Christmas Cake and Mince Pies

I make the same tried and tested cake mixture every year but I gussy it up differently each time. 

This time I went for stars,  falling snow and gold dust.

The cake is layered with peach, apricot jam or in my case fine cut marmalade as I like that orangey spike. Then a layer of marzipan, any of the supermarkets finest ready to roll but I do prefer the white. Then a layer of fondant. 

This year I dusted the whole cake with edible gold glitter, added white stars and gold hearts, piped little white snow balls and a layered gold star for the centre,

It’s a simmer and stir Christmas cake from the BBC Good Food site. None of that soaking your fruits malarkey you just bung it all in a big saucepan bring it to the boil, simmer for a bit, let it cool down, mix in the dry ingredients, stick it in a cake tin with plenty of greaseproof to protect and “Baaake” as they say on GBBO. I use whisky instead of brandy as my preferred tipple as well. So same cake different décor each year.

The star cutter also came in handy for prettying up the mince pies. Made with a rich and crumbly shortcrust pastry and shop bought mincemeat. I have made my own mincemeat before but the quantity you end with is rather enormous and too much for just us two. If you fancy having a go at making your own I used Delia Smith’s recipe and it turned out lush. PS I just checked out the link and it makes 6lb (2.75kg)! I’d be eating mince pies for the whole year!