Ever since I can remember, my Nanna would make a Christmas Fruit Cake for each of her children every year - my dad, his brother and sister. Unfortunately my Nanna passed away last year. Christmas 2012 there was no Christmas cake and we still had an empty chair and candle for where she would have been sitting on Christmas day.
My aunty was going through some of her books and things at the beginning of this year and came across the recipe book - well diary from the 1960's where she had stuck in recipes she had collected over time. Known to have done a bit of baking in the past, the book was passed on to me. And so was the roll of making the families annual Christmas Cake.
So I converted the ingredient quantities from the Imperial System in which she had hand written them at that time to the Metric System and started the three day process of making enough cakes for the family. Day 1involved combining all the fruit together and covering in brandy to let soak for 24hrs.
Each cake needed 4 hours in a low temp oven, and you could only cook one at a time. So Day 2 I made two separate cake batters, managed to get one cooked and out of the over before I had to go to work, and had the second prepared and in the tin for when my mum got home. I had written her clear instructions of what time it had to go into the oven so that it would be close to ready when I got home from work and training later that night.
Finally Day 3 and I made and baked one more cake, got them all out of their tins and wrapped up in glad wrap now ready to sit for around 3 weeks. So I am thankful for being able to keep this family tradition alive even without my Nanna still with us, and for the trust my family has in me to maintain this tradition.
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