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Simnel Cake
2 cups margarine 2 1/4 cups brown sugar 6 eggs 3 tablespoons milk 1/2 teaspoon each of cinnamon, mace and ginger 5 1/2 cups flour 2 teaspoons baking powder 1 lb. chopped raisins 1/2 lb. currants 1/8 lb. sliced citron 1/2 lb. almond paste (do not add to batter) Combine the batter as for any fruit cake. Now, this is where this cake is different from other fruit cakes. After the cake batter is mixed together, beat it hard for 10 minutes. Then spread half of it in a greased and floured cake pan, cover with a layer of the almond paste rolled thin and cut large enough to come almost to the edges of the cake. Then spread the rest of the cake batter over the paste. Bake the cake in slow oven (300 degrees) for about 3 hours; or it may be steamed for 2 1/2 hours. Ice it with water and sugar icing, but not until after the third day after the cake is baked. Store in crock or tin box.
A very large fruit cake with a hidden seam of almond paste through the middle. The two things that decide whether it works are the long, hard beating of the batter and the very low oven.
- Scale and pan sizeThe original never names a pan. With 5 1/2 cups flour, 2 cups fat and 6 eggs plus about 1 5/8 lb of fruit, this comes out around 6-7 lb of cake -- enough for one 10-inch deep round pan or two 8-inch. Fill pans no more than three-quarters, since the batter rises slowly but does rise.
- The 10-minute beatingThis is the step that separates it from a plain fruit cake, and it is not optional padding. Beat the finished batter on medium with a paddle for a solid 5-8 minutes in a stand mixer (the full 10 by hand), which develops enough structure to carry the weight of the fruit and the paste layer without the middle collapsing.
- The almond paste layerRoll it thin, about 1/8 inch, which is as far as 1/2 lb will stretch across a large pan, and cut it to sit just inside the pan wall, as directed. If it touches the sides it melts against the metal and the cake sticks. Note also that American almond paste is less sweet and less firm than European marzipan; either works, but marzipan is easier to roll cleanly.
- Oven and lining300F is correct and the three hours is realistic for a single large pan. Line the pan with a double thickness of parchment up the sides, and tent the top with foil once it has coloured, or the outside will be dark long before the centre is set.
- Testing itA skewer into the top half will meet the almond paste and come out sticky, which tells you nothing. Test by going in at an angle near the edge, and look for the cake pulling slightly from the pan sides plus an internal temperature around 200-205F.
- The steaming optionSteaming 2 1/2 hours gives a darker, moister, pudding-like cake with no crust. Cover the pan tightly with pleated foil and keep the water at a bare simmer, topping up with boiling water so the pot never runs dry.
- Waiting three days to iceA fresh fruit cake throws off moisture for several days; icing it early gives you a damp, sliding glaze. The three-day rest lets the surface dry and the crumb settle. Water icing here means confectioners' sugar slaked with just enough water to pour.
- StorageA crock or tin means an airtight container at cool room temperature, not the refrigerator, which dries fruit cake out. Wrapped well it keeps for weeks, and improves for the first two.
Simnel cake belongs to the English spring calendar rather than to Christmas: it is traditionally associated with Mothering Sunday in mid-Lent, when servants and apprentices were given leave to visit their home parish, and later with Easter, where the familiar eleven marzipan balls are said to stand for the apostles minus Judas. The name is generally traced to the Latin simila, a fine wheat flour, and the cake is linked in particular with Shrewsbury and Bury. A band of almond paste baked into the middle of the cake, as here, is part of the traditional form as well as the more familiar top layer.