Christmas Cake Clearout

The annual question of which recipe to follow has been dictated by the contents of the cupboard this year.  A couple of weeks ago, in a fit of efficiency, I bought packets of what I thought might be the necessary ingredients and pushed them onto the requisite shelf when I reached home.

Baking is something we do in this household; we like it and are reasonably adept at it. This means that we have an entire cupboard dedicated to flours, sugars, fruits, nuts, chocolate and so on. Today, I reached for the necessary fruits of the vine and kept pulling out other, smaller packs, wrapped with elastic bands. One thing led to another and soon the kitchen worktops were strewn with the contents of two of the cupboard shelves, as I, specs on, peered at the sell by-dates. Feeling quite smug at first, I soon had two reasonably sized bags of vintage dried fruits and nuts ready for 're-cycling'. In my defence, 2004 was the oldest date that I found; something my late mother-in-law would have scoffed at and added the contents to the recipe regardless.