Words and Recipe by Brenda Anderson
Photography by Chia Chong
Styled by Libbie Summers
I was running head first into adulthood before I acquired a taste for fruitcake.
Here’s the thing, fruitcake gets a bad wrap. Just the mention of it at a holiday party will drop jaws, spread seas and make time stand still. Trust me, don’t mention it, I’ve made the mistake.
As a child, just barely tall enough to see over the kitchen table, I watched my grandmother and momma mix the scary colored ingredients of the fruitcake into a big chipped enamel wash pan and was horrified. Grandmother would prop her elbows up on the kitchen table and cut the sticky fruit by hand with the smallest sharpest knife –all the while carrying on a lively conversation with my mom, my sister and me. The knife would swing in the air as she told stories and added ingredients. Grandmother never measured anything, but the loaves of cake always turned out perfectly. Her Christmas fruitcake miracle.
When grandmother died, momma didn’t make the fruitcakes for a couple of years. When she decided to have a go she wrote the recipe by memory and continued to adjust it over the years until it was just right.
Momma is gone now and it’s up to my sister and me to continue the tradition with our own daughters –something we look forward to every year. Laughing and telling stories just like grandmother and momma, but unlike them, we are careful to measure all of the ingredients. I hope we have taught our daughters, like our own momma and grandmother did, that tradition is the best gift given. EVEN if it involves fruitcake. Thank you momma. I love you.
Fruit Cake
Ingredients:
½ cup shredded coconut
1 cup golden raisins
1 pound candied mixed fruit, chopped
1 pound candied cherries, chopped
1 pound candied pineapple, chopped
4 cups flour, divided
1 lb. butter, room temp
8 eggs
1 ½ cups sugar
5 cups pecans, chopped
3 tablespoons pineapple juice
1 teaspoon black walnut extract
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 tablespoon rum extract
1 tablespoon brandy extract
½ teaspoon lemon extract
1 banana, mashed
Directions:
Preheat oven to 275º F. Prepare 4 loaf pans with non-stick cooking spray and set aside.
In a large mixing bowl toss the fruit (excluding banana) and nuts with 1½ cups flour. Set aside.
In the bowl of a standing mixer fitted with a paddle attachment, add the sugar and butter. Mix until creamy. Add eggs, one at a time, mixing well after each addition. Add pineapple juice, banana and remaining flour and mix until combined well. Add extracts and mix until combined. (Note: Want a fruit cake a little more tipsy? Substitute a dark rum for the rum extract and brandy for the brandy extract.) Remove bowl from mixer and add fruit nut mixture. Stir with a firm wooden spoon until just combined. Bake until golden brown (about 2 ½ to 3 hours).
Yield: 3 to 4 loaves, depending on size of pan
Prep time: 45 minutes
Cook Time: 3 hours
Difficulty: easy
