Marmalade Christmas Cake

Christmas cake is one of my favourite festive bakes and this one is baked traybake style then finished with a neat layer of almond marzipan and white fondant icing, for a simple yet refined presentation. I’ve flavoured this fruit cake with sharp orange marmalade, warming festive spices, rich brown sugar, a whole load of dried fruit and a generous amount of orange liqueur. Though you can use brandy if you’d prefer.

This recipe covers everything that you’ll need to make an impressive Christmas cake from scratch. From soaking the fruit for the ideal amount of time, baking low and slow, how to feed and mature your cake during the lead up to Christmas and an easy way to finish your cake with marzipan and fondant icing. Plus I’ll be sharing my favourite way to serve this festive fruit cake too.

For more festive bakes, take a look at our Christmas baking recipes. Here you’ll find plenty of mince pie variations, classic stollen, festive cookies and lots more.

Ingredients For Marmalade Christmas Cake

• Dried Fruit – You can use pretty much whatever mix or ratio of dried fruit that you like for this Christmas cake, as long as the total weight is the same as the recipe. I used a mix of raisins, sultanas, dried cranberries, dried pears, apricots, dried figs, dates and glacé cherries. Plus some candied peel as well.
• Liqueur – As this fruit cake is flavoured with marmalade, I used Grand Marnier (orange liqueur) for soaking and feeding mine. Traditional brandy or amaretto would work great too.
• Marmalade – This orange preserve works fantastically with the flavours of a spiced Christmas cake. Any shop bought or homemade orange marmalade will work.
• Spices – I kept things traditional with the spices and used ground cinnamon, allspice and nutmeg. Plus some stem ginger, for a stronger flavour.
• Butter – You’ll need to use unsalted butter for the cake batter, as we’ll be adding salt in as well.
• Sugar – You’ll need dark brown sugar and black treacle for the batter, for the richest flavour. Light brown sugar will work instead of dark brown.
• Eggs – This recipe uses large eggs. These should weigh around 50 grams each out of the shell.
• Flour – We’re using plain flour as we’ll be adding baking powder in ourself. You get a better rise this way, though Christmas cake only needs a tiny amount of baking powder as it’s meant to be quite dense.
• Ground Almonds – Adding almonds adds flavour and moisture to this fruit cake. I like to add a splash of almond extract too, for some extra flavour.
• Baking Powder – Fruit cakes don’t need a lot of baking powder, as they’re meant to be fairly dense and squidgy. For a cake this size, we’re using 1 tsp.
• Salt – The batter for this cake is seasoned with fine table salt, as it mixes in more evenly.
• Zests – Fresh orange and lemon add another layer of flavour to this fruit cake. You’ll need one of each.
• Marzipan and Fondant Icing – The classic way to finish a Christmas cake is with marzipan (almond paste) and white fondant icing. You can get both of these from the supermarket during the festive period.

How To Make A Marmalade Christmas Cake

This Christmas cake is made like a traditional one, the only difference is that this one is baked in a 9″x13″ baking tin instead of a round tin. As a rectangular cake isn’t quite as deep as a round one, this Christmas cake will take around 3 hours to cook instead of 4-5. The rest of the process is still the same.

1. Liqueur Soaked Fruit

Like any Christmas cake, this one starts by soaking the dried fruit in alcohol. Any larger dried fruits (like apricots, figs, etc) will need chopping into smaller pieces, a similar size to the raisins and sultanas.

Once you’ve added all of your fruit into a bowl, you stir in your alcohol of choice (I use Grand Marnier!), cover then leave to soak overnight. Your fruit needs to absorb all of this alcohol, to avoid adding extra moisture to the cake batter so it’s best to let the fruit soak for at least 12 hours.

2. Cake Batter

As this Christmas cake is baked in a 9″x13″ tin, it does need quite a lot of batter. Because of this, you’ll need a big bowl to mix it in. I had planned to use a stand mixer for this but settled with a wooden spoon and some elbow grease! Though you can use an electric hand mixer if you like.

