There is no denying that this cake, like most home made birthday cakes, will take you a considerable amount of time.  It really will be a tiring labour of love but when you hand it over you will make somebody's day.  Try not to get stressed, remember that your recipient will be so happy to receive the cake so do not stress too much about anything not looking perfect, they will most likely only notice this if you mention it. 

With something that will take so many hours, the best thing to do is break it up over a couple of days to keep it manageable.  2 is best but 3 would work too. 

As this cake was for a beautiful young lady and the top cake was a rose I wanted the colours to also be sparkly rose but you don’t have to stick to this, feel free to make it your own and use your own colour palette. 

Ingredients
Chocolate Fruit Cake 
375g mixed dried fruit with peel (you can buy bags of raisins, currents and sultanas with mixed peel) 
350g prunes, cut into smallish pieces 
2 tbsp cocoa powder 
1 tsp mixed spice  
175g golden syrup  
175g dark muscovado sugar 
125ml coffee liqueur  
2 oranges, zest and juice 
175g butter 
3 eggs 
150g plain flour split 
75g ground almonds 
½ tsp baking powder 
½ tsp bicarbonate of soda 

Rose Cake 
130g plain flour 
100g cocoa powder, divided 75g and 25g 
2 tsp baking powder 
1 tsp bicarbonate of soda 
270g caster sugar, divided 200g and 70g 
4 eggs, separated  
120ml vegetable oil 
120ml coffee, cooled slightly 
1 tsp vanilla extract 

Decoration  
5 tbsps apricot jam - ideally smooth 
750g chocolate flavoured fondant brown icing 
30cm rose pink cake board 
250g green fondant icing (optional) 
1 meter of 25mm rose diamanté mesh ribbon trimming 
Double sided tape 
Edible pink glitter spray 
6 lindt balls 
6 rose pink candles 
2 champagne bottle candles 
Diamanté ‘21’ 

Equipment needed 
26cm spring form cake tin 
23.5cm Rose bundt tin - I like to use Nordic as the cakes release perfectly 
Palette knife (ideally although an ordinary butter knife can be used) 
Rolling pin 
2 x fish slices 
Sheet of paper and pen 
Scissors 
Cling film or food bag

Method
Day 1 
Start with the fruit cake as unlike sponge, this improves with some sitting. 

Put the fruit, cocoa powder, mixed spice, sugars liquor, orange zest and juice and the butter into a large saucepan and stir on a medium heat until the butter is melted and the ingredients are totally combined. Cook for 10 mins to reduce slightly and turn off the heat and leave to cool for at least half an hour.  Leaving for half an hour ensures that the mixture is not so hot it will scramble your eggs. 

After half an hour, preheat the oven to 140C.  Line the bottom and sides of your large cake tin. I unclip the tin, turn the bottom upside down and butter the bottom (which is now facing upwards) and put grease proof paper over the top and clip it back together so the grease proof is sticking out of the tin. Butter and lime the sides also.

Add the eggs, flour, ground almonds, baking powder and bicarbonate soda, and mix well until the ingredients have combined.  Carefully pour into your lined tin and bake for 1½ hours before testing the cake.  To test, take a cocktail stick and carefully push it into the very centre of the cake, the cocktail stick needs to just come out clean but you don't really want to overcook this as it will be very dry and heavy.  The baking could take up to 2 hours so if it is not done when you first test, just close the oven door and check again every 10 mins. 

Take out of the oven and leave to cool.  Once cool carefully place into a large plastic container out of the tin and free of the baking paper or, if you do not have a plastic container large enough then leave the cake in the tin and wrap with cling film.  The important thing here is that the cake needs to be totally sealed to stop it going hard and dry. 

Day 2 
Put a baking tray tin to the oven and turn the oven on to 180c.  Thoroughly grease your Bundt tin either with baking spray, spray oil or with butter.   

In your mixer put the egg whites and start to mix.  When they have formed soft peaks start to add the sugar a tbsp at a time mixing well between each spoonful.  This will take a few mins. 

