*smiles* My family's Christmas cake has absolutely NOTHING to do with our genetic heritage. It's an icelandic cake called Viena Terta (I'm sure I'm mispelling that. I don't speak Icelandic and I've never seen it written). It's some sort of really sweet white dough, in very thin pancake like layers, held together with a sort of heavily spiced prune paste and then left to age in a cold place for at least 3 months. My mother and grandmother used to get together in late August and make a whole huge bunch of them and us kids would try and snitch dough.. *s* I can try and talk my mother out of the recipe if anyone would like...

Cat who has actually never HAD fruitcake OR marzipan but who is really really fond of mince meat (which has made it as far as BC, Canada at least)