Hip, Hip! Let's Hear it for Fruitcake!🥳
Once a Christmas staple, later the butt of late-night comics, it deserves some love
It's always the same: a morning arrives in November, and my friend, as though officially inaugurating the Christmas time of year that exhilarates her imagination and fuels the blaze of her heart, announces: “It's fruitcake weather! Fetch our buggy. Help me find my hat.”
—Excerpt from Truman Capote’s 1956 story, “A Christmas Memory.”
I’m a bit of a contrarian. While everyone is writing about turkey and stuffing, I’m thinking of fruitcake. While knowing I should be pouring over innovative recipes for brisket and latkes for Hanukkah, which comes early this year, I dream of fruit-bejeweled cakes that sparkle with holiday cheer—like the 30 cakes that Buddy, the seven-year-old Truman Capote, and his distant sixty-something cousin Sook (whom he just calls “my friend”) make and give away in Capote’s unforgettable story, “A Christmas Memory.” To someone who didn’t grow up with Christmas, the story, which takes place in Alabama in the 1930s, seems to embody the spirit of the holiday—making something for the sheer joy of it and then giving it away.
Tomorrow the kind of work I like best begins: buying. Cherries and citron, ginger and vanilla and canned Hawaiian pineapple, rinds and raisins and walnuts and whiskey and oh, so much flour, butter, so many eggs, spices, flavorings: why, we'll need a pony to pull the buggy home.
But before these purchases can be made, there is the question of money. Neither of us has any.
You can read an online version of the story here. If it doesn’t make you a fan of fruitcake (and maybe of Truman Capote too!), I’m not sure what will!
Fruitcakes were once a standard of the Christmas season, something that hailed back to another era, perhaps to the Christmas pudding that Charles Dickens wrote of in A Christmas Carol. It included some of the same ingredients as fruitcake, though the latter is baked and the former boiled. Also, suet (usually beef or mutton fat) isn’t used in most fruitcake recipes I’ve ever seen, and, though some are doused in liquor, I didn’t think it was a custom to set the cakes on fire until I saw one recipe where they were! But, again, this isn’t a tradition I grew up with, so if I’m wrong on any of this, please do let me know!
In half a minute Mrs. Cratchit entered—flushed, but smiling proudly—with the pudding, like a speckled cannon-ball, so hard and firm, blazing in half of half-a-quartern1 of ignited brandy, and bedight with Christmas holly stuck into the top.
Oh, a wonderful pudding! Bob Cratchit said, and calmly too, that he regarded it as the greatest success achieved by Mrs. Cratchit since their marriage.
While I’ve never attempted a Christmas pudding, nor do I believe my mother ever did, I have taken on the holiday tradition of making fruitcakes. I’m not quite sure when or why I embraced this task, but perhaps it is because (1) I love traditions, whether they’re my own or other people’s; (2) I like a project, which fruitcake-making definitely is; (3) I keep thinking I’ll convert people to actually liking them again because mine will be so delicious they won’t be able to resist, and (4) I really do like fruitcake, preferring the dark, deep-flavored ones over the lighter varieties, and minus the masses of artificially colored and preserved fruits and fruit peels that I believe are largely responsible for the cake’s bad rap.
Two years ago, I wrote a post about fruitcake that includes a link to a famous Johnny Carson piece from 1989. It elicits a laugh from the moment the famed late-night comic says the word “fruitcake” when talking to sidekick Ed McMahon.
Testing the anti-fruitcake bias theory
In the quest to find out if my hunch is right—that few people these days either make, like or want to receive fruitcakes—I posted a note on Substack soliciting opinions on the holiday staple. Few had tried it, fewer still had made it and almost no one seemed to like it.
“I don’t have any memories of eating fruitcake, but as a kid I was always fascinated by the grocery store end cap full of technicolor candied fruit that showed up only once a year,” said Mia Billetdeaux, who writes the creative, food-centric Borscht for Breakfast newsletter.
These days, the neon-bright little gems are far more scarce, at least where I live. In fact, I couldn't find any in my Southern California neighborhood and earned blank stares and a “Huh?” from most clerks when I asked: “Excuse me. Do you have any candied fruit—you know, the stuff you put in fruitcakes.” Mia sent me some pictures a friend took of a display at a mid-Atlantic Kroger’s market (see below).
Most are made by Paradise Fruit Co., which also encompasses the Pennant brand. It’s the look and often chemical taste of these fruits—particularly the lemon, orange and citron peel—that seems to repel the anti-fruitcake crowd. It’s not too surprising in light of the ingredients. Here’s the list from the Pennant fruitcake mix:
Orange Peel, Lemon Peel, Cherries, Citron, Pineapple, Corn Syrup, High Fructose Corn Syrup, Sugar, Citric Acid, Malic Acid, Natural & Artificial Flavor, Sodium Benzoate and Potassium Sorbate (preservatives), FD&C Red 40, Yellow 5 and Blue 1(colors), Sulfur Dioxide (preservative).
