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I beat Uncle B about the head and shoulders with an inflated pig’s bladder until he rendered up the recipe. For the cake curious:

The Receipt

8 oz butter
8 oz soft dark brown sugar (ideally muscovado)
1 tablespoon black treacle
Grated peel of 1 lemon
4 medium sized eggs
9oz plain flour
1 tsp mixed spice
1/2 nutmeg grated
4 oz glace cherries
4 oz ground almonds
2 tablespoon sherry or brandy

The Method (Stavislavski did not know about this)

Cream the softened butter with a wooden spoon. Beat it, in fact. It owed you everything and is very lazy.

Add the sugar and treacle (keep beating – it will work eventually if you force it to). Sieve the flour and spices into the mix, stirring thoroughly. Beat the eggs (S&M time again) then stir into the mix, a little at a time. Add the fruit. If you can’t get mixed fruit, choose your own combination of currants, raisins and sultanas with mixed peel in proportions to taste. Also add grated lemon peel, nutmeg and brandy or sherry at this stage. Also ground almonds.

Stir it all very thoroughly, folding it all in, (an electric mixer will help but a wooden spoon is better – tradition!).

Place the gloppy mixture into an 8″ round cake tin lined with buttered greaseproof paper or baking parchment. Take several thick sheets of brown paper (newspaper works as well) and wrap the tin with it, tying it with string (not nylon string!). Cut a further piece of greaseproof to sit on top of the cake but cut a hole in the middle about 1″ diameter -coin size and shape.

Bake in the middle of an oven at 300 Fahrenheit for 3 1/2-4 hours. After three hours take a look at it. If the mixture is coming way from the sides of the tin, it may be on the way, so turn the oven down a little and pop hem (see Eliza Acton for why ‘hem’ is correct) back in. When the top seems golden brown and the mix is slightly away from the sides you can insert a skewer (if not, a long toothpick). If that comes out without any mix stuck to it, yer cake’s done.

This is important! Leave it to thoroughly cool, then carefully extract from the tin (I like spring loaded cake tins with removable bases). When absolutely cool, wrap in two sheets of greaseproof and silver foil after that. Store in a tin.

A week later, unwrap your cake. Cackle merrily and prick it with a toothpick until it confesses and then feed it with two tablespoons of brandy. My Canadian relatives use whisky, but Canadians, eh?

Repeat weekly. Be certain to drink what is left over from feeding the cake. Icing I don’t do…nor marzipan…

God save King Big Ears!…on second thoughts…maybe you lot were right after all. They say New Hampshire is nice at this time of the year.

Do they make worm pies there?

Henry Kissinger has fallen off the perch at last. Let us congregate here tomorrow for DEAD POOL 173.