Fruit cake - yes/no/kill me now?

We haven’t had them in my family since my mom stopped making them 20 years ago. Thank goodness. I couldn’t stand them.

My preferred Christmas cake is really a bread – stollen

This is very close to the recipe I use. I replace all of the candied fruit with different types of raisins (I usually have at least 4 different kinds).

I bake my stollen about a month in advance. They get wrapped in cheesecloth and then clean tea towels and then drizzled with some kind of booze. I like to use Remy Red because it’s nice and fruity. I pack the stollen in a box and once a week open the box and add more booze to the cake.

By Christmas it’s a wonderfully boozy fruit bread. Like raisin bread on steroids. Great toasted with tea. I slice up the last pieces and use eggnog to make the best New Years Day open house french toast.

A friend of mine from Jamaica has had me over for her Christmas Black Cake with her sister’s home-made Coconut Pudding Ice Cream. Tasty but so rich I can only eat about a one-inch square of the cake in a sitting (with at least two giant cups of tea).

http://www.cookingchanneltv.com/recipes/jamaican-black-cake.html

@zenvelo , what kind of Christmas cake did your mother make?

I love a fruitcake homemade with high-quality ingredients. Those weird ones from the big-chain supermarkets with plutonium cherries make good doorstops.

My dad’s employer used to send a fancy fruitcake to us every year. No one liked it, but the tins were highly prized. The tins always had different pheasants painted/printed on the lid. They all sold well when my dad auctioned off the contents of his house.

I lie. I had a university roommate who liked the cake. My mother used to give them to him.

Sorry, I am firmly anti-fruitcake. Hideous concoctions!
I have never had a fruitcake I liked, ever, and I no longer even attempt to try them. The ghosts of fruitcakes past are truly haunting. lol Just stick with fudge and christmas cookies IMHO. haha

@Coloma , do you like raisin toast?

I love Christmas cake. Fruit cake covered in marzipan and royal icing. Yum. We didn’t make one for years, but making a cake together has become a new tradition.

@BellaB She made an English style cake, but without the marzipan coating. Contained candied fruits, and heavily soaked in brandy once a week from late September until Thanksgiving, when she would start giving them away.

I loathe currants, raisins, sultanas etc so xmas cake is not on my menu, never has been.

Nobody in my family ever made fruitcake, but I grew up loving the stuff. As a teenager, I’d actually go out and buy myself a fruitcake every December. I’d bypass the versions with those unnaturally bright red-and-green things and, instead, go for the ones with good-quality nuts, dried fruit, and citrus zest.

Wow…what a trip down memory lane. It’s been decades since I last had, or even thought about, fruitcake. Gee, thanks so much, @BellaB, for enticing me to bad behavior!!!

@Love_my_doggie, I make an outstandingly boozy (with high quality rum, Grand Marnier, organic nuts and dried berries) that you would love!

And I’ll forward my address in a dm @canidmajor.

@canidmajor Would you be willing to share your recipe? It sounds delicious.

@BellaB Yes, I like raisin toast not sure how that compares to fruitcake though.

The best fruit cake is made in Corsicana, Texas
Collin Street Bakery is the name and they are known
world wide by now I would think. I grew up on them and
would kill for one now! Of course my mom grew up in
Corsicana, TX so she grew up eating them!

Not a fruitcake fan here.

I can’t recall ever seeing a cake at Christmas as it was always cookies, Christmas cookies and especially my favorite Apricot Kolaches.

Fruitcake = target practice

Squirrel food.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=V1z35I7J-Sw

@Coloma , the type of Christmas bread I make – stollen – is a like slightly boozy raisin bread. I wondered if you were one of the people with an aversion to raisins.

I posted a link to what it looks like in my first post in the thread

Stollen is a completely different story. Stollen is a must have, toasted with the frosting ready to blister your tongue, perfect for Christmas morning bacon and fried eggs and strong coffee.

@Cruiser , love kolaches! they’re on my Christmas treats I love list.

Boozy raisin bread, I might try that, might. It’s still scary, like an almost fruitcake. haha

@MooCows “I grew up on them and would kill for one now!”

