Hey Guys, happy early holiday season to you all!
As the end of the year mean a lot of parties and food; and one of my favorite Christmas dessert is traditional fruit cake with loads of dark rum.
A festive, flavorful, and moist fruit cake to enjoy all holiday season. 

Sometimes I have no time left to marinated the dried fruit and I felt the appearance of the fruit cake can get a little bland and boring, anyway… I still want to eat fruit cake.

So I was thinking why not we try something that’s a little different? It’s gonna be a “Quick Fruit Rum Cake”, decorate as a Peppermint Hot Chocolate Drink! How cool is that?

And to decorate the cake, of course marzipan is the best and traditionally has been used to cover fruit cakes with it.

You could use ready made marzipan, I personally love to make my own “No Cooked Homemade Egg-free Marzipan” which is very simple and easy. It only takes 10 mins and needs no special skills or equipment to make it.

So… you will need to sift the almond flour and icing sugar.
It will be easier if you have food processor on hand, you can just pulse them until smooth, coz how smooth you grind the almond will determine the texture of your marzipan.

I don’t have one, so… I just do it manually by hand, try not to do it all at once, sift it gradually.
It will be a bit time consuming, just keep smiling and be patient.

And the most fun part, by using marzipan you can create customize decorations for your Hot Choco Mug.
I really fall in love with this cute little Gingerbread man cake topper, it’s perfect for my Christmas Cakes.

The liquor will make the fruitcake more moist, and will help it last longer.
Well, traditionally one of the most important function of fruitcake is for storage. It could be stored for weeks, sometimes half year, if stored properly.
But in this recipe, it tastes the best when it’s fresh in my opinion.

Unlike the other brownish fruitcake, this one has a beautiful golden color. The Marzipan is so soft not too sweet. A thin slice of this cake is a wonderful treatment with a cup of black coffee or tea.

I hope you Guys give this recipe a try and have a wonderful Christmas & Happy New Year!
Love you all…

PEPPERMINT HOT CHOCOLATE DRINK FRUIT CAKE
Yield: Five Pieces (Upper diameter: 6.8 cm, Bottom diameter: 6 cm, Height: 5 cm) cupcakes liners
Active time:  2 hour
Total time: 3 hour

INGREDIENTS
Marzipan:

• 300 grams Almond Flour
• 775 grams Icing Sugar
• 2 1/2 tablespoons Corn Syrup
• 1 teaspoon Almond/ Rose/ Vanilla Extract (or any favourite extract)
• 2-5 tablespoons Water

Fruit Rum Cake:

• 100-120 grams Dried Fruit (cut into small pieces)
• 80 grams Dark Rum
• 40 grams Orange Marmalade
• 130 grams Cake Flour
• 2/3 teaspoon Baking Powder
• 100 grams Salted Butter
• 50 grams Brown Sugar
• 50 grams Granulated Sugar
• 2 Eggs

Soaking:
30 grams Dark Rum, 1 tablespoon Orange Marmalade

Decorating:
Candy Canes, Mini Marshmallow, Food Colouring (red, black, green, pink)

INSTRUCTIONS

Marzipan

1. In a large bowl, sift together the almond flour and the icing sugar.
   If you have food processor on hand, you can just pulse them until smooth, coz how smooth you grind the almond will determine the texture of your marzipan.
2. Pour in the corn syrup and mix.
   Add in the water and almond extract, mix well (the mixture started grainy).
3. Using hand, bring it all together into a ball (you can add one or two teaspoons of water if necessary if you feel the dough too dry). Lightly knead on a work surface until you have a smooth ball.
   Please note, try not to ever kneading, coz it will cause the almonds to give out oil and that can make the marzipan too oily.
4. Place it in a plastic wrap and store them in the fridge for at least 1 hour before using. Colour as needed.

Soaking
Mix marmalade with dark rum, strained the mixture.

Fruit Rum Cake

1. Mix dried fruit and dark rum, let it soak for at least 1 hour. Add in marmalade and fold to combine.
2. In a medium bowl, whisk together the flour and baking powder, set aside.
3. In another large bowl, combine the butter and both kinds of sugar, beat until fluffy. Pour in the eggs and mix until well combined.
   Add half of the flour mixture and mix. Pour the soaked dried fruit rum mixture that has been mixed with marmalade and fold to combine. Pour the rest of the flour mixture to the bowl and mix until well combined.
4. Pour the batter into the prepared cupcake liners about ¾ full and bake them in the preheated 180°C for about 30-35 minutes of until toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.
5. Once they come out from the oven, brush the with generous amount of soaking mixture and let them cool completely on the cooling rack.

Decorating

1. Trim the top of the cupcake so it have an even flat top.
   Sprinkle some icing sugar so the marzipan won’t stick to the work surface. Roll some red marzipan about 3 mm thick for the base of the mug cake, using some marmalade jam as a glue.
2. For the sides; prepare a piece of greaseproof paper as a marzipan templates so we know how long and how much marzipan should we roll for the sides of the mug cake.
   Roll the marzipan about 5 mm thick according to the template, stick onto the cake with some marmalade jam. Cut off the excess.
3. Using fondant smoother, press the marzipan onto the sides of the mug cake to make sure that it stick well to the cake surface
4. Using knife tool, tuck the marzipan under a cake so it completely seal.
5. For the decorations; add some ribbon and tiny hearts around the cake. Stick all mug details and handle with some marmalade. 
6. Insert a stick of candy cane to the mug, add some mini marshmallow and tiny gingerbread man 

NOTES

1. You can use your favorite dried fruits such as raisins, figs, prunes,cherries, apricots, or maybe peaches.
2. If you don’t like dark rum, feel free to use other liquor.
3. To colour the marzipan, you can use any food colouring, water based, gel, powder. 
4. I highly recommend to use concentrated food colouring, specially for a deep colour (so you can add less and still get a deep colour).
   Food coloring can throw off the consistency of your marzipan, especially if you have to add a ton to achive the color you’re after.
5. To store marzipan; wrapped well in an airtight container or it can dry out easily. I suggest to store your Marzipan in the fridge (1 month) or freezer (up to 6 months), when you are ready to use take it out from the fridge or freezer then lightly knead to make it pliable again.
6. To store fruit cake; In an airtight container for about 3 days at room temperature, 1 month in the fridge and 3 month in the freezer.