Fruitcake review: Rustic Bakery Fruit & Nut cake (aka Fruitcake)

Hello everyone! I blame social media and the fact that I can barely even concentrate on an Instagram or Twitter feed for my lack of posting here. But nevertheless, my pursuit of good fruitcake continues, and will continue forever.

So there I was in Whole Foods, picking up, I don't know, olive oil or something, and subliminally my brain was telling me "the items you've selected will not yet cause you to gasp in shock at the amount of your bill! And lo, what did I just then see? The below:

I peered closer. I had seen a whole towering display of panettone, but this unassuming loaf looked like....could it be? I  leaned in for a closer look: 

Yup. They're trying to keep it on the down low, but that there, friends, is fruitcake. 

The name of the bakery is Rustic Bakery out of Petaluma, an organic bakery. It's a beautiful box and they have a nice description on the side describing this cake as something that will "vanquish forever fruitcake's bad reputation!" Bravo!

The price was around $18.99 for a 1 pound cake, give or take a dollar. That's not a bad price for the ingredients, which contain NO preservatives, along with: whiskey, apricots, cranberries, cherries, raisins, pistachios, hazelnuts, pecans, almonds and orange zest. All fruits are dried, not candied. And I say again NO preservatives--nothing bad in this cake (and by bad I mean artificial or food science-y--of course there's butter). 

Here it is out of the box:

And again out of the paper. Looks like the loaf is baked and packaged in the same paper pan:

Finally, a slice:

This cake is not chock-full of fruit and nuts like you may see in a more traditional fruitcake. They are there but there's a lot of cake along with it. I'm sure that's how they can price it at that price point--fruits and nuts are expensive!

That being said, this is a delicious cake. I would put it into a "fruitcake for beginners" category, as it tastes very much like a quick bread. The cake is delicious, buttery and a little crumby as you see, but it tastes really nice. You can taste the whiskey, which elevates it a bit from your usual breakfast bread, but it's not at a smack-you-over-the-head-level that you might get in something more hard core.

I am very pleased with this little loaf. If you're someone who loves fruitcake,  and you want to convince your family that they would like it as well, this would be an excellent choice to bring to a holiday party. And it's right there in the bakery section of Whole Foods, at a price that won't kill you. (Obviously I don't know the extent of Whole Foods' distribution of this to their stores, but it's worth a hunt).

I agree with Rustic Bakery. The cake is very nice, and this--and ones like it--WILL vanquish fruitcake's bad reputation.

Epilogue: when I reached the checkout with my small basket of, like, 4 items, I was shocked to find my bill to be $49.50. That's more like it, Whole Foods. Stay Whole Paycheck there, fellas. 

Guest Post, and Food Network Magazine!

Hello all, and happy fruitcake season! I hope that yours are all ordered, or are freshly baked and soaking up some tantalizing liquor in your basement/garage/fridge/mouth. I've been quite busy at work so unfortunately didn't even get around to baking fruitcakes this year, however my friends did, so I will be posting soon about our annual fruitcake tasting.

The December issue of Food Network Magazine contains an article on fruitcake where I'm quoted.  Looks to be a really interesting article on fruitcake's resurgence, to which I proclaim a loud HUZZAH! I believe the article is currently only in their printed magazine so by all means pick one up.

If you're here because of that magazine article, welcome and please take a look around! You can also like my Facebook page and join other fruitcake lovers there.

Until further posts, please enjoy a guest post by Jay Martin, where he describes his love for a good monastery fruitcake and provides some great links and reference at the bottom. Please excuse the differences in font -- in the interest of expediency I will post it as is.

Thanks, Jay!

---

Monks selling fruitcake

Guest post by Jay Martin

Every year my mom sends my brother a fruitcake. This year her source dried up, a clothing catalog called Norm Thompson. Her fallback source, the Vermont Country Store, didn’t have the right kind of fruitcake, which is baked by monks in Oregon. My mom asked for help. I stalled.

