Christmas Battenburg (25/11/22)

Rock 'n' Roll Recipes / 25/11/2022 / By

It’s Chriiiisssstmaaasss!!!! Or not yet, you choose 😉 This recipe is a lovely, simple way to make your own cake at christmas (or any time). Much as I would love to be, I will never be that person who makes a traditional christmas cake in advance so when I saw this recipe, I thought all my christmases had come at once! It is so, so simple and tasty, I can’t believe it AND Paul Hollywood loves it. I always have loads of jars of mincemeat because I bulk buy after christmas when prices come down so all I had to buy was marzipan. I had bought a battenburg tin in a mad moment, they’re not cheap! The first time I ever made a battenburg I improvised with tins I had and we ended up with a huge cake. My eldest was only about 5 at the time and his wee face when he saw a ginormous version of his favourite cake, I’ll never forget it 😂
As ever, enjoy and share your make and tips on the post.

Christmas Battenburg

Ingredients

  • 125g Unsalted soft butter
  • 125g Caster sugar
  • 2 Large eggs
  • 100g Self Raising Flour
  • 50g Ground Almonds
  • 1/2 tsp Almond extract
  • 3 Tbsp Mincemeat
  • 4 Tbsp Apricot Jam.
  • 454g Block of Marzipan
  • Icing sugar for rolling out marzipan

Method

  1. Preheat the oven to 180 degrees centigrade (160 fan) and grease a battenburg tin (If you don’t have a battenburg tin, split the mix between 2 1lb loaf tins. You will need to cut each mix into two even sized oblongs when the cakes have cooled completely).
  2. Put the butter, sugar, eggs, flour, almonds and almond extract in the bowl of a stand mixer and mix until all the ingredients are fully incorporated.
  3. Put half the mixture into two of the compartments of the prepared tin and level.
  4. Add the mincemeat to the other half of the mixture and stir with a spatula. Put this mixture into the other two compartments and level.
  5. Bake for 25 minutes. Leave to cool completely before removing from the tin.
  6. Assemble the cakes into a chequerboard pattern sandwiching them together with the jam. Roll out the marzipan into a rectangle approx 20x 30cm. Brush the marzipan with the jam and put the cake in the middle. Wrap the marzipan round the cake tightly and seal the joint.
  7. Trim the ends to neaten and decorate with the off cuts of marzipan if desired. Sprinkle with sieved icing sugar.

Recipe: https://www.sarahsslice.co.uk/
Photo: M Campbell

Scroll to Top