If one were to look around, you would find every baker with his/her own special recipe for a fruit cake. But it is not very often that you will find one which has a tea flavour to it! The aroma of tea leaves lends a unique taste to this delicious fruit cake and will have guests wondering about the secret ingredient to this fruit cake.
Ingredients
Tea bags – 8 pcs
Water – 300 ml; boiling hot
Mixed dried fruit – 500 gms
Self-rising flour – 500 gms
Butter – 325 gms
Caster sugar – 250 gms
Mixed spices – 2 tsp; ground coarsely
Eggs – 5 pcs
Salt – 1 tsp
Method
- Place the tea bags in a large bowl and pour the boiling hot water on them.
- Stir to make a very strong tea liquor.
- Add the mixed dried fruit and stir well.
- Leave to soak overnight as this will impart more of the tea flavour to the fruit.
- On the following morning, remove the tea bags, give the fruits a stir and keep aside.
- Pre-heat oven to 175°C.
- Grease and line a nine inch springform cake tin. Keep aside.
- Add the flour and butter in a large bowl and use your fingers to rub the fat into the flour until evenly distributed and the mix looks like breadcrumbs.
- Add the sugar and mixed spices and stir well.
- Add the eggs and the soaked fruit, along with any remaining liquid and stir well till evenly combined.
- Pour the mixture into the prepared cake tin and level the top.
- Bake for around an hour or until the cake is risen and is golden in colour.
- Remove from the oven when a skewer inserted into the middle of the cake comes out clean.
- Put on a wire rack to cool. Cut into slices and serve.
You can soak the mixed fruits in orange juice to get a fruity flavour. Alternatively, with Christmas around the corner, you could soak them in rum and make a quick Christmas cake!