You see, I’m the son who likes fruitcake. Years ago my mom confused my brother with me somehow. Maybe my brother likes fruitcake too, or maybe he’s just been gracious. Either way my brother has received at least 14 Christmas fruitcakes that should have been mine.

I searched Google for monks selling fruitcake. The Oregon monks my mom remembered weren’t even the first search result. Impressed, I started a list. Google showed six monasteries, then I found Mondo Fruitcake which knew about two more, and then I found some nuns. The nuns in New York and the monks in Michigan are Orthodox, but most are Trappists, monks who stay silent at meals.

I’m the son who eats fruitcake. I’m the son who in a Christmas show attempted to eat an entire fruitcake in the time it takes to sing “The Twelve Days of Christmas.” I was going to succeed too, until the singers sped up.

The Michigan monks bake a four-and-a-half pound fruitcake. The Kentucky monks go up to five pounds. I added those details to my list. All the monks douse the fruitcakes. My mom was surprised to hear that fruitcakes have rum in them—or peach brandy if your monastery is in Georgia. I assured her that was the regular recipe.

I’m the son who baked fruitcake. I baked professionally, briefly. I worked at Jen’s Hawaiian Bakery Café in Santa Cruz, California. We used dried pineapple and tropical fruit. We moistened our fruitcakes with guava concentrate.

I sorted my list. Most of the monasteries were established in the years after World War II. Many young men sought a religious life after the military, including my dad. I showed the list to my mom, and she chose the California monks, who are Camaldolese. It's a monastery we think my dad visited. My brother got my dad's religious side, which might explain my mom's confusion about which son should receive a fruitcake baked by monks. I ordered the fruitcake for my brother.

I’m the son who knows fruitcake. After I placed the order, I came back to Mondo Fruitcake. Isabelle has tasted all the fruitcakes from monks (and fruitcakes from 26 other sources). I looked at her ratings. The fruitcake I ordered my brother wasn't number 1. Isabelle likes best the one she had as a child, which her mom still sends her every Christmas. Without telling my mom, I ordered Isabelle's favorite fruitcake for myself.

Monks selling fruitcake: the list

Guest post by Jay Martin

Here is a list of monks and nuns who sell fruitcake online as of Christmas 2018. Prices are rounded to the dollar and include shipping but not rush shipping.

- Abbey of Gethsemani (est. 1848) in Trappist, Kentucky, 2.5 pounds for $57 or 5 pounds for $101, store and fruitcake

- Monastery of the Holy Spirit (est. 1944) in Conyers, Georgia, 1 pound for $28 or 2 pounds for $43, store and fruitcake

- Our Lady of Guadalupe Abbey (est. 1948) in Carlton, Oregon, 1 pound for $30 or 3 pounds for $39, store and fruitcake

- Assumption Abbey (est. 1950) in Ava, Missouri, 2 pounds for $35, store and fruitcake

- Holy Cross Abbey (est. 1950) in Berryville, Virginia, 2.25 pounds for $47, store and fruitcake

- Abbey of the Genesee (est. 1951) in Piffard, New York, 2 pounds for $49, store and fruitcake

- New Camaldoli Hermitage (est. 1958) in Big Sur, California, 1 pound for $39, fruitcake

- New Skete Monasteries (est. 1966) in Cambridge, New York, about 2 pounds for $49, store and fruitcake

- Holy Transfiguration Skete (est. 1983) in Eagle Harbor, Michigan, 4.5 pounds for $66, store and fruitcake

Fruitcake season is here again....and yes, fruitcake is coming back.

It's getting to be fruitcake season! I received my first King Arthur Flour catalog today. Here's the cover:

And oh, what's that in the upper right? What does that say?

Let's zoom in a bit, shall we?

When fruitcake starts making it to the front of the King Arthur flour catalog......I call it a resurgence.

Seriously, though, the latest catalog contains several different fruit blends in addition to their standard fruitcake blend...resurgence. They also have some nice sounding organic candied lemon and orange peel from Spain....fruitcake resurgence!!

