Fruit cake recipe (raspberry buckle) & coffee

Fruit cake recipe is meant to impress. It is in human nature that we all (sometimes) want to impress other people. That might not always be as simple as we think but with this fruit cake recipe this is childishly easy.

I regularly read food blogs where people bake such great desserts and I am always impressed. There are so many different recipes. But most of them are often complicated, you need so many (sometimes) hard to get ingredients and a lot of patience and time. OK, I'm not saying this kind of recipes aren't a joy. After all it is making and experimenting that makes baking so interesting, but everything is so much easier with this fruit cake recipe :)

Where is the secret?
- the cake tastes fantastically yummy
- it looks good
- the recipe is really easy to follow (so, you can easily ask your children for some help)
- the required ingredients are your normal lot of kitchen wonders
- gorgeous smell of baking is simply irresistible and stay there for some time
- this cake is one of those truly amazing cakes which pair coffee so well

Although my friends are not really the kind of people that would be over excited with my baking recipes (because, it is much easier to come to my house and have a bite than baking it on your own) but this fruit cake recipe is the rare exception. Everyone wants to have the recipe and I mean everyone.

This is a truly awesome recipe as it can be baked the whole year around with different kinds of seasonal fruits. Fresh strawberries, raspberries, blueberries, apricots, plums, rhubarb and even apples make it absolutely delicious. During the winter time the frozen food can be used as well. The variety is immense!

Sometimes fresh fruit may lack sweetness but cinnamon crumble offsets this in such an elegant way. The taste of cinnamon leaves the sour taste of the fruit behind and prevails in the mouth with all of its exotica.

Fruit cake recipe:

Serves: 8

INGREDIENTS:
- 175g plus 2 rounded tbsp of self-raising flour
- 200g softened butter
- 2 tbsp light muscovado sugar
- 2tsp cinnamon
- 175g caster sugar
- 3 eggs
- 2 tsp vanilla extract
- 1/4 tsp cloves
- 140g fresh or frozen raspberries

- Heat oven to 180C/fan 160C/gas 4. Butter and line the base of an oval ovenproof dish (diameter 30 cm) or a base of a 23 cm square tin.
- For the crumble mix, put in a bowl 2 tbsp of flour and 25g of butter with the muscovado sugar and cinnamon.
- Rub the crumble mix between your fingers until you get damp "breadcrumbs" texture.
- Mix the flour (175g) and remaining butter, caster sugar, eggs, cloves and vanilla in a bowl,..
- ...then beat until well combined.
- Transfer half of the mixture to the oven proof dish and spread raspberries over it.
- Cover the raspberries with remaining mixture, then sprinkle with the crumble mix.
- Bake for 45-50 minutes until light golden, then cool for 10 minutes and remove from the tin.

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Method (step by step):

	STEP 1: Heat oven to 180C/fan 160C/gas 4. Butter and line the base of an oval ovenproof dish (diameter 30 cm) or the base of a 23cm square tin. For the crumble mix, put in a bowl 2 tbsp of flour and 25g of butter with the muscovado sugar and cinnamon.
	STEP 2: Rub between your fingers until you get damp "breadcrumbs" texture.
	STEP 3: Mix the flour (175g) and remaining butter, caster sugar, eggs, cloves and vanilla in a bowl,...
	STEP 4: ...then beat until well combined.
	STEP 5: Transfer half of the mixture to the oven proof dish and spread raspberries over it. In this case I used frozen raspberries.
	STEP 6: Cover the raspberries with remaining mixture, then sprinkle with the crumble mix.
	STEP 7: Bake for 45-50 minutes until light golden, then cool for 10 minutes and remove from the tin.

Our coffee choice for fruit cake recipe - Raspberry buckle:

cappuccino
espresso
cafe latte
Turkish coffee

What a match, oh boy what a match!

It really makes it difficult to find the best coffee choice for this fruit cake recipe. While espresso and Turkish coffee crown the flavor of cinnamon, cappuccino and even more so cafe latte get a whole new deeply full taste of coffee. This is, as far as I am concerned, one of the best yummy coffee and food combinations ever.

Useful baking tips:

If you use frozen raspberries do not thaw them before using them.
Make sure, that fresh raspberries should not be soft and mushy and packaging shouldn't have stains and be moist (e.g. condensation).
How to wash raspberries: Just rinse them under water and nothing else.
When the fruit cake is baked it should rest for at least 20 minutes (10 minutes in the tin plus 10 more minutes minimum). Freshly baked fruit cake is very soft and fragile but it might be difficult to resist.
You can change this fruit cake recipe by adding different sort of fruits. Blueberries, strawberries, rhubarb, apricots are all suitable.

Good to know:

Eating a diet rich in raspberries may help to reduce your risk of several types of cancers.
Raspberries are very nutritious fruit full of vitamins and minerals. They contain ellagic acid which may prevent cancer.
There are over 200 species of raspberries (I mean, can you imagine that).
Raspberry plant leaves are used for making herbal tea. This tea could be effective in regulating the menstrual cycle.
In my opinion fruit cake recipes are the easiest to bake. You can bake them all year around and experiment with different kinds of seasonal fruit.

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