How to Store and Feed a Christmas Cake (and Keep Your Pudding)

A rich fruit cake improves with keeping, which is why so many families bake their Christmas cake weeks ahead. What matters is how you wrap it, where you keep it, and how much you feed it.

Wrapping the cake

1. Let the cake cool completely in its tin.
2. Leave the baking paper on, or wrap it in a fresh double layer of baking paper.
3. Wrap that in foil. Keep the paper between the cake and the foil, because the fruit can react with foil in direct contact.
4. Store in an airtight cake tin somewhere cool and dry, not the fridge.

Feeding

• Prick the top with a skewer and spoon over 1 to 2 tablespoons of brandy, whisky or rum.
• Feed it every week or two, then wrap it back up.
• Stop a week before you add marzipan, so the top is dry enough for it to stick.
• For an alcohol-free cake, feed with orange juice or cold tea, but keep it for days rather than weeks, as it will not keep as well.

Marzipan and icing

Marzipan the cake about a week before Christmas and leave it to dry for a few days before icing, so the oil in the marzipan does not stain the icing. Once cut, keep the cake in its tin with the cut side covered with baking paper.

Christmas pudding

Keep a homemade pudding in its basin, wrapped, in a cool, dark cupboard, and follow your recipe for how long it keeps. On the day, steam it again until hot all the way through. Serve with brandy butter.

Baking yours? See our Christmas cake, Christmas pudding and Dundee cake, and line the tin with baking paper.

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