Recipe: Christmas Cake - Stages 2 and 3

Stage 2 - Feeding the cake:

This stage of my Christmas cake making was pretty simple - feed your cake.  I made an alcohol free cake, not for any reason apart from the fact that I didn't have any brandy in the house and also loooove the flavour of earl grey.  

I dribbled a tablespoon of earl grey over the cake once a week for the 3 weeks prior to Christmas. 

Stage 2 done.

Stage 3 - Decorating the cake (the fun bit!):

I cheated with decorating the cake and have to admit that I made neither the Marzipan nor the Royal Icing.  I bought both from ASDA and am hoping (having never made a Christmas cake before)that these are as tasty as if I had made them. 

To get the marzipan to stick to the cake, and add an extra bit of Christmas flavour, heat a bit of marmalade mixed with water and brush this all over the cake.

I love the marzipan layer on an Xmas cake and have heard a good way to add a bit more is to cover the cake in a thin layer, but then add another disc of marzipan just to the top of the cake.

Once the marzipan is on it's time for the icing and making things look pretty.  I'm not a fan of royal icing so I rolled mine as thin as possible. 

A tip for the marzipan and Icing - once you have rolled it out, fold it over your rolling pin to lift it over the cake as this will prevent it from stretching too much as you lift it.

You can make your decorations as simple or extravagant as you want.  I went simple this year for my first year, with just thin icing snowflakes, glued into place with marmalade.

Christmas cake - Done!

60 Minute Hall Make Over

I felt totally inspired on Friday to do something a bit different with the house.

I think that the entrance hall is important and for the last 4 years that I've been in my house it's totally been missed.

The walls are covered in gross artex, but this would be a huge job to get rid of so I realised that there were a few little touches that would make the hall look more inviting without having to do a major re haul!

I replaced the light bulb (it's been out for over a year!), made a photo montage of wedding pics, painted the end wall pink to add a bit of warmth, added some fab pink and white paper pompoms (Martha Stewart website has a good description of how to make these), and stacked my Country Living, The Simple Things and wedding magazines in the alcove.

To finish it off my 'Christmas Cookie' Yankee Candle has been lit every day and is making the house smell glorious.