That peel,though....limited time only, and 8 ounce packages are $16.95 per. Pricey. Nuts.com has candied orange peel for $6.99/pound. I've used it and it's good quality. Maybe I'll try the King Arthur, but even Market Hall foods has imported Italian orange peel for $17/pound, and it's very nice.

Which all leads to how I started this post. It's getting to be the time to start thinking about making and/or purchasing fruitcakes! I'm considering making the Sailor Jerry fruitcake, and then an intriguing one that is supposedly from 1957 and contains crystallized ginger. Remember that I have tons of fruitcake recipes collected on my Pinterest board.

Are you thinking about your fruitcake baking/purchasing? Let me know what you're planning on my Facebook page!

For the love of Fruitcake

I was recently quoted in an article in Adweek about fruitcake. It's an excellent article about the history of fruitcake, how it may have received its bad reputation, and why there is that silent group of people (hello, person reading this blog post!) who actually love fruitcake.

I truly believe what I said in that article. Fruitcake's time has come. Why not? Just about everything else has been revisited. I live in Chicago, and I've seen the following items, just off the top of my head, get a modern update, or been made locally, or just been revisited with a fresh perspective:

• Mustard
• Twinkies
• Ham
• Moon pies
• Cider
• Cookies & Milk
• French fries & vanilla shakes
• Pickles

So why not fruitcake? Why not you, why not now? You might be buying local already--your beer, your bread, your alcohol, your pickles, your food. Why not find a local person making fruitcake and buy/try it? Or better yet, make it yourself?

Granted, maybe you just don't like it--you don't like the spiciness, or the nuts, or you don't like the texture of all the fruit, That's fine (my husband, God bless him, doesn't like it). Don't eat it. But...have you even tried it?

Fruitcake has a lovely, long tradition of being a condensed expression of a good harvest, of abundance, of hospitality, of care, and of love. For those reasons alone, give it a try.

Happy Holidays! Happy Winter! Happy New Year!

Fruitcake tasting 2017!

The annual fruitcake tasting was held earlier this holiday season. As you may have read, on the blog or on Facebook, a group of us make different fruitcake recipes and share them. We agreed this year that our fruitcake-making abilities have definitely improved from when we first began. It's hard to make a good fruitcake! There's the purchasing--who's a good purveyor of quality fruit, etc? Then the preparation: carving out enough time and doing enough planning to have your fruit soaking in alcohol, and making sure you have ALL the ingredients in time to bake. Because we have our party right after Thanksgiving, that means that we're purchasing ingredients and baking right after Halloween--when, face it, most people are not in the holiday baking mood.

But several years of practice have honed this group's skills, and the photo below is the result-- a stellar group of delicious fruitcakes, cookies, and even a panettone!

The fruit(cake)s of our labors

What you're looking at, clockwise from upper left, is a panettone, Nigella Lawson's Chocolate Fruitcake, Martha Washington's great cake, a half of Jane Parker fruitcake (the only commercially made cake in the bunch), Nigella Lawson's Gorgeously Golden Dundee cake, the Joy of Cooking's Pfeffernuesse (the powdered-sugar covered cookies), a chocolate fruitcake, and an 1866 (or Lee, as in Robert E) fruitcake. Unfortunately I don't have the last 2 fruitcake recipes in a linkable format yet, stay tuned.

This group has had the Nigella Chocolate Fruitcake once before--a dense, dark fruitcake. I personally don't get a strong chocolate flavor from it; the other chocolate fruitcake tasted more chocolatey. Still, it's a good one to make if you like those dark, caramelized, deep and rich flavors in your fruitcake. 

My friend who made the panettone was not super happy with the result, but I thought it was delicious! A close up of the texture is at right.Some commercially made panettones are cloyingly sweet, but this was delicious, yeasty, bready/cakey, and yummy with chocolate bits and fruit.

