People are adding this 'divisive' chocolate block to fruit cake and it's genius

Isn’t fruit cake already divisive enough?!

Fruit and Nut fruit cake article hero image 1

As December slowly creeps up on us, we’ve started to think about three things: the Christmas ham, whether it will be pavlova or trifle this year (this recipe allows you both) and… the fruit cake. 

Like it or not, fruit cake is a quintessential part of the Christmas spread. I haven’t had a Christmas without a fruit cake in my few decades on this earth. 

Fruit cakes can be pretty laborious, so if you need something easy to whip or have reluctantly agreed to make the fruit cake this year – we’ve got the perfect fruit cake recipe for you. 

Our Baileys coffee fruit cake

Taste.com.au member, CollieCollins, said: “If you’re a first-timer to the fruit cake/Christmas cake world, then this is the cake for you to make. It doesn’t get any easier and tastes good too!!!” And they’re right!

Mixed dried fruit, iced coffee, self-raising flour and Baileys – plus four easy steps – is all it takes to make this cake. 

Most fruit cakes opt for some kind of alcohol (usually brandy or rum), but we’ve chosen Baileys as it complements the coffee and adds some sweetness to the cake without the need to add more sugar. 

One of our favourite things about this type of cake is that you can get pretty experimental with it, since it’s so dense and doesn’t need to rise as much as other cakes (such as the finicky sponge cake). 

Our members are definitely putting some weird and wonderful twists on it. Some add nuts like almonds, walnuts or macadamias and other dried fruits such as glace cherries. For an extra boozy cake, some people mentioned that they brushed the top of the cake with extra Baileys when it came out of the oven (we’re seriously here for this).

But one particular member, Slmor, added an ingredient that immediately grabbed our attention.

“1 block of Cadbury Fruit & nut chocolate”

You mean the chocolate block that divides most families and friendship groups?!

At first, we were a bit shocked by this addition, but it totally makes sense. A block of Fruit and Nut contains sultanas and almonds which are common in a traditional fruit cake. Plus, the chocolate works well with the iced coffee and the chocolate and vanilla notes in Baileys. 

We’re unsure if Slmor chopped or melted the chocolate block into the batter, but we think chopping the chocolate into choc-chip-sized chunks and then folding it through the batter would be ideal. 

If you’re in the pro-Fruit and Nut team, this is the fruit cake hack to try this year. 

Baileys coffee fruit cake recipe

More fruit cake recipes:

• Classic fruit cake
• 4-ingredient Milo fruit cake
• Pineapple boiled fruit cake 

Originally published as People are adding this 'divisive' chocolate block to fruit cake and it's genius