Do you ever find yourself with a tonne of leftovers in the limbo period between Christmas & New Years…? You’re living solely off of turkey sandwiches, Quality Street & ‘plates’ as we like to call them, basically an amalgamation of bits of cheese, leftover pieces of roast vegetables & Yorkshire puddings put together to to resemble some sort of meal (solely because it’s now on a plate as opposed to you merely just picking at them with your bare hands as you walk past them in the kitchen).
Whilst our diets may consist of cold cuts & chocolate because that’s all we have left, the thing’s that generally do tend to disappear & no longer leaving you searching for a new lease of life for them is the sweet stuff, except for one thing that is… the Christmas mincemeat.
You’ve made your pies, even eaten your pies (batches 1,2 & 3), but lurking somewhere deep within your cupboard is that half opened jar of mincemeat. You could save it for next year (I find the alcohol ferments a little though, giving it a little more oomph that’s not for everyone), you could swirl it through a little bit of vanilla ice cream or you could make this mincemeat loaf.
Not only is it good for using up your leftovers but it can also be a lifesaver just before the Christmas period too. It works just as well as a cheats Christmas cake, it’s got all of the Christmas flavours you want in a cake but without the heaviness of the more traditional fruit cake & is a lot less effort to pull together. You could save yourself the effort of wrapping layer upon layer of parchment in & around tins, the hours waiting around the oven & the continual feeding up to Christmas, instead you can throw this together as great little last minute cake to offer people.
I’d recommend making this with a good homemade mincemeat like this one here but you can use a store bought jar at a pinch so long as it doesn’t contain too much liquid (the kind that have more juices than fruit, usually true of the cheaper jars), it’ll tend make a less fruity cake is all. This little loaf isn’t a showstopper by any means, she’s not perfect but she’s homemade & looks the part but it tastes amazing.
This keeps really well in a tin for a week or so (you can even freeze slices if you prefer) & being a loaf, I find it a good all rounder for slicing & packing up for any days out or long walks during that in-between period of Christmas & New Years (because yes, no matter where I am, I will still be eating this Christmas).
MINCEMEAT LOAF
(makes one 2lb loaf)
Ingredients:
- 150g butter
- 150g soft light brown sugar
- 2 eggs
- 425g mincemeat
- 250g self-raising flour
- 1 tbsp milk
Method:
- Grease & line a 2lb loaf tin with baking parchment
- In a large bowl, beat together the butter & sugar until light & fluffy
- Beat the eggs into the mixture, one at a time, beating after each egg
- Sift over the flour & fold this through the mixture
- Add the mincemeat & milk to the bowl & fold everything together
- Pour into the tin and bake at 160C for approximately 1 hour, 45 minutes, until a skewer inserted into the centre of the cake comes out clean when removed
- Allow the cake to cool in its tin for 10 minutes before removing & allowing to cool fully on a cooling rack
