Make your own Christmas tree cake
Hallo lovelies, this week we’ve been trialling various alternatives to the traditional Christmas cake. With 2021 being all upside down, I reckoned we could look at new takes on Christmas favourites. A lot of festive foodie fun has been fad in the Naish Farm kitchen as we’ve experimented with new cake decorating ideas. I lay no claim to being a cake decorating expert though! Sugar craft being an art form best left to those more patient, dextrous and talented than I. So the idea for an easy, fun and gluten free Christmas cake started to form. How lovely to be able to bake and decorate with the kids on a cosy festive holiday afternoon?
As with all the recipes we create and feature, the cake (or more accurately little tree cakes) needed to be gluten free and in this instance:
- vegan and dairy free
- marzipan, icing and sugar craft free
- easy and fun to make and decorate
- suitable for making and freezing ahead
- plastic free and as eco friendly as possible.
Knowing how busy this lovely season can be, I’ve suggested a shortcut version where you can simply order a tray bake from us online for you to decorate at home.
How long will this Christmas baking project take?
If you’re baking your tray bake from scratch then allow one and a half hours all in.
If you’re buying one of our vegan Millionaire’s Slice tray bakes online, then allow 30-40 minutes to decorate. Please allow longer for tea breaks or cheeky glass or two of Baileys-
How many portions will I get?
10 x little trees and 1 x star
Can I make this ahead and freeze?
Yes! If you bake from scratch, allow the tray bake to cool then cut out your shapes as per instructions below. Freeze these until you need to decorate them.
What ingredients do I need to make my vegan mini Christmas tree cakes?
- Simply look up our blog on how to make vegan Millionaire’s Shortbread to assemble the ingredients to make this tray bake. Alternatively, you can shortcut the baking bit and simply order a vegan Millionaire’s Slice tray bake from us online. We deliver throughout the UK.
- For the decoration you will need edible green and red glitters. Check out Cake Craft Company for a great range of edible cake glitters. I used the Rainbow Dust brand in holly green and rose. These glitters come in little 4g pots in a range of colours.
- You will also need either silver or gold glitter for your Christmas tree star. I used gold lustre dust, again from the cake craft company.
- Some jam which you will use as edible glue
- 10 x dried cranberries, or you can use jelly tots – just ensure the brand you are using are gelatine free and suitable for vegans. Small chocolate buttons would also work. Again, check they are gluten free and suitable for vegans.
What kit do I need to make these gorgeous gluten free cakes?
We like to keep things as simple and easy as possible. You need minimal kit:
- Xmas tree cookie cutter. Measuring approx. 65 mm in height, top to the bottom of the tree.
- 4 x small shallow dishes
- A board to pop your creation on
- Star cookie cutter measuring approx. 65 mm across it’s middle.
How do I set about making my mini gluten free Christmas tree arrangement?
Prepare your board or platter. As a change, we used an A3 sheet of all natural eco parchment paper and it looked lovely.
Decant your jam and red, green and gold glitters into 4 x shallow bowls.
To make your red glittery berries
Carefully dunk your dried cranberries in the jam to make them sticky. You can use tweezers for this if you’re as dextrous (not) as I am- Then dunk each sticky berry in a shallow dish of red glitter. Shake off any bobbly bits/excess.
For the green glittery Christmas trees
First, cut out 10 x Christmas trees. Then sprinkle each one with green glitter
To make your vegan gold biscuit star
Using your star cookie cutter create your star. Dunk this in your gold glitter.
To assemble your finished Christmas tree cake
I popped my star close to the top of my A3 paper and then start with 1 tree, then 2 below, then three and finally a line of 4.
Tips to make your eco friendly Christmas tree cakes Instagram-tastic
- You will need to be patient when cutting out your shapes. A bit of gently finger tip nudging is required to release each tree cake from the cookie cutter. Don’t worry if the chocolate cracks a bit. You can cover it all up with glitter-
- If you are using parchment paper to display on- be aware that you’ll need to arrange it and serve it on the parchment swiftly as the oils from the cake will bleed onto the paper if you leave it for too long.
- It’s a good idea to do a dry run first by laying out your tree arrangement on baking paper where you can dust your glitter on. Then you can mark out your serving board/platter and pop your glittery trees in place ready to serve.
- For extra gluten free bling and sparkle, Sugar Flair do a lovely non aerosol finishing spray which you can spray over the whole lot.
- To make a Christmas tree trunk, just slice up some of your spare millionaire’s shortbread into finger slices to create a trunk.
- For eco friendly, edible Christmas presents simply cut up cubes of spare gluten free shortbread and wrap with kitchen foil. I used some recycled chocolate foil wrappers
- To frame your creation use sprigs of rosemary sprayed with glitter spray. See my blog on how to create edible vegan Christmas decorations.
- For lots of vegan and gluten free foodie gift ideas check out our online shop.
- Favourite Christmas stocking fillers this year have been our delectable vegan hot choccies in a tin.
- Check out our latest gluten free blog discovery – Rebecca Smith at Glutarama for lots of fantastic foodie inspiration.
Happy Baking,
Em x
Comment below and share what your favourite part of this recipe is! Be sure to share this recipe with a friend too! Thanks for reading!