Not everyone was anti-fruitcake. Some respondents to my note thought of novel ways to use it.
“I love to turn the seasonally shamed holiday cake into crispy crackers to serve on my charcuterie boards,” wrote As We Eat, a journal of food memories, family recipes and food traditions. “They’re fabulous when paired with robust hard cheeses or smeared with soft cheeses and topped with fruity preserves.”
Definitely something to try for the holidays. The twice-baked cake slices might turn out like some fruity crackers I saw on this website.
There seems to be a generational divide on fruitcake, with many respondents remembering their parents liking fruitcake but not sampling it themselves.
Here are a few replies:
“It’s a British thing, possibly Welsh,” wrote Dawna. “My mother loved it. … Way too heavy for me.”
“My mother makes fruitcake every year, but I honestly can’t remember ever trying it,” said Lisa Dearen of The California Table.
“Not a big fan and have never made it,” wrote Amie McGraham of the excellent Cook & Tell newsletter, whom I was lucky enough to meet last month. (Do check out Amie’s latest post, which includes recipes for three Thanksgiving side dishes.)
Jolene Handy of Time Travel Kitchen prefers receiving fruitcakes to making them. Her latest newsletter offers a tantalizing pear dessert as an alternative to pie for Thanksgiving (or maybe fruitcake for Christmas!).
Vicki Smith, who shares musings along with her accomplished painting and recipes at Easel to Table, enjoys fruitcake with a cup of tea. “My mom always made a white fruitcake. I guess it didn't have the molasses or rum, but I don't have her recipe.”
I asked my friend and neighbor Susan Raycroft to share her thoughts on fruitcake. An enthusiastic recipient of my annual fruitcake giveaway, Susie remembered herself and four sisters helping her mother to make the fruitcakes to give to relatives and neighbors when she was a kid.
“It was a whole day process. The electric mixer was in the middle of the kitchen, with the cord going to the wall. You had to make sure you didn’t trip over it. Someone added the cherries. Someone poured the batter. Someone timed the baking. It was filled with all that horrible fruit. I didn’t really like it, but we weren’t wealthy. You ate what was put in front of you.”
Susie, who says she likes my fruitcakes because they don’t include that “horrible fruit,” was the subject of one of my early posts here on Substack. You can find it here:
A dark and delicious fruitcake
One of my favorite comments came from Satchel Pooch:
“Once upon a time, every fall, I would make a full recipe (four loaves) of the original dark fruitcake from Marion Cunningham’s “Fannie Farmer Baking Book” for Christmas gifts. It contains no candied fruit, only dried, so it looks (and tastes) very different from most fruitcakes. My friends in Boston who get one every year say it’s their mission to convert fruitcake haters, and they’ve had some success — turns out what most people dislike is the candied fruit 🤷🏻♀️ Give ‘em a block of apricots, dates, figs, pecans etc. and they change their mind (unless the molasses and brandy puts them off).”
Satchel gets to the root of what I think about fruitcake. He also introduced me to a new favorite recipe in Marion Cunningham’s Fannie Farmer Baking Book. No candied anything in it.
If you do happen to like candied lemon or orange peel, try making them yourself. Though it’s time-consuming, once you’ve tasted them, you may become a convert, especially if you dip the peels in chocolate. They make a nice holiday gift too! (You can find a recipe for candied orange peel here and another for candied citron in my previous fruitcake post here.)
A recipe for dark fruitcake from Marion Cunningham
Below is a the ingredient list for Marion Cunningham’s Dark Fruitcake from the 1984 edition of The Fannie Farmer Baking Book. It makes four 9 x 5 x 3-inch loaf cakes, but you can bake it in whatever size pan you wish, from a tube pan to a bundt pan to the 5 1/2 x 3 x 2 1/4-inch nonstick loaf pans I favor from Williams-Sonoma. The baking time will be less in the smaller pans, but how much less may depend on your oven. I made half the recipe, and it still made four mini-loaves and a small 8-inch bundt.
Here are Marion’s notes—and mine—on how to make it. Many of the suggestions apply to other fruitcakes you may attempt.
Make the fruitcake well in advance if you can, though it tastes good right out of the oven.
The day before you make it, combine all the dried fruits, nuts, ginger, spices and citrus zest in a large mixing bowl. Add molasses, brandy and orange liqueur.2 Cover and let sit overnight, stirring once or twice and adding a bit more brandy or juice if you like. You can leave it for a few days more, but I would suggest refrigerating the mixture.
Fruits and nuts before molasses, liquor, spices and zest. The day you make the cakes, preheat the oven to 275°F. If you aren’t using nonstick pans, grease your chosen loaf pans and line with wax paper or parchment, grease the paper and roll flour about the pans to coat them lightly, knocking out the extra flour. (I didn’t use paper in the nonstick pans, but I did spritz them with an oil and flour baking spray.)
Sprinkle one cup of flour over the fruit mixture, stirring until lightly coated. (This helps prevent the fruit and nuts from sinking to the bottom of the pan.)
