The sweetest thing

Today hasn't been the easiest of days. The whole overground train network is down after a computer system failure with many people stranded and a few unlucky ones stuck in tunnels. Lack of information meant I waited 25 minutes on a cold platform before giving up and cancelling all other arrangements. Still, it wasn't all bad; stopping off to do some Christmas shopping and finding time to braise a red cabbage (recipe coming up soon). We're down to the last of the sweet stuff and between you and me, I'm relieved. After a day of excess on Tuesday with all those cookies and then snow topped spice cake for breakfast yesterday I'm off sugar for the rest of the week in an attempt to detox a little in time for the festivities. That doesn't mean I can't write about it though. The mince pies turned out great thanks to my friend S. who suggested using Pflanzenfett instead of shortening for the pastry as you can't get it over here. I can't say it tastes exactly the same but it brings the necessary lightness and crispness which you can't achieve with all butter.

The orangettes couldn't be simpler and will make everywhere smell of warm citrus fruit and chocolate, the very essense of Christmas, no? Thanks to the lovely Susan of Bricolage and Giulia Geranium (two of my favourite blogs so please check them out) for giving me the idea to make them.

Mincemeat

Until a few days ago, I never understood the mania for making mincemeat yourself. I'd always found really good shop stuff which we added some extra brandy to and even an article in the Guardian about the virtues of the homemade variety failed to convince me. In Berlin though finding mincemeat isn't all that easy; I was delighted to come across some at Galeria Kaufhof by Wilkin and Son, although at more than €3 a jar, you might curb your mince pie ambition. Yet when I used it in the cheesecake I was somehow disappointed with the flavour and decided to take the plunge and make my own. It turned out to be amazingly simple; if you've got plenty of time, combinig the ingredients overnight to let the flavours blend might be a good idea but it's not essential. I also noticed that with the homemade kind the individual ingredients are much easier to taste rather than the usual fruity mass.

Recipe adapted from a mix of those by David Lebovitz and Nigella Lawson's How to be a Domestic Goddess.

Makes 600g

2 medium sized cooking or sharp apples (boskop/russets/canadiens gris are good), peeled and cut into quarters

juice and zest of an unwaxed lemon

125g raisins

125g sultanas

50g glacé cherries, roughly chopped

50g blanched almonds, chopped into thin slivers

2 tablespoons brandy

125g soft, dark sugar

1/2 teaspoon mixed spice

1/2 teaspoon cinnamon

2 x 300g jam jars

In a large saucepan, dissolve the sugar in the lemon juice over a low heat. Add the chopped apples and all the other ingredients, except for the brandy. Simmer gently for about half an hour until the mixture has become very soft and slightly liquid. Remove from the heat and leave to cool a little before stirring in the brandy. Spoon into sterilised jars (see note below) and cover the tops with a wax disc.

To sterilise jars you can either put them in the dishwasher and remove them when clean but still warm or otherwise wash them in soapy water, dry thoroughly and place in an oven at 180°C for 5 minutes.

Mince pies (from Nigella Lawson's How to be a Domestic Goddess)

Makes around 24

300g plain flour, sifted

75g shortening/ Trex or Pflanzenfett in Germany

75g cold, unsalted butter

juice of 1 orange

a pinch of salt

600g mincemeat (see recipe above)

some icing sugar to dust over

1. Sift the flour into a small bowl and using a teaspoon, add small dollops of the shortening and butter. Rub in a little with your fingers and place the bowl in the freezer for 20 minutes.

2. Mix the orange juice and salt in a little jug and chill in the fridge for 20 minutes.

3. When the time is up, tip the flour and fat into a food processor and pulse until you have crumbs like rolled oats. Drizzle in the orange juice a little at a time through the funnel and continue to pulse until the mixture is just beginning to stick together. Remove the dough from the food processor and on a floured work surface, knead it a little with your hands until it forms a ball. Divide into two discs, wrap in plastic and chill in the fridge for another 20 minutes.

4. Preheat the oven to 200°C.

5. When the time is up, roll each disc out as thinly as possible but not so thin that it breaks or won't support the filling. Using a 6-7cm round cutter, cut out circles in the pastry and gently place each one into the pie mould, pressing down a little so they're even. Fill each one with a generous teaspoonful of mincemeat as nobody like a dry mince pie. When you've cut out enough circles for the base, roll the pastry out again and cut out the tops using a star shaped cutter, placing each one lightly on top of the mincemeat.

6. Bake in the oven for 10-15 minutes, checking that they don't burn. Leave the pies in the tins for a minute or two as it makes them easier to remove and transfer to a cooling rack. Dredge with icing sugar before serving.

Orangettes (from Smitten Kitchen)

3 large organic oranges

water for boiling

250ml water + 225g sugar for the syrup

400g dark chocolate (I used 70% Lindt)

1. Slice the tops off the tops off the oranges and with a shap knife, score the peel from one end to the other and remove. Cut the peel into thin strips and trim the edges to make them neat.

2. Place the strips a large pan of boiling water for 5 minutes, drain and throw the water away as it will contain bitter juices. Boil a fresh lot of water and place the strips in it for another five minutes. This step removes the bitter taste.

3. Make the syrup by mixing together the 250ml water and 225g sugar and bringing it to a gentle simmer, Tip in the peels and cook for about an hour, checking back from time to time that the pan hasn't run dry.

4. Remove and transfer to a wire rack to cool and dry out. I placed a piece of baking parchment underneath to collect the sticky drips.

5. When they're cool, melt the chocolate in a double boiler or in the microwave, stopping to stir every 30 seconds with the latter. Using a fork, dip each strip of peel in the chocolate and leave to set on a baking tray covered with parchment. When the chocolate has set, store them in a metal tin.

