I made this Christmas cake with a twist (Yes! It has chocolate in it:) during New Year break. Though I enjoy watching Nigella's shoes on the telly, but I have never really tried out any of her recipes. Hubby has placed an order for a fruity rummy christmas cake well in advance, so I decided not to disappoint him and baked her famous Choco X'mas cake for New Year's. I did not follow her recipe to the T, but have tweaked based on preference and availability. The result was soo amazing that I still can't believe that I had myself baked the cake in my puny oven:)
I found the recipe from here after reading praises on her website as well as other blogs. The only changes I made were in the ingredients: Nigella has specified prunes, raisins and currants as the dried fruits for the cake. I used chopped almonds, cashews, cherries, dates, raisins and currants (keeping the same total quantity). Since I did not find any coffee liqeour in the market, instead I used dark rum and soaked the chopped fruits overnight.
The aroma when the cake was baking was simply overwhelming...therapeutic should describe it aptly:)
So this cake was not just a traditional christmas cake, but also healthy and tasty...also not very difficult to bake. Just remember to plan well in advance so that all the ingredients are with you.
Happy Baking!!