I've posted on the Martha Washington cake on Facebook, I'm pretty sure. I would not call it a fruitcake, frankly--it's more just a poundcake with fruits and nuts in it. The preparation for this cake was done by beating the egg whites and yolks separately. The whites are beaten until stiff, and then folded into the batter. However, this batter is pretty stiff all on its own, so I didn't get a good rise--I feel the batter flattened out a lot of the bubbles in the yolks. I also had soaked the fruit in alcohol, as mentioned in the recipe, but then also wrapped the cake in brandy-soaked cheesecloth. Uh-uh. Not enough heft in this cake to support the additional alcohol--it felt a bit too hot in the mouth. Once that alcohol evaporated, however, it tasted fine. I wouldn't bake it again, however, as I truly didn't feel it was a fruitcake.

The other Nigella Lawson recipe, the Golden fruitcake, was a big hit. This cake is described by Nigella as "squidgy," and I agree. It is just oozing delicious, sticky fruit. Big thing with this cake--gluten free! No flour in the recipe. Certainly adds to the "squidginess" if there's no glutinous batter involved! I advise cutting this one in very thin slices, however, as it is quite rich.

Closeup of the 1866 (Lee) fruitcake

The chocolate and Lee fruitcakes were very similar in that they had a pretty even proportion of fruit to cake, and both were QUITE boozy--both are soaked in booze after baking. The chocolate fruitcake was very approachable--almost a quick bread with fruit in it. A good "fruitcake for beginners."

Finally, the Pfeffernuesse. I was a little disappointed. They were fine as cookies go--a spicy gingerbread-type cookie dusted in powdered sugar. I made these because they actually had black pepper in the recipe, and I was expecting something deliciously spicy. They certainly looked cute. But I have another Pfeffernuesse recipe that I've made that I like much better--they are dipped in a lemon glaze instead of powdered sugar, and they taste, well, frankly, more fruitcake-ish.

The Jane Parker I've reviewed elsewhere. It was tasty, but as usual, commercially made pales alongside good, homemade cake.

Hope you all are tucking into a delicious fruitcake of your choice as we edge toward the dark nights of winter. Happy Holidays, everyone!

Fruitcake Review: Jane Parker Classic Fruitcake

From what I hear, for certain areas of the country, the Jane Parker fruitcakes were a beloved part of Christmas. Not for my family—I had never heard of it until some blog readers asked about it. You all know I’m an OG Gethsemani Farm fan.

I had reviewed the Jane Parker Dark fruitcake a few years back. It was fine but evidently I wasn’t a fan. Since then, it’s my understanding that the cake became unavailable until the brand and original recipe were purchased by a new group after A & P’s bankruptcy. The cake is now made in the US Midwest (previously it had been made in Canada).

I was sent a 3 pound fruitcake, which costs $49.97 with free shipping. Packaged in a holiday tin, it’s $59.97 with tin. This is pretty comparable to other fruitcakes. It’s pricey, but I personally love it when shipping is included—just one flat cost. The fruitcakes are also available in 1-pound and whopping 4.5 pound sizes. The ingredients are OK for a commercial fruitcake: raisins first, then cherries, pineapples, and the nuts are pecans. There is high fructose corn syrup in this cake, a bit of a surprise for me. So many products have been dropping this ingredient. I guess I’d prefer sugar but I’m not terribly surprised to see this in a commercial fruitcake. Finally, and my favorite: Fruitcake flavor. I don’t know. I guess a commercial flavoring—perhaps a spice mix? I didn’t get a clear answer when I asked the company. No worries – let this cake keep its fruitcake-flavored air of mystery.

The cake is garnished with pecans on top. They and all the nuts in the cake tasted very fresh—a straight-up pecan flavor, not burned, caramelized or otherwise off. There is a good proportion of cake to fruit and nuts in this cake—meaning that it’s not all fruit. The cake itself is gold, and has a nice buttery, pound-cake like flavor.


