Old recipes are always the best recipes. This whiskey cake recipe was given to me by a lady from Lurgan, Northern Ireland. Intensely dark and moist, it is very easy to make. This is a traditional boiled fruit cake, so called because part of the fruit mixture is boiled before adding it into the cake batter.

The old housewife trick of liberally lacing a little extra whiskey over the top of the cake once it is freshly baked increases the shelf life and in creating this intensely flavoured cake, which remains wonderfully moist even for up to a week, if stored tightly wrapped in an airtight container. The boiling method also means there is no creaming of butter and sugar involved, so the stove actually does the work for you. The mixed dried fruits are soaked in whiskey and spices before being boiled with butter and sugar. Though you’ll be tempted to eat the plump, liquor-soaked fruit straight from the pot, the sacrifice of leaving it be, will be worth it. 

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