Homicide is not necessary; you can order online: https://www.collinstreet.com/online_bakery/all_deluxe_fruitcakes

I think of cookies for the holidays. Rainbow cookies (the Italian ones like little petit fors) coconut macaroons, almond cookies, iced cookies, ginger and pumpkin cookies.

My MIL usually makes an apple cake for Christmas, so as an adult I associate that with her Christmas. I sometimes bring some cookies. I make the macaroons and almond cookies from scratch.

As far as fruit cake, most are terrible, but I’ve had a taste of a couple that were good.

So it’s a solid 7–2-1 poll here. 7 solid nays, 2 yays and one that likes boozy raisin bread, A.K.A. fruitcake.

7 thumbs down, now that takes the cake and throws it into the woods for the raccoons. lol

What’s the history on those fruitcakes? I know an Italian friend of mine always had one. Is it an Italian tradition?

It’s certianly an English one. My MIL always made one.

I’ve never actually tried fruitcake. Nan’s was heavily rum-soaked, so not a treat for the kids. I’ve never really had an occasion to make one myself… and Nanny’s recipes are long gone, now, anyway.

@Seek Just take any pound cake recipe and fold in chopped walnuts, dates, sprinkle in some cinnamon and nutmeg, (rum if it holds a nostalgic place for you) and chopped gummy bears…bake that bad boy and Viola fruit cake!

Italian panetonne is more of a fruit bread than a fruitcake.

It’s really the best part of the holidays – the different treats people bring. I had a Christmas baking party with a few friends about a decade ago, where we each made something representative of our cultures. I made stollen, Y made Jamaican black cake, D made refrigerator cookies and butter tarts, F made pineapple cake. We each made enough to share – and shared our recipes as well. Probably the best Boxing Day dessert buffet table we’ve ever had.

I like it in small amounts during the holiday season. So sue me.

My entire life I’ve been the beneficiary of the apparently widespread fruitcake revulsion. I LOVE a good fruitcake, and have a 94 year old uncle that has sent us the above mentioned Collin Street fruitcake every Christmas for at least 30 years. The cake will probably arrive in a week, but all of my friends who despise the things are well aware of my compassionate inclination to adopt the cakes they receive as gifts. As with most things, the cakes run the gamut quality wise. Nothing is more disgusting than those store bought fraudulent forgeries of genuine fruitcakes, superficially gussied up to appear genuine. Even as a kid I knew better than to be suckered into reaching for a “Woolworth” fruitcake.

@BellaB Italian panetonne

I’ll have a good panettone over any fruit cake. Some of the artisanal ones here are to die for.

I remember, at about 9 years old, helping my mom make a fruit cake from scratch. I had to ride my bike to the store and get dried cherries, chop candied citrus pieces and nuts. The day after we baked it; she poured over a cup of sherry into the container.

Panettone! That’s it.

Moon cakes and bakcang are two examples of traditional (and perhaps mandatory) baked goods during certain festive days in Chinese culture. They’re not available during normal days and I always enjoys such things when they’re available.

I used to love the classic English Christmas Cake with Marzipan and Royal Icing similar to this but haven’t had any in years.

We used to have a bakery in the Texas town where I lived. It was opened and run by an English couple who would make absolutely wonderful Christmas Cake, we would buy one every year but alas Texans have different tastes from the British and the couple had to modify their product and recipes to suite their clientele and the Christmas cake fell victim to the sickly sweet sugary tastes preferred by the unwashed masses

A pity.

@Unofficial_Member , bakcang/zongzi is wonderful. It’s found at dim sum and a lot of bakeries carry it year-round. I lived on it when I first moved to Toronto. An affordable meal in a package.

I love traditional fruit cake but in small quantities.

I love pannettone, which as someone said is more like a sweet bread with fruit in it.

I love Jamaican black cake. If you’ve never had it, it’s kind of like a plum pudding. Rich, dense, boozy, dark, flavorful. You can find it in some places that have jerk chicken (real Jamaican places). Last year I googled recipes and didn’t have time to make it, but I’ve been soaking various types of fruit in various types of liquor in my refrigerator for the whole year. I’m planning to make it this year but it’s too rich to just make for my household.