All about cake

One of things I dread most during the holiday season in Britain is visiting someone and being offered a slice of Christmas cake. Often dry or dense fruit cake covered with a layer of shop bought marzipan and some thick fondant icing like concrete. Even the smallest piece sits in your stomach like a lead weight and unlike in Germany you can't refuse it and say you don't really like such cakes but have to smile over every forkful and compliment your hostess. Thankfully there are lighter alternatives which also have the advantage of not needing to be made weeks in advance. If you do have your heart set on a fruit cake though, might I suggest a Dundee cake like the one P.K made? She recommends the recipe from Delia Online here for a lighter kind of cake.

Here are my suggestions for three different cakes to serve at Christmas.

When I saw Nigel Slater's mincemeat cheesecake recipe, my first reaction that it couldn't possibly work. Surely the flavours wouldn't blend well with the cream cheese or it would simply overwhelm everything else. Yet I couldn't resist the urge to test it and to my surprise it's a real winner. The buttery taste of the base with digestive bicuits, the creaminess and then the fruit make it something special and a little more original than just simply bringing out another batch of mince pies. A couple of points though; the recipe calls for 300g of digestive biscuits for the base but I found it didn't need half that amount and even then it came out much thicker than I'd normally like so I'd suggest using about a third. The second point is that you might not want to serve this cake to your, er, German friends. One student told me it was different which is of course a polite way of saying it isn't really your cup of tea while another friend compared the taste of mincemeat to Worchester sauce which is certainly original (although saying that, the other person who tried it really loved it.)

Mincemeat cheesecake (from a recipe by Nigel Slater in the Guardian)

For the base

100g digestive biscuits

65g unsalted butter, melted

For the filling

600g full fat cream cheese

100g brown sugar

4 medium eggs

zest of a small orange

a teaspoon vanilla extract

300g sour cream

1 jar of mincemeat (around 310g, I found that the 200g in the original recipe wasn't enough) or better still, make your own. I'll be posting a recipe for homemade mincemeat this week but Delia's is also wonderful

For a 26cm springform tin lined with baking parchment to prevent the base from sticking

1. Melt the butter in saucepan or in the microwave. Place the biscuits in a food processor and pulse a few times until you have fine crumbs (alternatively you can place the biscuits in a strong plastic bag and crush with a rolling pin). Mix the butter with the crumbs and transfer to the springform tin. Pat the crumbs down a little but not too strongly (to avoid having a thick crust). Place the tin in the freezer for 20 minutes to set.

2. Preheat the oven to 140° and begin making the filling. In a large bowl, beat the cream cheese and sugar together until smooth. Add the eggs one at a time, blending in thoroughly before adding the next one. Mix in the vanilla extract and orange zest, then the sour cream. Finally stir in the mincemeat gently until only just incorporated.

3. Remove the springform from the freezer and place it on a baking tray. Pour in the cheescake mixture and bake for one hour. The middle will probably feel a little wobbly but that's perfectly normal. After one hour, switch off the oven and leave the cheesecake in there with the door closed for another hour.

4. Take it out of the oven, let it stand in the tin until cool then transfer to a plate and leave overnight in the fridge. If you don't do this, your cheesecake will not set properly. Grate a little more orange zest and scatter some biscuit crumbs over the top if you like.

Few things seem to represent Christmas as much as cranberries. Their rich, gleaming colours and sourness so perfect for jam and cakes. I've seen the upside down cake with them in quite a few places, most recently on Barbara's blog but was keen to have a plain cake with them inside which proved more difficult to find. Joy the Baker has a lovely recipe for a cranberry streusel coffee cake which would be perfect for teatime or after a large main course as a lighter dessert. The streusel with brown sugar and oats is irresistable and it's amazingly airy and light.

Cranberry streusel coffee cake from Joy the Baker (recipe here)

My favourite festive cake of all though is this snow topped spice cake from Nigella Lawson. I posted the recipe last year but you can find it again here. This morning I took it into my morning class since this is my last week at work before my holiday and was really pleased how much everyone liked it. It's spicy enough with cinnamon, ginger and cardamom and sweet with lemon icing but manages to be as light as a feather and satisfyingly squidgy in the middle. Best of all, it's incredibly simple. This will be the one I'm making for my family at Christmas.

Snow topped spice cake (slightly adapted from Nigella Lawson's How to be a Domestic Goddess)

For the cake

4 large eggs, separated, plus 2 extra large egg whites
125ml vegetable oil
125ml water
2 tbsp runny honey
100g dark muscovado sugar
75g ground almonds
150g plain flour
2 tsps baking powder
1 tsp bicarbonate of soda
pinch of salt
1 tsp ground ginger
1 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp all-spice
1/4 tsp ground cloves
zest of 1/2 an orange
100g caster sugar

For the icing

juice of 2 lemons

150g icing sugar, sifted

1. Preheat the oven to 180°C.

2. Whisk together the yolks and oil, then add the water, honey and dark muscovado sugar. Add the almonds, flour, baking powder, bicarb, spices and zest, folding in gently.

3. In another bowl, beat the egg whites until stiff and then gradually add the pinch of salt.

4. Fold the whites into the cake mixture, and pour into a greased and lined Springform tin. Bake for 45 minutes, or until the cake is springy on top and beginning to shrink away from the sides. Let the cake cool in its tin on a rack for 25 minutes before turning it out.

To make the icing; sift the icing sugar into a bowl and add the lemon juice. Stir until smooth. Add more sugar/juice as necessray, depending on how thick or runny you like your icing. Spread on the cake with a palette knife and leave to set. The cake keeps well for a few days and also freezes (uniced) beautifully.