‘Tis the season for hot chocolate dotted with mini marshmallows, hanging baubles on Christmas trees, and festive feasts. Cultures across the globe celebrate Christmas and the year-end holiday season with a slew of unique traditions, most revolving around food. From distinct Christmas cookies to culturally specific Christmas dishes, the festive fare is some of the most diverse out there.
Read more: Christmas 2024: The ultimate gift guide for gourmands
In the lead-up to Christmas, we take a look at Christmas cakes from across the globe. Whether infused with rum, dusted with icing sugar, or topped with tropical fruit, here are eight different Christmas cakes worth discovering.
Panettone - Italy
Panettone dusted with icing sugar (Photo: Unsplash)
Both a sweet bread and fruitcake, panettone is one of the world’s most popular Christmas cakes. Usually prepared for year-end festivities, this bake comes from Italy and comprises, tall leavened cakes similar to brioche.
Its distinct airy crumb is most often dotted with candied oranges, currants, raisins, and other dried fruits typically soaked in rum.
Black Cake - The Caribbean
Black cake topped with currants (Photo: Instagram / @gracefoodsca)
Christmas cake takes the form of rum or black cake in the Caribbean, with numerous countries in the origin serving it over the holiday season. Much like the fruitcake we’re all familiar with, black cake is known for its dense texture on account of spirit-soaked dried fruits.
This bake is thought to have descended from English figgy pudding, with its Caribbean successor making use of cherry brandy or rum to preserve dried fruits in Guyana, Trinidad and Tobago, Jamaica, and other Caribbean regions.
Sugee Cake - Malaysia and Singapore
While fruitcake may be a popular Christmas treat here, there is another sort of Christmas cake popular in Malaysia and Singapore known as sugee cake. Served during festive occasions like Christmas, sugee cake is extremely popular among the Kristang or Melaka Portuguese community in Malaysia and the wider Eurasian community in both Malaysia and Singapore.
Sugee cake is crafted with fine semolina, ground almonds, and a splash of brandy to result in a tender, nutty butter cake with a coarse, gritty crumb sometimes topped with marzipan or royal icing.
See also: 7 Kristang dishes you need to know
Bûche de Noël - France
A bûche de Noël topped with cookies (Photo: Unsplash)
A quintessential Christmas cake, you may know this French dessert by its English moniker, Yule log. Made traditionally from genoise sponge and chocolate buttercream, the bake is rolled and often adorned in textured chocolate to resemble the barks of trees with powdered sugar sometimes being dusted on top to emulate snow.
Many variations of this dessert exist with some seeing inclusions of ganache, espresso, flavoured sponge cakes, liqueurs, and more.
Stollen - Germany
Stollen filled with fruits (Photo: Unsplash)
A cake-like fruit bread, stollen is a traditional Christmas bake from Germany. It is often peppered with candied orange peel, raisins, and almonds, and infused with spices like cardamom and cinnamon before being coated in melted butter and rolled in sugar right after being baked.
Crema de Fruta - Phillipines
Crema de fruta (Photo: Instagram / @keells.sl)
A type of Christmas cake from the Philippines, this iteration of fruitcake sees sponge cake layered with whipped cream or sweet custard and covered in jelly. Commonly served during the holidays, a variety of fresh and preserved fruits find their way into this dessert from mangoes and pineapples to cherries and strawberries.
Christmas Cake - England
Christmas cake wrapped in marzipan (Photo: Instagram / @kalesuckz)
We couldn’t compile a list of Christmas cakes without mentioning British-style Christmas cakes, for obvious reasons. Traditional English Christmas cake epitomises what we consider fruitcake, spiked with spirit-soaked fruit till nearly fudge-like and dense.
You’ll often find sultanas and currants within this kind of Christmas cake, infused with rum, whisky, brandy, or sherry before being covered in marzipan and icing.
Don’t miss: 5 dishes and drinks you didn’t know were British inventions
Allahabadi Cake - India
Allahabadi cake (Photo: Instagram / @historywali)
Allahabadi cake which takes its name from the city of Allahabad is Indian cuisine’s answer to Christmas cake. Using British-style Christmas cake as its foundation, the bake has since evolved into a uniquely Indian festive food, seeing the inclusion of local ingredients.
Made with ghee and orange marmalade, the cake differs from its English ancestor on account of it being accented with traditional Indian spices, from cardamom and fennel to caraway.
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