Meanwhile put the flour, 75g cocoa powder, baking powder, bicarb and 200g of the sugar into a bowl. Add the egg yolks, vegetable oil, coffee and vanilla extract and mix until just combined with a large metal serving spoon.  Take one spoonful of the egg whites and mix through.  Now put the rest of the egg whites in and carefully fold in.  You do this by running the spoon around the inside edge of the mixing bowl and cutting through the middle, then turn your bowl and repeat.  You don’t want to knock out the air but do want it thoroughly combined.

Pour the mixture into your tin and put into the oven on your baking tray.  This cake will take around 40 mins to bake although check after 35 mins, you want a cocktail stick to come out clean but you do not want this to be dry. 

Let the cake cool a little in the tin - at least 20 mins.   

Meanwhile move on to icing your fruit cake that you made yesterday.  Remove it from the tin and place on a chopping board.  If you happen to have string then take the string and measure from the bottom of one side of your cake, across the middle of the top of your cake and down to the bottom of the other side.  This should give you the size of your cake for the size of the icing needed.  

Take your jam and gently heat in a microwave, you want it warmed and the consistency to be thinner but definitely not boiled, so put in for 10 seconds, stir with a fork and if loose enough then put in for a further 10 seconds and repeat.  If you do not have a microwave then gently heat on the stove. 

You now need to put the jam over the top and sides of the cake as this is effectively your glue to get your icing to stick nicely to the sides of your cake.  Put 2 tbsps of the warmed jam on the top of the cake and with a palette knife ideally but a butter knife will also work, spread the jam over the top of your cake keeping it as even as possible.  This does not need to be thick but does need to be even as this will affect your finished look.  Don't worry if it dribbles down the sides as you will also be covering the sides with jam. 

Now the top is done, you need to cover the sides with the jam.  This is the part I used to really struggle with, much easier if you know how to plaster a wall.  However, it is doable and you will get better with practice.  With your knife carefully start to paint the outside, here I would say that although you don't want to waste jam, if you are a little heavy handed don't worry too much, just heat a few more tbsps and finish painting.  Then effectively what you need to do is with your palette knife, scrape off the excess.  How you do this is hold you palette knife vertically against your cake and go around the edge removing any excess jam, scraping back into your bowl.  You don't want too much jam on the sides, just enough to stick the icing and for me, it is easier to do the excess and scrape than try to be perfect first time.  Move the cake and the chopping board to one side. 

Remove any crumbs from your work surface and clean the sides down and thoroughly dry.  Remove any rings or bracelets.  You need to roll out the fondant icing and moisture, crumbs and jewellery are the enemy of icing.  Take cornflour and dust your work surface fairly liberally.  Cut open your fondant icing packs and push the icing together.  You now need to knead the icing so it is soft and the different packets are now merged as one icing ball.  This should only take a couple of mins.  Chocolate fondant icing is a little softer than ordinary fondant icing.

Re-dust your worksurface if needed and your rolling pin.  I find that the fondant can stick despite the flour so turn the icing one turn every few rolls to prevent sticking and be aware you may need to add more cornflour underneath if it starts to feel too sticky.  Roll until the icing is large enough for your cake (this is where your string comes in handy) and ideally the thickness of a £1 coin.  Fondant icing can be a bit of a pain and stretches and cracks fairly easily so try to handle it with care and try not to make it too thin. 

Once you are happy it is large enough and the right thickness the easiest way to move it from the board to your cake is to gently and carefully roll the icing around the rolling pin.  Before you start move your cake back to your work area close to the icing so you can move quickly.  Lightly dust cornflour over the top of your icing and smooth it over - this removes any excess - and very carefully, starting on one edge (I tend to work left to right but if you are left handed you will probably want to do this right to left), gently roll the icing around the rolling pin, wrapping it over itself.

Move the rolling pin so the icing is above your cake and working from the edge of the cake left to right  (or right to left) gently unroll the icing over your cake - this does need to be centralised so that it will cover all sides.  Once the icing is over the cake you will not be able to move it.  If you do make a mistake then don't fret too much as the very bottom will be covered with decoration.  