Combine the remaining flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt. Cream the butter (a stand mixer is good, but a hand mixer works too). Add the brown sugar, beating well. Add eggs, one or two at a time, beating after each addition. Then add the vanilla.
Add the flour and beat until thoroughly blended, but try not to over-beat.
Pour the batter over the fruit mixture. At this point, if you’re making a full recipe, you may want to transfer the fruit to a larger bowl or even a stock pot. This makes a LOT of batter! Even with a half-recipe, I ended up mixing the fruit and batter together with my hands (washed well first!).
Divide the batter among the prepared pans, filling them within a half-inch of the top. Bake large loaf pans for about 2 hours, and others for less. Each cake should rise to just above the rim of the pan, although if you use differently sized pans, this may not be precise. It should shrink a little from the sides of the pan and the top may crack in several places. Test doneness by sticking a skewer or toothpick into the center. It should come out clean or with a slight residue from the fruit, but no raw batter sticking to it.
Remove the pans and let the cakes cool on a rack for about 30 minutes. If you used nonstick pans, they may just come right out without any problem. Hopefully this would work the same with the larger loaf pans.
If your loaves are covered in paper, peel it off and let the cakes cool on a rack. If you wish, you can pour an additional tablespoon or two of liquor over them as they cool.
To store: Wrap each loaf first in plastic wrap, then in a secure covering of foil. If you prefer, you can wrap the cakes in spirits-soaked cloths (perhaps cheesecloth) and then in foil. Keep in a cool place until ready to serve. The cakes will keep for several weeks—some say for months. I haven’t tested this, though apparently Johnny Carson and others have, with results you can check out on the famous Tonight Show video.
To serve, slice into thin slices with a long serrated knife.
More fruitcake recipes to check out
The Fannie Farmer baking Book includes two other fruitcakes that look promising but which I haven’t made. There’s a simpler white fruitcake with candied cherries, canned pineapple, golden raisins, walnuts and almonds. There’s also a dark Italian fruitcake with figs, pine nuts and cornmeal. Both sound worth trying.
Another dark fruitcake that I have been making for years comes from King Arthur Baking. It called Everyone’s Favorite Fruitcake and is the Vermont-based baking powerhouse’s answer to the common refrain: "No, no, not the dreaded FRUITCAKE..." Here’s a link to the recipe. I wrote about it in more detail in my 2021 piece, and it’s the version my neighbor Susie most likes—though she hasn’t yet tasted my latest creation.
When I began my deep dive into fruitcake lore, I ordered a copy of a little volume called Fruitcake: Heirloom Recipes and Memories of Truman Capote and Cousin Sook. It’s by Marie Rudisill, who became famous and somewhat infamous when she appeared in a segment called “Ask the Fruitcake Lady” on The Tonight Show With Jay Leno. A no-nonsense nonagenarian, she sassed Jay and his guests mercilessly, to the delight of the audience.
She was also Capote’s aunt, his mother’s younger sister, who was on fruitcake duty in the house where little Buddy made 30 cakes with his cousin Sook and delivered or mailed them to a collection of friends, neighbors and beloved figures. They even sent one to President Franklin Delano Roosevelt.
In addition to an excerpt from Capote’s short story, the little sliver of a book contains a collection of 23 fruitcake recipes selected by Rudisill from a 19th century family farm journal that Capote’s cousin Sook had owned. Among these: Christmas Fruitcake, said to be copied from Martha Washington’s own book. It uses rather odd measurements like “as much salt as will lie on a nickel” and molasses measured out “by gobs.” I wonder how much is a “gob”?
Happy Thanksgiving!
There are so many great posts this week about Thanksgiving recipes that I won’t attempt to add my take. For those who would like concrete suggestions of what to make, I recommend Anne Byrne’s terrific newsletter of last week, “The best Part of Thanksgiving is Sides!” She is absolutely right! I could see skipping the turkey entirely and just digging into cheesy spinach gratin, cornbread stuffing and Bing Cherry Jell-O Salad.
I intended only to write a short piece about fruitcake, but, as you see, I’ve vastly exceeded my word count. Thanks for bearing with my obsession. After putting a few more fruitcakes in the oven, I’ll be ready to attempt a simple (ha!) pie or two to bring to the Thanksgiving table. No scary neon-colored fruit. Just apples and pumpkins. Maybe a pecan or two.
Thanks so much for your likes, comments, subscriptions and shares. See you soon!
Ruth
A archaic term of measurement that means a quarter of a pint, equivalent to half a cup.
I used dry sherry and orange juice instead of the orange liqueur. You can sub other spirits of your choice such as rum, whiskey or madeira—or use a juice of your choosing. I think cranberry, orange or apple would work best.
Ruth, this inspires me to bake fruitcake, which I love! Thank you. It’s the aroma of fruitcake baking that gets me, and it’s the smell of the bourbon brushed over it repeatedly that says HOLIDAYS!
Appreciate the thought but since nuts are such a large part of the volume of the batter, I don’t think this is way too time consuming just for me but thanks