it’s of help.
b. The cake dish should be only half-full or less when the cake mixture is poured in. Otherwise, it might overflow while cooking.
