Saw a tea-loaf being baked on TV this week and thought how long it had been since I made one so I brewed up a cup and gave it a shot. Overfired it a little, will need to tweak the timings a bit to suit my idiosyncratic oven but my better half says it tastes pretty good and not at all dry so maybe I shouldn't bother with the tweaking!.
Ingredients:
450g mixed dried fruit
160g soft brown sugar
1 tsp mixed spice
grated zest of 1 lemon/lime/orange as you prefer
25g butter or marg
1 cup of hot strong tea (about 160ml) (different teas give a different taste, for this one I used chai tea but will make the brew stronger next time, not enough flavour coming through)
1 large egg beaten
225g self raising flour
milk if needed
Method:
Mix fruit, sugar, spice and zest in a bowl, add butter and pour the hot tea over. Mix and leave covered to cool completely.
Add beaten egg to cooled mixture, mix in flour and add spoonsful of milk if necessary to make a dropping consistency. Pour into lined or well greased 2lb loaf tin and bake at 150C for 80-90 minutes until a skewr inserted in the centre comes out clean. Leave in tin for 10 minutes then turn out onto a wire rack to cool completely.
Enjoy with butter, jam, honey or just on its own.
Will keep in a tin, getting better all the time, for a week.