Celebrate Easter with these sweet and moist cakes.

Ingredients

Makes 8

For the cake:

  • 200g sultanas
  • 75g raisins
  • 50ml strong tea
  • 125g butter, soft
  • 125g dark Muscovado sugar
  • 2 medium eggs
  • 125g plain flour
  • Pinch of salt
  • 1.5 tsp baking powder
  • 25g ground almonds
  • 1 tsp mixed spice
  • 80g marzipan

Decoration:

  • 50g smooth marmalade
  • 250g marzipan
  • Edible or fondant flowers (optional)

Method

Add the sultanas and raisins to a bowl and pour over the tea and allow to soak for a few hours. Preheat your oven to 170C/150C fan.

Roll out the 80g piece of marzipan and cut out 8 x 2" round discs. Set aside.

For this recipe I used round silicone baking moulds (7cm diameter x 4 cm deep). If using a cupcake tin, line with muffin paper cases and depending on the size of your cupcake tin, you may get nine cakes from this recipe.

Into a mixing bowl, add the butter and sugar and mix together until soft and pale in colour. To this add the eggs, one at a time, mixing between each addition.

Sieve the flour, baking powder, mixed spice and salt into the bowl and add the ground almonds and mix to form a stiff batter. To this add the soaked fruit and the juices and mix through.

Divide half this cake mix between the cases, place the marzipan disc on top and divide the remaining batter on top to fill all ¾ full.

Place these in the preheated oven and bake for 35-40 minutes. Remove and allow to cool.

To decorate, gently heat the marmalade and set aside.

Roll out the 250g block of marzipan and cut out 8 round discs to fit the top of each cake. Take the trimmings and roll into 8 equal sized balls.

To assemble, brush some marmalade on top of the cakes, place the marzipan disc on top.

To finish, make a small thumb indent into the marzipan and place one ball on top of each cake. You can also garnish with a fondant or edible flower.

Top Tips
You can swap out the tea for your favourite spirit like whiskey, sherry or brandy. If your mini cakes form small domes on top while baking, carefully using a serrated knife, you can remove these peaks before decorating so the marzipan can sit on a flat surface.

Recipe is courtesy of Gem Pack and Shane Smith.