Here at The Croppie we love crop circles and everything associated with living the life of a circles enthusiast.

By popular demand our legendary reader’s recipes section is back and begins with the return of its biggest hit: the Israeli fruit cake. It’s best eaten at Rosh HaShanah La’Ilanot, a celebration of trees, the natural world and environmental awareness. However, it can be made and eaten at any time of year and goes great with a mug of hot, steaming coffee. Note that this recipe will give you a somewhat different, dense fruitcake which has a very long shelf life. Just be warned, after six years of being ignored in the cupboard it becomes exceptionally hard, bitter, potentially toxic and is best avoided.

Ingredients:

For this delicacy you will need the following:

70g sugar
70g flour
3 eggs
1 very large pinch of salt
1/2 pinch ground cloves (optional)
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/8 teaspoon ground cardamom
1/5 teaspoon ground nutmeg
200g of dried fruits of your choice. (The Croppie recommends cranberries, cherries and raisins.)
50g to 150g of chopped nuts according to taste.

Instructions:

Make your cake as follows:

  1. Preheat your oven to 150ºC.
  2. Grease up a bread pan and insert baking paper along the bottom of the pan.
  3. Mix your sugar, eggs, flour, cloves, cinnamon, cardamom and nutmeg together in a large bowl.
  4. Put the fruits and nuts into the bowl and stir them in.
  5. Carefully scoop or scrape the mixture into the bread pan and insert into the oven.
  6. Bake the mixture for 90 minutes.
  7. Remove the cake from the oven and allow to cool.
  8. Whilst the cake is still warm, remove it from the pan.
Enjoy this magical recipe. The Croppie recommends you take one with you during your next crop circle picnic in the late summer.