Eggless Non Alcoholic Christmas Cake

How can I not share a Christmas Cake recipe during this season? I have already shared the recipe of the Christmas Cake that I have watched my mom make always and also an Eggless Christmas Cake recipe. So what next? Well, both these recipes use dried fruits soaked in rum or wine. And these fruits have to be soaked in advance so that they soak in all the flavours. But if you have not planned it earlier and still want to bake a Christmas Cake, then this Non Alcoholic version is something you should try. And this one is eggless too!

Months before Christmas, the preparation for soaking of dried fruits start at my place. In fact, the longer you soak the fruits, the better. So nobody is stopping you from soaking the fruits for next year now itself..:) I soak all the soft fruits first and a couple of weeks before I plan to bake, I add in the nuts like cashews and almonds. But with this non-alcoholic version, you can soak the fruits in fruit juice just before you start preparing the cake batter.

When making any cake, it is always best to get a couple of things out of your way before you move on to making the batter. Keep out all the ingredients and make sure it is all at room temperature (unless a particular recipe specifies otherwise), measure the ingredients and keep it, sift the dry together if needed, line your baking time with parchment paper and grease it and finally pre heat your oven. If you spend 10 minutes to ensure all these steps are done, then not only will you be able to make the batter quickly, but also the chances of making mistakes while mixing the batter will be lesser – as some of the cake recipes can be pretty unforgiving!

Eggless Non Alcoholic Christmas Cake

Course: CakesDifficulty: Moderate

Servings

4

servings

Prep time

25

minutes

Cooking time

1

hour 

Total time

1

hour 

25

minutes

An eggless and no-alcohol Christmas Cake recipe which you can prepare at the last minute!

Ingredients

• For soaking

• Orange or Apple Juice – ¼ cup

• Golden raisins – 25 gms

• Black raisins – 25 gms

• Candied Orange Peel – 10-12 gms

• Candied Ginger Peel – 10-12 gms

• Chopped Cashews – 40 gms

• Chopped Almonds -40 gms

• For the cake batter

• Butter – 75 gms, soft at room temperature

• Sugar – ¼ cup + 2 tbsp

• Buttermilk – ¼ cup

• All Purpose Flour – 2/3 cup

• Baking Powder – ½ tsp

• Cake Spice Mix – ½ tsp

• Salt – a pinch

• Vanilla Essence – ½ tsp

• Caramelized Sugar – ¼ cup sugar with 2 tbsp hot water

Directions

• Heat the orange or apple juice till it starts simmering. Turn off the heat and add all the chopped dried fruits that you are using in the cake to it and mix well. Keep it aside to cool down.
• Preheat the oven at 170C for 15 min. Line a 6-inch cake tin with parchment paper.
• In a pan, add the sugar and heat it till it melts and turns a golden-brown color. The darker the color, more bitter the caramel. As it starts bubbling and frothing up, add the hot water to stop further cooking of the caramel and take it off heat. Keep this aside for cooling. You can prepare the caramel ahead and store it as well.
• In a bowl, whisk together the butter and sugar till creamy and smooth. Add the buttermilk to this and whisk well.
• Mix together the flour, baking powder, cake spice mix and salt. Fold in these dry ingredients to the cake batter.
• Once all the dry ingredients are well incorporated in the batter, add the vanilla essence and cooled caramel and mix well. To this, add the soaked fruits and mix.
• Pour the batter into the lined cake tin. Bake it at 170C for 60-70 min till the top looks done and a skewer inserted comes out clean. Let the cake cool down completely before slicing.

Recipe Video