Mum: How come you get to come first in the title?

L: Because I’m awesome.

Mum: And I am …?

L: Do you really want me to answer that?

Mum: Hmmm. Perhaps not.

L: Anyway, you should be asking how come the cake comes last. It’s the most important thing here.

Mum: Aaahhh …

Here’s the story. Yesterday, I decided to clear out my baking cupboard. I found … golden and flame raisins (left over from the Haroseth I made for a school Passover meal), cranberries (left over from something I definitely made to do with cranberries), dates (left over from a sticky toffee pudding I made for Boxing Day), apricots (left over from the jewelled rice we also ate on Boxing Day). These all went into a large casserole pan. The dried mango-that-went-out-of-date went into the bin.

I hunted around the kitchen and came up with three clementines, a lemon, a lime, a bottle of whisky and a bottle of sherry. I added the fruit juices and good glugs of alcohol to the pan. I stirred in some molasses sugar, light muscovado sugar, vegetable suet, cinnamon, ginger and mace, then put the whole pot in the oven for three hours.

Mincemeat!

Now … over to L for the rest of the story ….

Mum didn’t know what to do with all the mincemeat that was left over so I said, “I love mince pies, but I’ve had a lot of them lately. Maybe we could put them into something else I really love like… fruit cake! So that is how it came into being – ME! Mum said shed. No, that looks wrong. Try again. Mum said she’d (that’s better) make up a recipe if I took some photos. I told her she looked like she had a long neck like a giraffe in the jumper she was wearing, so she’d have to change if she wanted me to take any photos of her. Mum said she didn’t want photos of HER … she wanted photos of THE CAKE. I said whatevs and she went to change.

Ha mum, a photo of you!

So, I took a photo of Mum with some eggs …

… Mum mixing up some batter …

… Mum with a pile of dirty dishes …

… and oh, look! There’s me!

Made with Love Fruitcake

3 1/2 oz unsalted butter
7 oz golden caster sugar
4 large eggs
10 1/2 oz self-raising flour
14 oz mincemeat

Preheat the oven to 180 degrees C.

Grease and line an 8″ square baking pan.

Cream the butter and sugar, then beat in the eggs. Fold in the flour and mincemeat until evenly combined.

Scrape the batter into the prepared pan and level the top.

Bake in the centre of the oven for 35 to 45 minutes until golden brown, risen and springy to touch.

Turn out and cool on a wire rack.

Serve as slices of cake with glasses of sherry … or with dollops of custard or ice cream for a pudding.