Baking With Spirit: Cranberry Eggnog Loaf Cake

It feels like I blinked and the year flew by. However, looking back, I have packed in quite a lot since January. For instance, I made this cake at the end of the 2014 Christmas period, too late to post on here and be relevant, so left it in my drafts folder and completely forgot about it. (Discovering this post couldn't have been more timely, as I have not had time to bake this weekend!) I knew that I would forget important details such as recipe and taste profile, so I was kind enough to write those down for myself at the time.

Quick note RE eggnog: It's not easy to buy ready made in the UK (except for the Starbucks variety, which I do incidentally love), so I've made my own for the past two years. I remember bookmarking the original recipe, but each year since I have not been able to find the bookmark for the previous year's recipe. Trying to guess which recipe I used last year has become a strange tradition, if you can call it that. So I think I used this BBC Food recipe last year, without the cherries. But I can't be sure. 

And now, I hand you over to 2014 (possibly early 2015) Janine:

The cake was perfectly moist, though a little dense (it possibly could have been left in the oven for another 10 minutes or so). The cranberries cut through the sweetness of the sponge beautifully, and the eggnog brings a great subtle flavour. This cake was tasty at all times of day (yes, I ate it for breakfast), and I'll be making it again. Do yourself a favour and make some eggnog, then put it in this cake!

Ingredients

• 200g Butter
• 200g Caster Sugar
• 3 Eggs
• 200g Plain Flour
• 2 Tsp Baking Powder
• 250mL Eggnog
• 100g Fresh Cranberries, plus small handful for decoration
• 20g Dark Muscovado Sugar

Recipe

• Preheat the oven to 170C/160C fan. Line a loaf tin with baking parchment.
• Cream the butter and sugar together in a mixing bowl until light and fluffy.
• Beat in the eggs, one at a time, until the batter is smooth.
• Sift the four and baking powder into the batter and add the cranberries. Fold into the batter until well combined.
• Fold in the eggnog. The batter should have a soft dropping consistency; if not, add a little more eggnog or milk and try again.
• Transfer the batter into the loaf tin.
• Sprinkle the extra cranberries over the top of the batter, followed by the muscovado sugar.
• Bake in the oven for 1hr -1hr 30, or until a skewer comes out clean. Check the cake at 1 hour, and then check every 15 minutes to ensure that the cake doesn't over bake.