In Ireland, when the cold weather sets in — and it's usually wet as well — a lot of people, when they turn up at their local pub, really want something hot to take the chill off them. One of the great classic Irish drinks for this purpose is the "hot whiskey".
This is more than just whiskey. It's a slice of lemon with cloves stuck in it, dropped into a heatproof glass with a big shot of whiskey and a big spoonful of sugar or honey. Then the whole business is topped up with boiling water. To have one of these set down in front of you after coming in from the cold is a moment of true joy.
Our Irish whiskey cake — or "hot whiskey cake" as the neighbors call it — is meant to recall the drink in the same way that our Irish Coffee Cake recalls its name-drink. The cake itself is a classic Irish madeira cake — one originally designed to have alcohol poured onto / into it after baking. The lemony layers are the perfect foil for the warm, tart-sweet lemon syrup they're soaked in — scented with cloves and laced with Irish whiskey, to give the cake that real "hot whiskey" flavor. A lemon-and-whiskey glaze tops the whole thing off.
We used 9-inch pans to bake our example, but since these layers don't rise incredibly high, you can bake the cake in 8-inch layers if you like. Add 5 minutes to the baking time if you do, as they'll naturally be a bit thicker than the 9-inch versions.
Please note that this is not one of those showpiece cakes… not terribly photogenic, no matter what you do to it. It just tastes good.
Ingredients:
For the cake:
- 140g / 5 ounces / 3/4 cup butter
- 220g / 1/2 lb / 1 1/4 cups granulated sugar / caster sugar
- 440g / 1 lb / 3 1/2 cups cake flour / cream flour
- 2 teaspoons baking powder
- 1/4 tsp salt
- Finely grated rind of 1 lemon
- 2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice
- 1/8 teaspoon ground / powdered cloves
- 3 large eggs
- 100ml / 3/4 cup milk
- Also: butter for the cake pans
- And baking parchment to make it easier to move the layers around after soaking them with the syrup (and for prepping the springform pan if you want to use one in the cake's assembly)
For the lemon and whiskey syrup:
- 150 ml / 3/4 cup water
- Finely grated rind of one lemon
- 150 ml / 3/4 cup lemon juice (the juice of the lemon whose rind you just grated off, and enough extra lemon juice to make 150 ml / 3/4 cup. Bottled lemon juice is OK if you prefer to use that to arrive at the correct amount, but of course fresh-squeezed is always better)
- 4 whole cloves
- 240 g / 1 1/2 cups caster sugar / granulated sugar
- 6 tablespoons Irish whiskey
For the glaze:
- 400g / 14 oz / 3 cups confectioners' sugar / icing sugar, sieved
- 2-3 tablespoons lemon juice (preferably fresh)
- 2-3 tablespoons Irish whiskey
Please note before you start that the basic recipe for the cake layers produces a very firm and somewhat dry cake. This is intentional: it's going to be very thoroughly soaked with almost half a liter of whiskey-laced syrup, and needs to be able to maintain its structural integrity during the process. A softer or moister cake would simply disintegrate once soaked.
To make the cake: Preheat the oven to 190° C / 375° F. Butter well two 8- or 9-inch cake pans: then line their bottoms with baking parchment and butter the parchment as well. (As mentioned above, if you have a springform pan of the same size as the pans you're baking in, make it ready by cutting a baking parchment circle to cover the (buttered) bottom: then butter over this.)
Cream the butter and sugar very well until light and fluffy: then add the eggs one at a time and continue beating after each until the whole mixture becomes very light. Before adding the last egg, add a spoonful of flour to the batter. Once all the eggs have been beaten in, slow down the beater and add the lemon juice and ground cloves. Sieve the flour, baking powder and salt together very well; then at low speed with the mixer, or by hand if you prefer, add the mixture by spoonfuls to the batter, alternating with the milk, and mix gently until well combined.
Spoon the batter into two 9-inch cake pans / tins (or 8-inch if you prefer). Smooth the top of the batter, leveling it out. (This batter will be very firm, and may be a little reluctant to spread. Don't panic: this is the way it's supposed to be.)
Bake the layers for 35-40 minutes (check them at 30 minutes if you're using a fan oven: they may be done at that point), until the cake is just starting to pull away from the sides of the cake pans. Remove from oven and allow the cake layers to cool in their pans for ten or fifteen minutes. Then carefully turn the layers out onto a rack to cool. When they're out, wash and dry the cake pans. You'll need them again shortly.
To make the syrup: Heat the water, lemon juice, grated lemon rind and cloves together gently for 15-20 minutes (the mixture should just be steaming at this point, not boiling). Add the sugar and bring to a boil, stirring constantly until the sugar is completely dissolved. Then boil rapidly for 4 minutes. (Make sure you do this in a pan at least three times the size of the syrup, because it will try to boil over, and it'll leave you with an incredible mess if it gets all over the cooktop.) Remove the pan from the heat and allow to cool for five minutes or so. Then remove and discard the cloves, and stir in the whiskey.
Now put a piece of baking parchment in the bottom of each layer pan, covering the bottom of it as completely as possible and overlapping the sides so that enough sticks up for you to easily pull the cake layer out of the pan. Then return the cooled cake layers to their pans. Use a skewer to poke concentric circles of holes into the top of each layer, being as careful as you can not to go all the way through the layer and out the bottom. Then slowly pour half the lemon-and-whiskey syrup over each layer, alternating pours so that each one gets the same amount, and leave the layers to soak in the syrup for 2-3 hours.
To make the filling / glaze: Measure the confectioners' sugar into a mixing bowl, add the lemon juice and whiskey, and beat very well together. The consistency should be such that when it's been well beaten, the glaze should be pourable.
Put the bottom layer of your cake on a serving plate and drizzle the top of it well with about a third of the glaze in a very thin stream, crisscrossing it so as to cover as much of the surface as possible. Place the second layer on top and press it down firmly onto the bottom one: then use the remaining 2/3 of the glaze to do a similar crisscross pattern on top. Allow about ten or fifteen minutes to let the glaze set before handling the cake any further.
Slice and serve. Some people like to put slices of the cake in the microwave for thirty seconds or so, and serve it warm.
A final note: All told, there is nearly 175ml of Irish whiskey in this cake — the equivalent of nearly four Irish bar measures of whiskey (or 2 doubles). Maybe we're just being overcautious, but it seems unwise to drive after you've had more than a slice of this: there might be enough alcohol in it to produce a false positive on a test and get you in trouble with the local constabulary, and no one wants that. So, a word to the wise… hang the car keys up first.