The Seasonal Fruit Cake
Ingredients
Dried Fruit
- 2 cups sultana raisins
- 2 cups dried currants
- 2 cups dried apricots chopped in raisin-sized pieces
- 1 1/2 cups chopped candied peel recipe follows
- 1 cup Thompson raisins or chopped dried prunes
- 1 cup dried cranberries
- 1/2 cup crystalized ginger chopped in raisin-sized pieces
- 1 1/2 cups brandy or cognac
Homemade Candied Peel
- 3 medium oranges skin thoroughly washed
- 3 medium lemons skin thoroughly washed
- 1 1/2 cups granulated sugar
- 1 1/2 cups water
Cranberries
- 1 cup low bush cranberries
- 2 Tbsp birch syrup
Cake Batter
- 2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
- 1 tsp ground nutmeg
- 1 tsp cinnamon
- 1/2 tsp ground cloves
- 1 1/2 tsp baking powder
- 1/2 tsp salt
- 1 cup butter softened
- 1 1/2 cups brown sugar
- 4 large eggs
- Prepared fruit and brandy mixture
- Prepared cranberries
- 2 cups chopped pecans
Instructions
Dried Fruit
- 1.Combine dried fruits in a large bowl and stir to combine. Pour brandy over top and stir a few times to distribute evenly. Cover and leave fruit to soak for several hours or overnight.
Homemade Candied Peel
- 1.Quarter and peel fruit—it's easiest to separate the flesh from the peel with your fingers.
2.Slice peel into 1/4-inch strips, transfer to a small saucepan and cover with water. Cover, bring to a boil, reduce heat and simmer for 10 minutes. Discard water, leaving peel in the saucepan.
3.Add sugar and water to the pan and mix thoroughly. Cover, bring to the boil over medium heat, reduce heat and simmer for 40 to 50 minutes until peel is translucent.
4.Remove peel from syrup using a slotted spoon and drain on a rack set over a baking sheet. You may have to separate pieces that have stuck together.
5.Store in the fridge in a covered container for up to one month.
Cranberries
- 1.Combine cranberries and birch syrup in a small saucepan. Cook over medium heat until berries pop and the mixture is the consistency of jam, about 15 minutes. Remove from heat and cool. (You can do this step the night before and refrigerate the cranberries overnight.)
Cake Batter
- 1.Once you’ve organized your pans, grease each one with butter and then line the interior with buttered parchment paper. Preheat oven to 300F and place a pan of water on the bottom shelf.
2.In a medium bowl, whisk together dry ingredients, except pecans.
3.In a large bowl, cream butter and sugar together until light and fluffy. Add eggs, one at a time, beating after each addition. The mixture will curdle, but don’t worry, once the dry ingredients are in it will come back together again.
4.Add dry ingredients and mix in thoroughly with a wooden spoon.
5.Stir in fruit and brandy mixture, cranberry mixture, and pecans. Mix thoroughly, reaching right down into the bottom of the bowl.
6.Spoon the batter into prepared pans and smooth the tops with a spoon dipped in water.
7.Bake the smaller cakes for 1 hour and the larger ones for about 2 hours, until a tester inserted in the middle comes out clean.
8.Cool cakes in their pans on a rack for 30 minutes, then carefully turn out of the pans and cool completely.
9.Once cakes are cool, wrap them in brandy-soaked cheesecloth and then in reuseable plastic bags. After a week, unwrap cakes, poke holes in the top with a skewer and drizzle tops with brandy, about one tablespoon for the larger cakes and half a tablespoon for the smaller. Repeat every week until one week before you’re going to serve or give away the cakes.
10.If you’d like, cover with a layer of homemade marzipan before serving.
Notes
For the record, this recipe will make two, nine-inch round cakes that weigh a little over 3 ¼ pounds each. But I almost never make two big cakes—I have a small household and I give quite a few cakes away.
For this iteration of the recipe, I used round glass Anchor brand storage bowls, which are oven safe up to 400F. I filled each bowl with batter 2-inches deep, except the smallest bowl. This is how the weight per volume worked out for me.
One 6 1/2-inch bowl filled with batter 2 inches deep: one two-pound cake.
Two 5-inch round bowls filled 2 inches deep: two 1 1/2-pound cakes.
Two 4-inch round bowls filled 2 inches deep: two 10-oz cakes.
One 3-inch round bowl filled 2 1/2 inches deep: one 7-oz cake.
Fruitcake rouses strong passions amongst the cake-eating public—there are the fans, and then there are the haters. I started off as a hater in my younger days but have converted to fandom since making my own.
I’ve learned that if you avoid the commercial glace cherries and that packaged abomination known as “mixed peel,” you will be fine. Just use good quality dried fruit from the supermarket, make your own peel, and don’t stint on the brandy.
I made my first fruitcake in a wood stove in Greece, staying up all one November night to feed the fire while my partner was out fishing with his cousin. The cousin suffered from the family fear of ghosts, and the fishing expedition was cut short when he was terrorized by the apparitions coming at him through the mist on the night sea.
My partner and his cousin arrived home just as the cakes were coming out of the oven. We each had a small glass of brandy, some of us to celebrate the first fruitcake they’d ever made, others to soothe their nerves.
Now, ever since that early morning, I treat myself to a small sip of brandy each time I douse my fruitcakes with spirits, remembering my partner and his cousin and that trusty wood stove.
