I saw a post today by The Ginger Gourmand that got me all inspired. Tea loaf. TEA.

I love tea, me.

http://www.thegingergourmand.blogspot.co.uk/2013/06/earl-grey-fruit-loaf-with-lemon.html

I’m not a huge Earl Grey fan, and I didn’t have any, but what I did have was Twining’s Rose Garden tea. That’ll do says I. So, as is my wont, the recipe tweaking started. I love rose anything. Rose and cinnamon together are one of my favourite scents and flavours. So why not do that? I didn’t have self raising flour, so used plain with some bicarb.

Ingredients

350g mixed dried fruits (I used golden and dark sultanas, cherries and chopped dates to use up some packets)

225g soft muscovado sugar

300ml rose tea, well brewed

275g plain flour (gluten free flour would work fine I think. Dove’s Farm self raising.)

1 tsp bicarbonate of soda

1 medium egg, beaten

1 tsp rose extract (amazing extracts from here: http://www.starkaywhite.com/)

1 tsp cinnamon extract

1 tsp cinnamon powder

Get a good brew going.

Put the fruits, sugar and well brewed tea into a bowl, stir and leave to soak. Overnight would be ideal, but the whim took me this morning, so they had a good 6 hours.

Prepare a 2lb loaf tin by greasing and lining with baking parchment or do as I did and use a silicone loaf mould. I might need a bigger one though!

Stir the beaten egg into the fruit mixture and then mix in the flour and bicarbonate of soda, plus the extracts and spices. Stir very well indeed until combined. It takes a minute or two, but you get there.

Pour the mixture into the prepared tin and bake at 150C for 11/2 hours.

Leave the cake to cool in the tin and then turn out onto a cooling rack.

Because of the mix of fruits and dark sugar, this is very rich. No icing is needed at all but if you were using lighter sugar and just vine fruits, then a rosewater icing would be lovely.

This is perfect just sliced and buttered.