When Jeff Beattie lost his wife to leukaemia, he was left with a promise to raise their children and found an unexpected lifeline in baking.

Inside his kitchen, bowls of rum-soaked and sherry-soaked fruit line the bench as the widowed dairy farmer patiently shares the secrets behind the rich dark fruit cake that has become one of the Royal Queensland Show’s most prestigious baking entries.

WATCH THE VIDEO ABOVE: Meet the baker who healed his broken heart one cake at a time

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The recipe has earned the 85-year-old countless ribbons over the years, helping make him one of Australia’s most decorated home cooks with more than 5,000 awards to his name.

Beattie lost his wife, Elaine, to chronic lymphatic leukaemia in September 1987.

She battled the disease for 21 months before going into remission for three months.

When the cancer returned, she kept it to herself.

“She never told me,” Beattie said. “She only told her sisters, she said I had to stay strong to rear the kids.”

Suddenly, Beattie was raising their four children on his own.

The dairy farmer turned to baking after losing his wife to leukaemia, finding an outlet in the kitchen while raising their four children. Credit: 7NEWS

Baking became a way forward after devastating loss, eventually leading to thousands of ribbons and awards. Credit: 7NEWS

One night, overwhelmed by grief, he said he had what he describes as a conversation with “the big boss up top”.

“I wanted to know why he would take a young mother from my children,” Beattie recalled.

“He told me to get my act together. I have to rear my kids.”

For Beattie, it was the beginning of a new chapter.

Baking filled the hours after work. Then came local shows, country shows and eventually the Ekka.

Every competition taught him something new, whether it was soaking fruit for longer, dusting it with flour before folding it through the mixture or smoothing the top of the batter with a wet hand before baking.

Decades after he first entered a country show, his baking continues to earn recognition at the Royal Queensland Show. Credit: 7NEWS

There were setbacks outside the kitchen too. “I did turn to the bottle though for a while,” he said.

But baking kept pulling him back.

“This has been my outlet to ... keep me going,” he said.

And the secret behind his award-winning fruit cake? Patience.

Beattie soaks his raisins in alcohol for far longer than the recipe suggests.

“I soak them sometimes for months,” he said.