For great holiday fruitcake, start baking now
The baking bug took off in the early days of the pandemic and really just kept on going. There were runs on flour, sugar, cookie and pancake mixes and everyone found a new love for banana bread.
Now we are headed into the holiday season that for many of us will be a bit subdued this year but the urge to bake for the holidays will ramp up.
In my family, that urge was so strong that the ovens were fired up for some serious duty starting Oct. 12, the traditional Columbus Day. Nothing could deter my mother from getting her hands into her flour bin on that day. Columbus Day meant that fruitcakes were on the docket first because they needed time to “age.”
My mother’s fruitcakes did not resemble in any way those dastardly and dreaded fruitcakes in gleaming, shiny tins that lined grocery store shelves right after Halloween.
Those have caused more than a generation of people to pray with beads of sweat at their brow that they would not be the recipient of one from a dear relative or business acquaintance.
Mom’s were moist and chock-full of nuts and dried fruits. It shocked me how little flour there was in the batter to hold all the ingredients together. After they were baked, the hefty cakes were removed from their loaf pans. Then came the fun part.
Each one was brushed with port wine and wrapped in cheesecloth. They were tucked away for the holidays and stored in airtight tins in the pantry for a few weeks before more brandy or port wine was added.
When the holidays arrived, they were finally cut into. They were so rich that a small piece was more than filling and the cake could last for months. Something to look forward to.
MOM’S MOIST FRUITCAKE
1 (6 oz.) can frozen orange
juice concentrate, thawed K c. molasses
3 c. raisins
2 c. mixed, diced dried fruit such as cranberries, dried prunes and apricots
K c. butter
M c. sugar
3 eggs
1N c. sifted unbleached all
purpose flour
N t. baking soda
1 t. cinnamon
K t. nutmeg
N t. cloves
N t. allspice
K c. coarsely chopped nuts
(optional)
Port wine Cheesecloth
Preheat the oven to 275 degrees.
Grease and flour a 10-inch tube pan. Set aside.
Combine the orange juice, molasses and raisins in a saucepan. Cook until the mixture begins to boil; simmer and cook for 5 minutes. Stir in the dried fruits and set aside off the heat.
In a bowl, cream the butter, sugar, and eggs until light and fluffy.
On a piece of wax paper, sift together the flour, baking soda, cinnamon, nutmeg, cloves and allspice. Transfer to the bowl with the butter mixture. Mix well. Stir in the orange juice concentrate and molasses mixture. Stir in the nuts.
Pour the batter into the tube pan and bake for 2 to 2N hours or until a cake tester inserted in the middle of the cake comes out clean. Transfer the pan to a cooling rack and allow the cake to cool completely.
Loosen the cake from around the inside edges with a butter knife; invert the pan and remove the cake. Wrap the cake in cheesecloth.
Place it on a dish. Fill a spray bottle with K cup of Port wine. Spray the cheesecloth with the wine; be sure to spray all around the cake.
Wrap the cake in aluminum foil and place it in a deep cookie tin or in a Tupperware container. Cover and keep the cake in a cool, dark place; every two weeks, open up the tin, open the foil and re-spray the cheesecloth with the port wine.
Refold the aluminum foil over the cake and replace it in its container. Six weeks later, you will love fruitcake! Serves 12-14.
Variation: Make the cake in mini-versions using muffin tins or small loaf pans; follow the same procedure for aging and storing. The baking time will vary.