Packed with plump, juicy fruit and sweetened with pumpkin and apricot nectar this Pumpkin Fruit Cake is a luscious snack cake that is almost irresistible!
These days most people can be placed into one of two categories; fruit cake lovers or fruit cake haters. I myself am very much a fruit cake lover! I grew up eating fruit cake as a regular afterschool snack and in my family Christmas just would not be Christmas without a traditional Christmas fruit cake!
Speaking of Christmas cakes, if you want a great Christmas cake recipe check out this Easy Mix Christmas Cake recipe that I shared a couple of years ago. I usually make this Christmas cake a few weeks before Christmas so that it is really rich and moist by Christmas day!
If however you don’t want to wait a few weeks to get a moist and tasty fruit cake then you need to try this pumpkin fruit cake. I came across this recipe on a packet of Sunbeam mixed fruit that I had in the pantry and decided to give it a try (see the original recipe here).
We still have one of our butternut pumpkins from our autumn harvest so I thought this would be great opportunity to try using it in a sweet pumpkin recipe. The only modification that I made to the recipe was to change the shape of the baking tin. The original recipe suggested using a 20cm round tin but I wanted to be able to cut it up into small slices so I chose the rectangular slice tin instead. As a result the fruit cake is not quite as high but it does cook quicker!
So if you can’t wait till Christmas to have a delicious slice of moist fruit cake then I can highly recommend you make this Pumpkin Fruit Cake!
- 500g of mixed dried fruit
- 1½ cups of lightly packed brown sugar
- 1 tablespoon of golden syrup
- 125g of butter
- 1 cup of apricot nectar
- 1 teaspoon of baking soda
- 2 eggs, lightly beaten
- 1 cup of cold pumpkin, cooked and mashed*
- 1 cup of sifted plain flour
- 1 cup of sifted self raising flour
- Place mixed fruit, brown sugar, golden syrup, butter, and apricot nectar into a large saucepan and stir it continuously over a medium heat until the mixture comes to the boil.
- Once boiling, reduce the heat and allow the mixture to simmer gently for 10 minutes as you continue stirring.
- After 10 minutes remove from heat and add the baking soda. Stir the mixture thoroughly and allow it to cool.
- While mixture is cooling preheat oven to 160 °C (320 °F) and grease and line a 20cm x 30cm (8 x 12 inch) rectangular slice tin.
- Once cooled (saucepan is just warm to the touch) add eggs and pumpkin and beat with wooden spoon until smooth.
- Add flours and mix well to combine.
- Place mixture into the prepared tin and bake for 40 minutes or until a cake tester comes out clean.
- Allow to cool completely in tin before slicing and serving.
Hi, I'm Kaylene, and I'm a keen gardener,budding baker and wannabe DIYer!
I have tried this recipe and love it, so moist and delicious! Thanks for sharing.
Thanks Jennifer, I’m glad you enjoyed it!
I am about to make this cake for our family Chrissy cake will let you know how the family like it. Robyn
I haven’t though of using this cake as a Christmas cake, please do let me know how it turns out Robyn!
absolutely delicious !!
Glad to hear you enjoyed it Patricia!
So delicious
Glad to hear you enjoyed it Patricia!
Any ideas for substitution for the eggs?
Hi Jessica, sorry but I have never made this cake without eggs so I wouldn’t like to suggest a substitution.
Would love to try this recipe but need ideas for substitutes for the apricot nectar please.
Hi Pali, if you cant find apricot nectar you could proably use something like peach nectar, apple juice, or mango juice. Any similar sweetened fruit juice would probably work. Or you can make your own apricot nectar, there are recipes online for how to make it!