Christmas Cranberry and Orange Cake

This cake is an absolute showstopper - perfect for the centre of your Christmas dinner table for a couple of reasons. Firstly, it's a lighter option than the traditional Christmas pudding, but has all the familiar tastes of the season. Lighter options seem to be popular this year, I keep reading about them everywhere, so I thought I'd join the party. Secondly, this cake looks spectacular (if I do say so myself). And all you need to do to it is pop it on a cake stand and you're ready to go. It absolutely doesn't need setting on fire, and you still have plenty of time to whip it up before Christmas - it doesn't need time to develop. Really, it's an incredibly low maintenance cake. 

Have I convinced you to give it a go yet? 

It's very easy, and though it looks like there's a lot of steps it really doesn't take much time. It's worth bothering to heat the cranberries for the topping in sugar and water, it takes some of their tartness away, and makes them contrast just nicely with the rest of the cake. You could replace all of the cranberries with dried cranberries easily, but I think the fresh look much nicer.

Christmas Cranberry and Orange Cake

Cake

250g Unsalted Butter

250g Caster Sugar

3 Large Eggs
Zest of 2 Large Oranges
270g Self Raising Flour
120ml Fresh Orange Juice (those oranges you zested will come in handy here!)
100g Fresh Cranberries, cut in half

Icing
150g Icing Sugar
Freshly Squeezed Orange Juice

Frosted Cranberries
3tbsp Caster Sugar
Water
Fresh cranberries
100g Granulated Sugar

1. Preheat the oven to 180oC and grease your cake tin. I used an angel food cake tin, but a bundt cake tin or a loaf tin would work equally well.
2. Cream the butter and sugar together until really light and fluffy
3. Add the eggs one at a time, followed by most of the orange zest (save a little bit for the top).
4. Fold in the flour, and then slowly add the orange juice.
5. Chop the cranberries in half and coat in flour. Fold carefully into the mixture.
6. Bake in the oven for around 45 minutes, or until a skewer comes out clean. The time might vary a bit if you use a different type of tin. Particularly, I find loaf tins take a while, and after about half an hour I usually cover the tin with foil, so the top of the cake doesn't burn.
7. Leave the cake to cool for 10 minutes, then turn out to cool completely.
8. Whilst the cake is cooling, put fresh cranberries (however many you want on top of you cake) in a saucepan and just cover with water.
9. Add around 3tbsp caster sugar and heat. Once it's bubbling, remove from the heat and drain the cranberries. You mustn't let them pop when they're heating, so watch for cracks in the skin. If you see them, whip them off the heat then.
10. Coat the cranberries in the granulated sugar and leave to cool.
11. Sieve the icing sugar and add the orange juice - how much is up to you. I didn't use very much, because I wanted defined white stripes of icing, but if you want more of a glaze add more orange juice. The best approach is to add juice very slowly until you get the consistency you want. If you're using freshly squeezed you'll want to sieve it, so there's no juicy bits in the icing.
12. Put the icing in a piping bag, chop the tip of and decorate however you fancy.
13. Top the icing with the frosted cranberries.
14. Sprinkle over the remaining orange zest.