A little late, but if anyone hasn't started theirs here's a fun recipe:

A Christmas Cake

Ingredients:

* 2 cups flour
* 1 stick butter
* 1 cup of water
* 1 tsp baking soda
* 1 cup of sugar
* 1 tsp salt
* 1 cup of brown sugar
* Lemon juice
* 4 large eggs
* Nuts
* 1 bottle Brandy
* 2 cups of dried fruit

Sample the brandy to check quality. Take a large bowl, check the brandy again. To be sure it is of the highest quality, pour one level cup and drink. Repeat. Turn on the electric mixer. Beat one cup of butter in a large fluffy bowl. Add one teaspoon of sugar. Beat again. At this point it's best to make sure the brandy is still OK. Try another cup... Just in case. Turn off the mixerer thingy. Break 2 eggs and add to the bowl and chuck in the cup of dried fruit.

Pick the flippin fruit up from floor. Mix on the turner. If the fried druit gets stuck in the beaterers just pry it loose with a drewscriver. Sample the brandy to check for tonsisticity. Next, sift two cups of salt - or someshing. Sheck the brandy. Now shift the lemon juice and strain your nuts. Add one table. Add a spoon of sugar, or somefink - whatever you can find. Greash the oven. Turn the cake tin 360 degrees and try not to fall over. Don't forget to beat off the turner. Finally, throw the bowl through the window. Finish the brandy and wipe counter with the cat.

Bingle Jells!

My kind of cake.

What the hell is a stick of butter? Would 250g be a correct guess?

With all the talk of cups I guess this is a good ol US recipe.

Anyways I love the preparation.

I've seen a similar recipe before. It's pretty similar to what I'd do, except I'd leave out the flour and butter and stuff.


Apparently in America they actually sell butter in sticks, and all Americans know that there are exactly two sticks in a cup.

1 stick = 133g / 4oz

I hate the idea of measuring things in cups, but I guess it's OK if you're used to it and have the 99 different sizes you need and memorise all the conversions between packed and unpacked, fine and coarse etc...

Reminds me of a recipe on the bbc good food website. 7-cup cake or something

Odd that I had never heard of a stick of butter until recently and now I see it mentioned in a film.

The first time I heard the phrase was on a film. It was in reference to them being used in an orgy. The expression used was "butter bang".

I forget what the film was, but it wasn't a porn. A Google suggests it was "National Lampoon's Movie Madness" and a reference to "Last Tango in Paris".

The 7-cup cake recipe I mentioned earlier was awesome. Only criticism was maybe too much mixed nuts (half a cup) should suffice. The funniest thing was that it said to grate the butter!

Grated it and the moment I went to mix it in, it all clumped together instead of mixing like it should have done. Some more mixing and the butter melted so all was good.

Pastry is easier to work with in the UK when cold, so using lard, marg and butter mixes is not normally a problem with the ambient temp. However in oz they can be problematic so I've had to use a solid block of vegetable fat. Cutting it with a knife as I would do in the uk didn't work very well so I grated it and it worked perfectly.

Being able to adapt is very important with cooking.

I've now seen a stick of butter in Sainsburys. I didn't check the weight so I guess it would a uniform 125g rather than 133g, but it definitely looked like a stick.

WTF?!?

Having just had a look online it would appear that I must have been looking at garlic butter. Probably wouldn't go down too well in xmas cake or other sweet recipes.

I prefer a knob

Ooh, matron!

The only sort of cake I want near Christmas is Betty's Orange & Cranberry Cake.

Yum!