The overall flavor is not complex, good and approachable-- orange, pecan, sweet, pound cake. I’ve been happily snacking on this one. If you miss Jane Parker, you are safe to jump back in the pool and purchase. It’s a good “fruitcake for beginners.”

Fruitcake Tasting 2015!!

Last night was the annual Fruitcake tasting party at my friend Sherry's house. This event has truly evolved. A couple years ago we featured primarily purchased fruitcakes featured on this blog, with only one homemade cake. This year, there were seven--yes, seven-- homemade fruitcakes featured.

Another interesting progression has been our attitudes toward fruitcake. Previously, the attendees were fruitcake-curious. Now they are full on fruitcake aficionados, defenders, and even proselytizers.

So on to the party. We started with cocktails using a mixer that was really delicious and could be used to create both a fruitcake-esque type cocktail, or it could go full-on tropical. Here it is:

The Owl's Brew Coco-lada was very delicious mixed with vodka, because it created a cocktail that was fruity and coconut-y, but also light and not cloying. Certainly when you're steeling yourself up to plow through six fruitcakes, you don't need cloying. 

After our cocktails and dinner, we prepared ourselves for the fruitcakes. And what a beautiful variety met our eyes:

The center fruitcake is one from the New Antoinette Pope School cookbook, an older cookbook, I think from the '70s, and a local Chicago favorite, the Antoinette Pope School of Fancy Cookery being based in Chicago.

So in the photo, going clockwise around, starting with the cake immediately to the left of center, we have:

• Mary Meade's White Fruitcake
• White House Fruitcake
• Nigella Lawson's Chocolate Fruitcake
• Barmbrack, an Irish fruitcake
• Apricot-Macadamia Nut Fruitcake
• Toasted Almond Fruitcake (Couldn't find a link but it was a recipe from an old Good Housekeeping Cook Book, copyright 1949).
• Antoinette Pope Fruitcake (center)

Quite an impressive showing, eh? I must mention that my friend Laura, besides contributing the White House and Antoinette Pope, also made mini-loaves of two previously-made and highly esteemed fruitcakes, the Gourmet Best Fruitcake Ever (sorry, I'm not finding a link for this one) and Fiona Cairns' Rich Tamarind Fruitcake, aka the Will and Kate fruitcake, since it was served at their wedding. So I was sent home, blissfully happy, with a plate that looked like this:

PLUS two more loaves. I think I'll be set for the year......except I have family members with whom I must share my bounty. We'll see about that.

Anyway, on to the tasting. I'm going to group these into the darks, the whites, and the others. I won't be mentioning any Southern-style fruitcakes (which I define as very sweet, almost candy-like, without alcohol), because, it turns out, we all like our fruitcakes plenty boozy. 

The two white fruitcakes were the Mary Meade White and the Apricot-Macadamia. Both of these I would consider "gateway"  fruitcakes or "fruitcakes for beginners."  They both were more like rich pound cakes with fruit (and booze) added. They were both delicious--keep in mind we had already had cocktails and eaten pizza, so I think a lighter fruitcake was welcome. They were well balanced, boozy, rich, and with a nice pound-cake-type crumb. The macadamia-apricot cake in particular was on the edge of what you could consider fruitcake, versus the Margaret Meade, which had cherries in it and so seemed a bit more fruitcake-esque. We all agreed, however, that these were delicious. 

The darks included the Toasted Almond, the Nigella Lawson, and the Antoinette Pope, although the latter was more of a happy medium. 

I made the toasted almond and on first tasting it, was not a big fan. There is a lot of raisin in this fruitcake, and anyone who has read other posts knows what an un-fan of the raisin I am. This one also has a lot of molasses, and I used stout in the batter as well, so overall the cake had a very dark, toasty flavor. The others in the party, however, liked the unique flavor, and I have a feeling that on its own, I will appreciate this more as the rich, dark, spicy cake that it is. 