Fruit cake batter starts with creaming softened with sugar and black treacle. Once that’s light and fluffy, you beat in eggs and some almond extract then fold in the dry ingredients (flour, ground almonds, spices, baking powder & salt), followed by the soaked fruit.

3. Low and Slow Bake

Once mixed, the cake batter needs to be transferred into a 9″x13″ baking tin that’s been greased and lined with baking paper. Make sure to use a tin that’s at least 2.5″ deep. Then once you’ve spread the batter out into an even layer, place a greased piece of baking paper on top. This prevents the top from burning and gives a more even bake.

A Christmas cake of this size and depth will take 2½-3 hours to bake at 140°c/284°f. You’ll know when it’s done when a skewer inserted into the centre comes out clean.

4. Initial Feed

The first feed happens as soon as your Christmas cake comes out of the oven, whilst it’s still hot. To do this, poke a few holes in the top with a skewer then pour a generous amount of liqueur all over. The alcohol will sizzle as you do this and will soak in as the cake cools.

5. Cooling and Storage

Once your fruit cake has cooled enough to handle, this will take around 1 hour, carefully invert it out onto a wire cooling rack. The bottom of the cake now becomes the top and this is the side we’ll be feeding and icing.

When your cake has cooled completely, gently wrap it in a piece of baking parchment then cover in a double layer of foil, so that it’s airtight. Due to the size and weight of this traybake Christmas cake, you need to be careful when handling it, so you don’t break it! Now your cake needs to be stored in a cool, dark place until you go to ice it.

Feeding Your Christmas Cake (With Schedule)

Christmas cakes are designed to be made ahead of time, as they need time to mature. This deepens the flavour of the cake and the crumb will get moister due to the dried fruit releasing moisture and the added alcohol that the fruit is fed with.

Ideally, you’ll want to make your Christmas cake at least 1 month before Christmas or up to 3 months before hand, so that it has plenty of time to mature. The traditional date for making your Christmas cake and pudding is Stir Up Sunday which falls on the last Sunday before Advent. Though for this recipe, I’d recommend making yours around 6 weeks before you want to serve it!

How often you feed your Christmas cake depends on how long you’re going to let it mature for. But as a general rule, the total number of feeds should be no more than 4 otherwise you risk overfeeding the cake with alcohol which will make it soggy.

Christmas Cake Feeding Schedule (6 Week Example)

For this Christmas cake, the sweet spot for maturing will be around 6 weeks. Now you don’t need to feed the Christmas cake every single week unless you want to. I’d go with a feed using 1 tbsp of liqueur every other week for this length. If you’re going with 4 weeks, for example you would feed every week.

Week 1 – Making The Cake And 1st Feed

1. Initial Feed – Straight after the cake comes out of the oven.
2. Wrap Once Cool – Once cool, wrap your cake in baking paper and a double layer of foil. Store in a cool dry place (like a cupboard) undisturbed for 2 weeks.

Week 2 – Second Feed

For the second feed, carefully unwrap your Christmas cake then poke a few holes on top with a thin skewer. Spoon 1 tbsp of liqueur (I use Grand Marnier or Brandy) over the top of the cake, letting it soak in. If the alcohol pools on the surface anywhere, use a pastry brush to spread it over the cake.

Once fed, wrap your cake back up with baking parchment and foil then place back into storage. If the baking paper or foil is ripped, make sure to use fresh to keep the fruit cake airtight.

Week 3-4 – Third Feed

1-2 weeks later, repeat the feeding process once more then return to storage. 3 total feeds is sometimes enough but we’ll check the Christmas cake again in 1-2 weeks time.

Week 5 – Stop Feeding Before Icing

The final feed needs to be done no later than 1 week before you plan to top it with marzipan and icing. If the cake is too moist on top, the marzipan won’t stick properly and will slide around. This gives the cake time to dry out slightly on the surface.

At this point, give your cake a look over. If it looks or feels damp on top don’t worry about another feed. If the surface already looks dry, another feed will be fine.

Week 6 – Finishing The Cake With Marzipan And Icing

You’ll need to start finishing the cake at least 1 day before you’re planning on serving it. This is so the marzipan layer can dry out overnight.

