"Diane Epps" > wrote in
:

>
> "Wayne Boatwright" > wrote in
> message . ..
>> "Charles Gifford" > wrote in
>> hlink.net:
>>
>> >
>> > "Daisy" > wrote in message
>> > ...
>> >> I read a newspaper article yesterday written by a non-USA person,
>> >> who had experienced life in a Brtitsh-style culture for a while.
>> >> The article was all about fruit cakes.
>> >
>> > One thing I've noticed in this thread is that, while the thread is
>> > titled "Christmas Cake", the conversation so far is about fruit
>> > cake, plum cake or similar. For me, a Christmas Cake is similar to
>> > a fruit cake, but has layer(s) of marzipan and nice crunchy icing
>> > over that.
>> >
>
> I am British, and you are quite right that the Christmas cake is fed
> with brandy/rum for a week or two and then it is painted with warmed
> and sieved apricot jam [jelly] which helps the marzipan to stick the
> cake is then fully covered in Marzipan and finally iced with Royal
> icing and either made to look like a snow scene if you are not so good
> at icing or it is flat iced and them elaborately decorated with piped
> icing rather like a wedding cake. Diane

Diane, I'm not sure that the progression of your quotes are right, so I'm
not sure if you're responding to what I posted.

However, thank you for confirming what I believed about British
Christmas Cakes. I had forgotten about the apricot jam. While I do bake
fruitcakes, I don't cover them in marzipan, but if I'm prsenting the
whole cake I do glaze them with apricot jam.

Thanks,
Wayne