The Nigella Lawson is also a rather dark fruitcake, having cocoa in the batter, which I'm sure gives it a darker flavor. It does not, however, give the cake a chocolate flavor, so if you were hoping for chocolate gooiness, this is not that cake. There are prunes in this one and overall it also shares that dark, rich spiciness. It's very elegant as well if you choose to decorate it as my friend Sherry did, with gold dragees.

Coming in sort of in the middle of the ones I've mentioned so far was the Antoinette Pope. This is a classic, quintessential fruitcake, boozy, fruit-filled, and spicy, but not overly so. My friend went with a lot of citron and peels for her fruit mix on this one. I personally love orange peel because it gives cakes a fresh, bright flavor, but this was tempered with the slightly bitter taste of citron, which added complexity. I liked this recipe as a very nice take on a classic fruitcake. 

On to the last two. The White House fruitcake was my favorite of the night, primarily because it was flat out sweet due to the delicious apricot glaze and icing. It was a really moist, boozy cake. If you peruse the recipe you'll see that it has a few different additions--almond extract, dried pears, etc---that adds to its uniqueness. 

The final was a really unique cake or bread, called barmbrack, a traditional Irish fruitcake or bread. Upon a little investigation I learned that it's actually associated with Halloween more than Christmas, but I was thrilled to have this on the table. It has a really unique and yummy flavor, containing dried fruits like apples, and those fruits are soaked in tea. It was really unique. The one we had was a bit too moist and resembled in a way a bread pudding, but it was delicious. Definitely a recipe to investigate in the future.

There was some interesting discussion about the amount of care, time and let's face it, money that goes into making a fruitcake. We discussed going super hard-core and candying our own fruit for next year--but honestly, then, the preparation for these cakes would have to start in summertime, and as it is we were baking cakes around Halloween. What I take away from those discussions, however, is a real appreciation for what a fruitcake is--a celebration of bounty, richness, time, and love, all combined in one cake.

Happy Holidays all!!

On Hiatus

Hi all -- last time I posted was back in January and you see it's already May. I created this blog back in 2005 to address all of the fruitcake hate out there. Since then I've taken an incredibly fun, alcohol- and calorie-enhanced journey through the fruitcakes out there for purchase--good, bad, excellent and horrible.

Ten years is a long time and I think I've fallen prey to the short attention span that Facebook and Twitter have inspired. For whatever reason I just can't bring myself to post long posts about fruitcake anymore--or maybe I've simply just eaten most of them, and there are fewer fruitcakes to write about!

For whatever reason, I'm not going to mince words anymore--this blog is on hiatus. You can continue to find me on the Mondo Fruitcake Facebook page, and I've been storing recipes, etc., on a Mondo Fruitcake Pinterest page, as well.

Thanks to everyone who's taken the journey with me. I have met that silent minority of people who truly love and appreciate the fruitcake, and they are fantastic people to know. I'm honored to stand among them.

I feel, in a way, as if I'm shutting down this blog right at the time when fruitcake will begin to become appreciated again. There are so many craft and artisanally made foods nowadays--I would not be at all surprised if fruitcake made a resurgence. I have personally tasted many home-made fruitcakes, from many of you, that could proudly stand as evidence of the deliciousness of the product.

So I won't say I'm "shutting down" the blog. But it's definitely on hiatus. Certainly people come here to look for reviews of fruitcakes, and I continue to stand by my reviews. You may continue to see posts about home-made fruitcakes I've tasted or made, since I've learned through this journey that that's truly the best.

Thanks all!!

Happy New Year all!!

Well it finally hit me--one of the reasons I don't think I've been posting as much on my blog has not been my lack of interest in fruitcake--far from it. It's been a technology-related problem.

I don't have a computer at home. Well, I should be more specific--I don't have a computer with a full keyboard at home. For the past 4 years or so, I've been using tablets--first an iPad, now a Nexus. That was actually the problem. Have you ever tried writing a lengthy, thought-provoking post on fruitcake while tapping on an extremely tiny keyboard? Let me tell you, it's not easy.

