Christmas cake

Well lads (and lasses), being confined to the house for a couple of days due to a back strain (from lifting a very heavy beehive), I decided to make a couple of Christmas cakes. I bought packets of sultanas, raisins, currants, walnuts, ground almonds, flaked almonds chopped nuts, mixed peel, glace cherries, chopped dates, prunes etc and cinnamon, allspice, ginger, vanilla extract, pickled onions (I think they might have been a mistake), butter, flour etc.
All the recipes I found said 300g of this, 200g of that, 425g of the other. .. I can't get my head around that bull $hit. I grew up with pounds and ounces, which meant something. Anyway, if you use half a packet of raisins or whatever, what are you going to do with what's left? So, I got the biggest bowl I had and chucked all the fruit and nuts and spices in and fired in a bottle of brandy, the remains of a bottle of rum and a pint of cider - enough to cover the fruit. And left it to steep for a day.
Next day (yesterday), I mixed up a pound of butter, half a bag of muscavado sugar, a bag of flour and the ground almonds and then mixed in the boozy fruit. Filled up my cake tins and chucked 'em in the range (well covered with greaeproof paper) for five hours. Took 'em out before going to bed. Today, de-tinned 'em. Result: fantastic! Top was a bit burnt, so sliced that off and eating it now with a glass of whiskey - delicious! Feeding the cakes with whiskey, every few days from here till Christmas.
Moral of the story: don't be a slave to recipes!

Well Sean. I have just read your recipe to Gloria, and with much amusement she said " Where are the eggs?, No wonder you have a bad back. Lifting all that weight out of the oven will do it no good at all" . She does share your opinion about sticking to recipes though. She has made over twenty for the mart and all from one recipe. 8 oz of everything plus 4 eggs and a good glug of brandy makes an 8 inch cake. She also said that if you added bread crumbs and suet and take out the butter you would have a fine pudding mix. Whatever Sean. Your cake sounds fine to me. I guess you should keep it away from naked flames though!.

I didn't forget the eggs - I just forgot to mention them! Half a dozen, chucked in one at a time, just before the flour.