Jamaican Black Cake:

www.aroundtheworldin80bakes.com/2012/03/28/27-jamaican-black-rum-cake-the-most-alcoholic-cake-ive-ever-baked/

I always loved A Christmas Carol’a references to “Christmas Pudding”, whatever THAT USC

I think I would love fruit cake if it didn’t have that “fruit” in it.

@Pachy A Christmas pudding is a plum pudding. (from 1711 ”: a rich boiled or steamed pudding containing fruits and spices” -from Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary 11th. ed.)

I personally always liked the references to Christmas Goose. I think I’ll make a goose and a fruitcake this year.

And heck, a pudding too. Why not.

@Seek Marwyn will haunt you in the night.haha

I’ve actually never tried traditional fruitcake; I only know it as the “most hated dessert” but I never understood why it was so hated. Someone mentioned panettone, and I do like that—I bought one a few days ago.

KMN

Thanks for the info, @kritiper. I think I knew that once but forgot. By the way, kudos for decoding my mangled comment. I really need to stop posting with my iPhone in the middle of the night like I’m doing right now.
;-)

@BellaB I see. Where I live these baked goods only available for sales near and during certain Chinese festive days, Chinese people tend to be the only ones to buy these particular goods, they will buy a lot to celebrate the festivities and won’t buy during regular days which explain why nobody selling these things on normal days. After all, these food won’t feel special anymore if you can eat them everyday lol.

I have a recipe for a chocolate fudge fruitcake that is amazing. Very dense like fruitcake, but none of the scary fossilized cherries and pineapple. It’s full of dates and figs.

@tedibear You had me before you mentioned dates and figs. haha

My mom and I are the only people I know who not only like fruitcake, we love it. My grandpa’s second wife (after my grandma passed away) made the best fruitcake I’ve ever tasted.

I have never made a traditional fruit cake, because no one except my mom and I would like it. I tend to make pumpkin loaves or gingerbread cake loaves instead, for the holidays.

I am one of the few people I know who does not like chocolate cake. I actually prefer fruitcake over chocolate cake.

I also love Date Cake especially the kind you can buy at Hadley’s near Palm Springs. It kind of tastes like and has the consistency of brownies, without being so sweet.

Here is a recipe for something that is being called a “Fruit Cake” although it is not the traditional kind that most people hate. This is a nice loaf cake with dried cranberries and dried apricots and nuts. Not weird candied cherries. Take a Look

@Kardamom: Is date cake anything like date nut bread?

@Kardamom – what do you make as a gingerbread cake loaf?

OH ! OH ! OH ! I remember going to Hadley Fruit Orchards for date shakes in the 1950’s @Kardamom !

@Bella. Here is a good gingerbread loaf cake. It has more of the texture and consistency of banana bread rather than the flat kind that you make gingerbread men from, which are either chewy or crispy depending on the recipe.

@jca The date cake at Hadleys is flat and dense and chewy like brownies. I think date nut bread is more like banana nut bread that’s made in a loaf pan.

Thanks @Kardamom . The ingredients look a lot like the inside of a lebkuchen soft cookie. I think I’ll give that a try. I’m pretty sure I’d like/love the results.

Ooooh, that Gingerbread loaf looks amazing, thanks @Kardamom !

I have some lebkuchen from Trader Joe’s, genuine, made in Germany. I was googling how to make it before. I really would like to make it. I love spicy stuff.

@jca ,once you’ve made the lebkuchen , take on pfeffernusse. Even spicier! (and then speculaas – less spicy , but crispy)

@jca did you ever get to make your Jamaican black cake? It sounded really yummy.

@Kardamom: Since last winter, I’ve had the fruits (four containers, four different types) in the refrigerator with four different types of liquor, soaking away. My goal is/was to do it this winter. I won’t get to it by Christmas, probably not New Year’s either, but sometime soon.

@jca Easter cake?

My neighbor made fresh persimmon cookies today with walnuts. To die for!