Dundee Cake
This Dundee style fruit cake is delicious and best accompanied with a slice of really good cheddar cheese. When I took my son to Bristol airport one day, I decided to visit the Cheddar Gorge on the way home and buy some ‘real’ cheddar cheese. Of course I then needed to find a fruit cake recipe and opted for Mary Berry’s easy Dundee cake recipe.
Dundee cake is a full flavoured fruit cake but lighter than Christmas Cake and can be a good substitute if you find the latter a bit too rich and heavy
It is very much an all in one cake where all the basic ingredients go in together first (flour, butter, eggs, sugar) and are simply mixed. Then the fruit is added and you are ready to go.
The fruit is much less dense that in a more traditional Christmas Cake and it is a good option for those that don’t like the over rich fruit cake. You can always add some mixed spice or nutmeg to the mix too. Of course it can’t be iced – so it depends whether you like icing.
Why Dundee Cake?
It seems the name was coined by the Keiller family when they produced this cake in the 18th century. There is now an application to give the name protected status. If this is granted only cakes baked within a certain postcode will be entitled to be called a Dundee cake.
Cheddar Cheese
Back to my trip to the Cheddar Gorge – I had forgotten just how spectacular the Cheddar Gorge is, and it was wonderful to drive through. The area of shops does feel a bit ‘touristy’ and a bit spoilt but never the less there is plenty of locally made cheddar on sale and it is possible to taste the wide number of varieties, some depending on the maturity some on flavouring such as port (very yummy!).
The best cheese deserves the best fruit cake!
Best Fruit Cake Recipe
Below is the recipe I used, adapted from Mary Berry’s recipe in Mary Berry’s Complete Cookbook
It is just a little simpler, excluding candied peel and suggesting mixed fruit that you have from sultanas, raisins and currants. You can buy mixed fruit too so if you don’t have any in your cupboards it means your outlay is less.
Cooking Notes
You will need a 20cm /(8inch) deep loose bottomed cake tin
Dundee Cake Recipe
Ingredients
- 150g / 5oz margarine
- 150g / 5oz light muscovado sugar
- 3 eggs
- 250g / 8oz plain flour
- 1 teaspoon baking powder
- 350g / 12oz mixed dried fruit
- 60g / 2 oz glace cherries
- grated zest of 1 lemon
- 1/2 teaspoon nutmeg (optional)
- 60g / 2oz whole almonds to decorate
Cooking Directions
- Preheat the oven to 160 degrees C
- Line a 20 cm / 8inch diameter loose bottomed tin with baking parchment
- In a bowl blend the butter, sugar, eggs, flour, baking powder and nutmeg if using and beat well
- Stir in the mixed fruit, cherries, and lemon zest
- Spoon into the prepared baking tin
- Arrange the whole almonds on top
- Bake in the oven for about 90 minutes. Check if cooked by inserting a skewer in the middle to see if it comes out clean
- Allow to cool on a wire rack
Mary Berry suggests you store in an airtight container for a week before serving.
Completely delicious with a slice of mature cheddar cheese!
sadly NOT a traditional Dundee cake… No Dundee marmalade in it. Made with margarine and not proper butter!!!! addidn cherries and spices are also not traditional.. this is a pleasant fruit cake, but it is NOT a Dundee cake!!!
Thank you for the correction 🙂
Best easy recipe for Dundee cake
Hi Penny
Is the oven temp 160 for a fan oven?
Yes – my oven is a fan oven. Having said that I find ovens do vary and some are ‘faster’ at cooking than others – so you need to make adjustments according to your oven. Also apologie sfor the lateness of this reply. I hope you had success if you tried the recipe!
I would like to use this recipe for a diamond wedding cake ( excluding almonds on the top ) which I want to cover with marzipan & fondant but what I would like to do is make a 10″ round cake can you advise how to scale up please
You may need to experiment before the big day but I think I would try adding on 1/3 again – ie 4 eggs, 200g marg and sugar, 330g flour, 1 and 1/3 teaspoon baking powder, 460g fruit, 60g cherries, 3/4 nutmeg and zest of 1 and 1/2 lemons.
I hope it goes well! Let me know!
Hi,
You say in the text that you cannot ice this cake, can you explain why? I’m trying to find a recipe for a non-alcoholic fruit cake which I can ice. I have made the Be-Ro Dundee cake before and iced it successfully, but perhaps this is different. Would be interested to know why?
Thanks for the advice
Hi Ruth
Thanks for asking! Only because it has the almonds on the top and the icing would cover them up. If you don’t add the almonds – you can ice it 🙂
I hadn’t made a Christmas cake this year, but when I saw this recipe, I decided at almost the last minute to make one- it was so good and didn’t last long in our house. Very Christmassy taste, but delicious for any time – and – no hassle to make. Economical too as it doesn’t require alcohol – the spices are enough.
Hi Thought it would be a good idea to make instead of Christmas cake, How long before Christmas would you bake it ? Thank you 🙂
I would say a couple of weeks.