Simnel Traybake
This delicious fruit cake is traditionally made at Easter Tide. It is a little fiddly to produce, as it requires several distinct stages but the end result is a wonderfully moist cake with a subtle spicy flavour and a lovely crunchy topping, so it is well worth the effort.
The baking tray recommended for this quantity of cake mix is 20cm x 30cm. My tray is about ¾ of the size – I have a larger one, but it is not deep enough, so I compromise by filling my smaller tray to the required depth, then making buns in paper cases with the remaining mix. Lightly grease the baking tray and line it with baking parchment.
The raisin/sultana/dried apricot mix is soaked overnight to fluff up the dried fruits and make them more succulent. You require a 450g block of marzipan for this recipe, but I have given the ingredients in separate sections, as there is marzipan in all three stages.
I use a food processor to make the sponge cake element of this cake, the method being as though the finished objective would be a Victoria sponge.
Ingredients for the body of the cake
- 300g mixed dried fruit – I used sultanas, flame raisins, cranberries, glacé cherries and chopped peel
- 100g dried apricots chopped up
- 2 oranges - zested and juiced. Add the orange zest and the juice from a single orange to soak the dried fruit and apricots overnight. Reserve the juice of the second orange for the icing glaze
- 3 large or 4 small eggs *
- 200g self-raising flour
- ¾ tsp baking powder
- 2 tsp mixed spice
- 1 tsp cinnamon
- 1 tsp ground nutmeg
- ¾ tsp baking powder
- 200g soft light brown sugar
- 200g mix of butter and marge
- 50g ground almonds
- 200g marzipan, cut into small cubes
Put the remainder of the marzipan in the fridge as you will be grating it in the next stage.
*My gauge to quantities is the weight of the eggs as a baseline, then flour, butter and sugar in the same quantities as the eggs. I found that 3 large eggs from our local community shop weighed 203g. If the weight was greater or lesser, I would have increased or decreased the quantities of flour, fats and sugar proportionately.
Oven temperature Gas Mark 3, 160o standard oven or 140o fan-assisted.
Add the spices and ground almonds to the flour and baking powder. Mix thoroughly with a metal spoon. (Reserve about a tablespoonful to coat the dried fruit).
In a separate bowl, beat the eggs.
In the food processor, whizz up the sugar and fats until they are soft and very well blended. Next add the beaten egg, a bit at a time, blending thoroughly, adding a spoonful of flour and spices mix, then the rest of the flour in one go, beating thoroughly. Now transfer the blended sponge mix to a large mixing bowl.
Shake the saved amount of ground almonds and flour over the dried fruit mix and stir to coat – this helps prevent all the fruit simply sinking to the bottom of the mix during cooking. Add the marzipan and dried fruit to the sponge mix, making sure everything is well combined. Now put the mixture into the baking tray but don’t fill it too full as it will rise well and the crunchy topping is added near the end of the baking time. Smooth the top roughly with a fork.
It is now ready to go in the oven, on the middle shelf. Set the timer for 40 mins remembering that if your oven bakes on the hot side, it will take less time. If necessary, you can increase the initial baking time for a few minutes.
Once baked, remove from the oven and poke with a knife or similar, to check that it is cooked. If it seems a little underdone, it will finish cooking when the crunchy topping is added to it.
If your baking tray is not big enough to accommodate the whole mixture, add a tablespoonful of orange juice to the remaining mix to make it slightly less thick, then put spoonfuls of mix into individual paper cups. These will cook much more quickly than the dense mass in the baking tray –15 mins or so will suffice to cook them. Put the bun tray on the top shelf.
Crunchy topping
- 50g butter or hard margarine
- 50g soft light brown sugar
- 100g plain flour
- 50g ground almonds
- 50g whole unblanched almonds chopped coarsely
- 150g grated marzipan
- 2 dessertspoons runny honey, warmed so it is very liquid. If no honey, use golden syrup
Put the flour, sugar and ground almonds in a bowl. Grate in the butter or marge and rub it in lightly, so the mix resembles breadcrumbs as if making pastry. Stir in the chopped almonds, then add the grated marzipan, stirring all this together roughly with a fork. Warm the honey – it must be as runny as possible, and stir it quickly through the dried mix – the topping should be as crumbly as possible, avoid ending up with a sticky lump. If it seems too coagulated, add more ground almonds, mixing in with a fork. Sprinkle this crumbly mixture over the top of the tray bake (and buns, if applicable). Return this to the oven for several minutes, keeping an eye on it, so it becomes golden and toasty in appearance.
While the crumble topping is cooking, form the remaining marzipan into round balls. Traditionally, there were only 11 marzipan balls, to represent the faithful Apostles.
When the baking process is complete, remove the tray and buns and put the marzipan balls on the top of each potential slice, and one on each bun if you have made these as well. Add the marzipan before the cake cools completely, so it sets in place.
For the glaze
- 85g – 100g sifted icing sugar
- 2 – 3 tbsp orange juice
Pour over the cake in zigzags.
Now, try to resist eating this before Easter Sunday!