If you have cake smoothers you can use these to push out any air bubbles or creases otherwise just use your hands.  Firmly and carefully glide your hand or smoother over the top and then around the side.  I do sometimes find that the fondant around the top edge cracks slightly, I have no idea why but do know that if I gently hold my hot hand against it for 5-10 seconds and then with my finger carefully smooth, it does somewhat diminish.  I like to use my hands to push the bottom of the icing a little to ensure it is against the cake.  Then take a small knife and cut around the edge of the icing at the bottom of the cake, try not to cut it too short. 

With the scraps of icing you can make a rose to fill the bundt hole in the rose cake.  Cut off any icing that has jam on it and discard.  Cut a 5cm square out and roll one side to the other so it looks like a swiss roll.  Cut another 5cm square only cut off the corners and wrap this around the swiss roll.  Hold the swiss roll at the bottom and gently squeeze together.  At the top, gently push the top of the icing down a little so the top is now softened.  Repeat until you have a nice sized rose.  The soft squares are effectively petals so just build it up.  Carefully place in a small glass or ramekin to keep it safe.

The thing to say here is that you really do not want your fondant icing to dry out while you are working with it so from the moment you open the packets to the time you fit it to the cake, do this in one sitting. 

You need to carefully move your cake on to a cake board. Put the cake board next to the cake, you are not going to want to balance the cake for very long this way, smashing it is not an option.  The best way to do move the cake is with 2 fish slices.  Very carefully slide the fish slices underneath the cake, one either side, one at a time.  When you slide them under the cake be as careful as you can to not ruin your freshly iced cake.  Once the fish slices are under the cake, very very carefully lift up and place as centrally on the cake board as you can, moving it once it is down is never very easy as the cake boards get damaged really very easily and so is something you should avoid. 

Take your diamanté mesh ribbon and measure around your cake, overlapping by 5cm. Cut the ribbon and put double sided sticky tape on the back last 5cm overlap. You now need to decide which side you want your front to be and put the ribbon around the cake with the overlap being the opposite side. Very carefully but firmly pull tight so there’s no slack and with the overlap, carefully press against the start of the ribbon. This should now snuggly fit. 

Clean and thoroughly dry your worksurface again so that you can roll out your next fondant.    Take cornflour and dust your work surface fairly liberally.  Cut open your green fondant icing pack and cut off a quarter and wrap the rest in cling film or put into a food bag.  Knead the icing so it is soft.  Re-dust the worksurface and your rolling pin and roll out the green again to the depth of a £1 coin. 

On your piece of paper, draw a leaf.  Use this as a template to cut out some leaves from the green icing. With a knife, give your leaves a central stem line and little nicks around the edge to give some dimension. To place on the cake, you want them to sit on the edge of the top with the tip just going over the side.  Put a dab of jam on the back of leaf to secure and place the leaves  around the cake wherever you want. 

The next step is to place the rose cake on the top of the base cake.  You now need the cake to come out in one piece without a hitch.  Even if you have properly greased your tin this is always a tense moment.  Pick up the tin and gently tilt to one side - this should pull the cake off of the edge a little, I then try to tease the cake away as much as I can all around being very careful to not damage the cake.  Take a plate and put over the top of the tin and carefully tip out the cake.  If any part of the cake has stuck, patch it back in as carefully as you can. 

Put the fondant rose and put it in the top of the rose cake, this will hide the hole in the top of the cake.  Take your glitter spray and spray all over the cake to give it a glittery pink hue.  The glitter spray clogs really easily so you may need to bang the bottle on the worksurface every couple of sprays, it is annoying but stick with it.  Once you are happy with how much glitter is on the rose cake, decide what side the front will be and carefully place on top of the base cake. 

Take your Lindt balls and look for the 'flat' side.  Put the flat side down as this will help it sit properly on the board.  Spray the balls with the glitter spray.  You need to move the balls on to the board and the best way to do that is to place the candle in the top of the ball and lift by the candle.  Place the two champagne bottle candles at the very front and the 21 in the top towards the back.   

Hey presto, one cake!