This just hit me the other day. I just haven't wanted to compose posts on my 7 inch tablet!

This post is the product of my most recent purchase -- a Bluetooth keyboard. I am typing with the ease and comfort that only a full-sized keyboard can bring.

So I hope you can look forward to more posts from me on the subject of fruitcake. And in this new year 2015, I am going to state an unlikely prediction--that fruitcake will see a resurrection. The tide is turning, and I think fruitcake will finally win some followers. Stay tuned for more musings on that.

In the mean time, happy new year to all! If you have a special fruitcake memory from this past season to share, please do so in the comments!!

Laura's Stollen recipe

My friend Laura, who is an excellent baker, made the stollen we enjoyed at our fruitcake tasting. She cobbled and jiggered (I suppose you could say "stole," ha-ha) stollen recipes from the New York Times and Slate to create her own recipe, aptly named Frankenstein Stollen. Here it is!!

Frankenstein Stollen

Ingredients:

1 cup golden raisins

1 cup dried cherries

1 cup candied orange peel

1 cup chopped crystallized ginger

1 cup sliced or slivered almonds

3/4 cup orange liqueur (like Grand Marnier or Cointreau)

1 package active dry yeast (1/4 ounce)

1/2 cup milk, at room temperature

4 cups all-purpose flour

3/4 cup plus 3 tablespoons sugar

2 3/4 teaspoons ground ginger

1 teaspoon kosher salt

1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

1 teaspoon ground cardamom

1 teaspoon freshly grated nutmeg

1 teaspoon freshly grated lemon zest

1/2 vanilla bean, seeds scraped and reserved

2 cups (4 sticks) unsalted butter, melted

1 large egg yolk

1/2 cup chopped candied ginger

1/2 cup mixed candied citrus peel (optional, see note)

2 cups confectioners’ sugar.

Instructions:

1. The night before baking, mix golden raisins, dried cherries, candied orange peel, crystallized ginger, slivered almonds and orange liqueur in a small container. Cover and let sit overnight at room temperature.

2. The next day, in an electric mixer with paddle, set on low speed, mix yeast with milk until dissolved. Add 1 cup flour and mix until a soft, sticky dough forms, about 2 minutes. This is the “starter.” Transfer starter to a lightly greased bowl, cover with greased plastic, and let rest for 40 minutes at room temperature.

3. In an electric mixer with paddle and set on low speed, mix remaining 3 cups of flour, 3 tablespoons of sugar, 1/2 teaspoon ginger, salt, cinnamon, cardamom, nutmeg, lemon zest and vanilla seeds. With motor running, pour in 1 cup melted butter. Mix on slow for 1 minute, then add egg yolk. Mix until liquid is absorbed, about 1 minute more.

4. Divide starter dough into 3 pieces. Add starter to mixture in bowl, 1 piece at a time, mixing on slow until each addition is thoroughly combined, 2 to 3 minutes after each addition. After starter is absorbed, mix dough on a medium speed until glossy, 4 to 5 minutes.

5. Add fruits and almonds, and mix on slow until combined, 4 to 6 minutes.

6. Turn dough out onto a lightly floured surface and knead until fruit and nuts are inside dough rather than stuck on surface, and dough is smooth and glossy, about 5 minutes. Place dough in a medium bowl and cover with plastic. Rest for 1 hour to let rise slightly. Then knead it once or twice, cover with plastic and let rest for another hour.

7. Divide into 2 equal pieces and shape each into an oval loaf about 8 inches long. Stack 2 rimmed baking sheets on top of each other, lining top pan with parchment. Place loaves on doubled pans and cover with plastic. Allow loaves to rest 1 more hour at room temperature.

8. About 20 minutes before this rise is completed, preheat oven to 350 degrees. Remove plastic covering loaves and bake for about 1 hour. Loaves should look uniformly dark golden brown and internal temperature taken from middle of each loaf should be 190 degrees.

