Tuesday 11 December 2012

Spiced Christmas Wreath Bundt

Spiced Christmas Wreath Bundt
After years of pining, I recently joined the Women's Institute. I need to get a few things clear before I continue:

  • They welcomed us with open arms, despite many of them being old enough to be our grandmothers
  • They were very excited about younger ladies joining
  • They are not all superb bakers
  • They don't really make jam
  • They like to make a difference to our community
  • They raise money for charity
  • They are not fascists
  • Yes, we do sing Jerusalem
  • They love a knees up

This month's meeting was a Jacob's Feast. If you've never heard of this notion, it basically means everyone brings some food and we all make pigs of ourselves! Not one to put myself under pressure... I decided to make a cake. For the WI. Of whom I have only been a member for three months. Nutter.

I decided to make a festive wreath cake packed with spices and Christmas cheer! I'm delighted to say that they loved it! You have no idea what the internal sigh of relief was like! Although, one lady did get in trouble for cutting it into lots of slices before they had all had chance to look at it...

Again, this can be made in any standard sized bundt tin.

Ingredients:
  • 250g unsalted butter, softened
  • 650g golden caster sugar
  • 5 medium free range eggs - beaten
  • 250ml milk
  • 2 tsp vanilla extract
  • 1 tsp lemon extract
  • 400g plain flour
  • 1/2 tsp bicarbonate of soda
  • 1/2 tsp salt
  • 1 tsp mixed spice
  • 4 tsp cinnamon
  • 2 tsp mixed spice
  • 1 tsp ginger
  • 1/2 tsp ground nutmeg
  • 1/4 tsp ground cloves
  • Icing sugar for dusting

Method:
  1. Grease and flour a standard sized bundt tin (10 inches, 10 cups or 2.4 litres). I used a lovely Nordic Ware festive wreath!
  2. Mix the butter and sugar until it is well combined. It might not look fluffy as there is so much sugar in it. Oops. This does mean it gets a fantastic sugar crust though...
  3. Add the eggs one at a time
  4. Add the extracts to the milk.
  5. In a separate bowl, sift the flour, spices, salt and bicarbonate of soda. 
  6. Fold 1/3 of the dry mix to the main bowl, followed by 1/2 of the liquid. Repeat until all the ingredients are used up.
  7. Give the whole thing a quick whizz until it is all combined.
  8. Pour the mix into the tin and give a sharp whack on the worktop to rid it of bubbles! 
  9. Bake for 1 hour 20 minutes at gas 3/160 C, turning after an hour.
  10. The cake should be shrinking from the sides of the tin, dark brown in appearance and a skewer should come out clean.
  11. Once cooked through leave the cake to cool in the tin fully. I mean fully. It sometimes needs a quick loosen with a knife to ease it out. 
  12. When cooled dust with icing sugar to decorate.

BloggersPlease respect the fact I am sharing my own ideas and recipe. Blood, sweat and many tears have gone into getting this right, so you may enjoy a perfect bundt. If you wish to re-blog a recipe from these variations, please credit my blog and link to this original post rather than pasting the recipe on your own page. 
Please see my Creative Commons Copyright information for more details. Thank you.

Please leave your comments below... x

Join my blog friends: Join Dolly
Join me on Facebook
Tweet me @dollybakes

Have a nosy at my pics on Pinterest 

9 comments:

  1. I've just joined my local WI too. I did worse than you, I baked a cake to takee first meeting I went to. Not just a vic sandwich or coffee cake, I tried to be clever, innovative - staid mre like! I baked a pistachio and courgette cake, it's lovely but when the average membership age is 75, perhaps not such a good idea!!!

    Hope you continue to enjoy yours, I love mine, it's like I've got a dozen new mums!!!

    Love your blog too by the way!

    ReplyDelete
  2. Ohhhh I think the WI is fantastic and I love your cake that you took along :-) x

    ReplyDelete
  3. I think older people are so much fun to be around! I love to listen to the stories that they tell. I miss my Nana so much! I use to watch her when I had school vacations and my Aunts were working, but she thought she was taking care of me. Lol.
    Wow, imagine my surprise when I saw two bundt cakes in a row and those cute little gingerbread people. I make a wreath bundt cake every year for the holidays too! It's so much fun and I don't have to put the frosting on the side of the plate. Haha.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. They are such lovely ladies. We love having a chat with them!

      Delete
  4. Wow, your bundt looks incredible! You should be proud of it :) x

    ReplyDelete
  5. Cake looks fabulous. I've been a WI member for about 6 months after being invited to do talks at a few. The group I belong to are all around 30-40 and I'm doing a biscuit decorating class with them in April.

    ReplyDelete

Related Posts Plugin for WordPress, Blogger...