Easy Christmas Cake Muffins

5 from 4 votes

Fancy making homemade Christmas cake but don’t have the time? Make my Easy Christmas Cake Muffins instead! These cute mini Christmas cakes have all the flavours of a traditional Christmas cake but take just 45 minutes from start to finish. They are perfect for taking to events or making with children.

Course Dessert, Snack

Cuisine British

Prep Time 15

Cook Time 30

Total Time 45

Servings muffins

Calories 366kcal

Author Eb Gargano

Ingredients

500 g mixed dried fruit (See Note 1)
100 ml sherry (or brandy / whisky / gin / rum - or use apple juice if you want this to be alcohol free)
Juice of 1 orange
100 ml boiling water
150 g butter (plus extra for greasing)
150 g soft dark brown sugar (ormuscovado sugar)
2 large eggs
200 g self-raising flour (AKA self-rising flour)
2 teaspoons mixed spice (or pumpkin spice)
1 teaspoon cinnamon
150 g glace cherries halved

Metric - US Customary

Instructions

Place the dried fruit in a saucepan. Squeeze over the juice of the orange and pour over the sherry and boiling water. Bring to the boil, then simmer for 10 minutes (lid OFF), stirring every couple of minutes. Leave to stand until needed.
Preheat your oven to 180C / 160C fan / gas mark 4 / 350F. Put 12 muffin cases in a muffin tin.
In a large mixing bowl, beat together the butter and sugar thoroughly.
Add the eggs, one at a time, beating the mixture until smooth after each one.
Gently fold in the flour, mixed spice and cinnamon until fully incorporated.
Add the glacé cherries and the dried fruit, plus any remaining liquid from the saucepan. (There should be very little liquid left, as most of it will have soaked into the fruit or evaporated.) Stir gently until the fruit is evenly distributed.
Divide the mixture evenly between the muffin cases.
Cook in the preheated oven for 30 minutes. Check with a skewer – if cooked the skewer should come out clean. If not give the muffins an extra couple of minutes and try again.
Serve just as they are or with a simple icing made from icing sugar and orange juice.

Notes

Ideally you want the dried mixed fruit to be a mix of sultanas, raisins, currants and candied mixed peel. You can usually find this ready mixed in supermarkets. I have used both this one and this one in the past. If you can't find it ready mixed, buy the ingredients individually and go for these proportions: 40% sultanas / 30% raisins / 20% currants / 10% candied mixed peel.
Suitable for freezing.
Nutrition information is approximate and meant as a guideline only.

Nutrition