Marzipan and Fondant Icing Layers

When I was planning my traybake style Christmas cake, I knew I wanted the marzipan and icing to be just on the top, instead of covering the sides like you would with a classic round one. Icing just the top of your fruit is a whole lot easier than the traditional way of finishing a Christmas cake, mainly as you don’t need to worry about the sides being neat, as the cake is trimmed before serving.

Marzipan

I like to use golden marzipan for my Christmas cakes as I like the contrast you get between the white fondant icing, marzipan and dark fruit cake. In order to get the marzipan to stick to the top of the cake, we’re going to spread a thin layer of marmalade on top first. You’ll need to sieve the marmalade before hand to remove the peel and possibly loosen it off with a splash of hot water if needed.

A Christmas cake of this size uses a 500g block of marzipan which is what is sold in most supermarkets. You simply roll it out on a work surface dusted lightly with icing sugar, into a 5mm thick rectangle that’s slightly bigger than the top of the cake. You gently lay the sheet of marzipan onto the cake then let it air dry for 24 hours. This stops any oil from the almonds leaking into the white icing.

White Fondant Icing

The top layer is the classic white fondant icing. Before rolling, you’ll need to give the icing a gentle knead to make it more pliable. Then the process is the same as with the marzipan. Though instead of marmalade, we brush a very thin layer of white liqueur (like vodka or white rum) or cooled boiled water onto the marzipan to make the icing stick. Once you’ve laid the icing on top of the marzipan, I like to use a small ball of excess icing to massage the top smooth. If you’ve got an icing smoothing tool, this will work too.

To Finish

The fondant icing will stick to the marzipan pretty much immediately though I like to leave it for 10 minutes just to be sure. Then it’s simply a case of lightly trimming the cake’s 4 sides, to so that they are level with the marzipan and icing.

Then you can slice it up however you like! I tend to cut the cake into smaller sections then cut into slices. I’ve found that a sharp serrated knife works best. If you wipe the blade clean after each cut, the icing will stay perfectly white on the sides. Any leftover cake should be wrapped in clingfilm so that it’s airtight.

What To Serve With Christmas Cake

Christmas cake is great served on its own, after your Christmas dinner or as a snack during the holidays. I’m partial to serving my Christmas cakes with a wedge of Wensleydale cheese, which is a festive Yorkshire tradition! Creamy, slightly tangy cheese works perfectly with boozy fruit cake and it doesn’t have to be Wensleydale, a soft cheese like Baron Bigod or a French brie would pair fantastically with Christmas cake too. You could even serve a wedge of Christmas cake on your festive cheeseboard!

I made some cultured butter recently over on my newsletter, which was really nice when slathered onto slices of this Christmas cake. The nutty, salty butter (doesn’t have to be cultured!) helps cut through the richness and sweetness from all that fruit, booze and sugar.

Christmas Cake Tips and Tricks

• Soak the dried fruit in alcohol overnight. This gives the fruit a plumper, juicier texture and the alcohol adds flavour.
• Be careful when handling the baked fruit cake. Due to the size and shape of a tray bake style fruit cake, it’s prone to breaking if you’re not careful!
• Let your Christmas cake mature in a cool dry place (like a cupboard) for 4-6 weeks, for the best flavour. Feeding the fruit cake with liqueur every 1-2 weeks helps preserve the cake and adds flavour.
• This Christmas cake is flavoured with marmalade, so I like to use Grand Marnier (orange liqueur) to soak the fruit and to feed the cake.
• Let the marzipan layer sit uncovered for 24 hours. This dries the top of the marzipan out slightly which prevents oil from the almonds seeping into the white icing.
• Once cut/sliced, wrap your cake in clingfilm to prevent it from drying out.

More Christmas Recipes To Try

• Double Chocolate Peppermint Bark Cookies
• Christmas Rocky Road
• Deep Fried Mince Pies
• Baileys Gingerbread Loaf Cake
• Stollen Buns
• Classic Mince Pies

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