9. Meanwhile, whisk together the remaining 3/4 cup sugar and 2 1/4 teaspoons ground ginger. When stollen is done, transfer top pan holding loaves to a wire rack (leave stollen on pan). While still hot, brush stollen with remaining 1 cup of melted butter, letting butter soak into loaves. Sprinkle ginger sugar on tops and sides of loaves. When loaves are completely cool, cover loosely with waxed or parchment paper or foil and let sit at room temperature for 8 hours or overnight.

10. The next day, sift 1 1/2 cups confectioners’ sugar over loaves, rolling to coat bottom and sides evenly with sugar. Wrap each loaf in plastic and let sit at room temperature for at least 2 days before sifting remaining 1/2 cup confectioners’ sugar over loaves and serving.

Yield: 2 loaves, each about 1 1/2 pounds.

Fruitcake Tasting 2014

The latest homemade fruitcake tasting took placeon the 28th, and many delicious cakes were enjoyed!! This evening was a homemade only event--no commercial bakeries were included.

So here are the cakes we sampled :

(far left platter) Alton Brown's Free Range Fruitcake
(top platter) Joy of Cooking's Dark Fruitcake *
(On lower right platter, clockwise from 9 o'clock)
Alton Brown's Free Range Fruitcake (we had two)
Gourmet's The Best Fruitcake Ever
Stollen (just a tiny corner)
Fiona Cairns' Rich Tamarind Fruitcake (William & Kate's wedding cake)

Notice that quite a few of these are duplicates from last year's tasting. I guess they were good ones! They were all winners in this bunch.

Two of the guests made Alton Brown's Free Range Fruitcake, so we did a head-to-head tasting of it--and found them both to be yummy. There were slight variations between the two: one baker had soaked the cake in brandy, while the other had lightly spritzed same, and we found that the latter had a bit lighter taste because of it. So for anyone making their own, take note--adding alcohol gives the cake a heavier character. If you don't like candied fruit, this is a good recipe for you--all dried fruits. It almost looks like a quick bread, and we agreed that a generous dollop of cream cheese and this would be a delicious breakfast bread. Perhaps for Christmas morning?

Both the Best Fruitcake Ever and Fiona Cairns' fruitcakes are stellar--full of a variety of fresh and interesting flavors, rich and delicious, and the almond extract-flavored glaze adds an extra little pop.

Now, for that asterisk above on the Dark Fruitcake: I learned while searching for the Joy of Cooking Dark Fruitcake recipe on the internet, that the recipe in my edition of the Joy of Cooking was misprinted. It was actually missing about 6 eggs! There was also too much brandy in the recipe (but can there ever be too much brandy in a recipe, I ask you). We all did remark on my cake being sunken in the middle. I attributed that to (and still attribute it to) the fact that I mistakenly baked it in 2 stacked loaf pans instead of 1, so it was more insulated than it should have been.

Regardless, it was a good fruitcake. Everyone liked it for it's markedly dark flavor, attributable to the molasses and brown sugar in the recipe. I actually found it to be a bit too dark for my taste, edging into burnt tasting (to me). Could also be the large amount of raisins in the recipe.

Some Lessons Learned from previous fruitcake tastings:

1. Eat lightly. Our hostess ordered 2 big pizzas (from Roots--delicious!) for six people, which on an ordinary night could have easily been decimated, but people limited themselves to only a few slices, knowing that the tasting lay ahead. 
2. Pace yourself. We enjoyed conversation for a while after dinner, ate the first round of fruitcakes, talked a bit more, than went back in for round two. This approach allowed us to clear our palates and heads so we could fully enjoy all the cakes. 
3. Small slices! Notice the sizes of the slices we had cut above. The Free Range Fruitcake slices at top left were further cut into thirds for tasting. This is heavy stuff, and can only be fully appreciated and enjoyed when doled out in small pieces. Anything bigger and you're groaning in pain by the end of them all and might dream of fruitcake slices chasing you--which is what happened at previous tastings. 

I'll post the stollen recipe soon!

Review: Neiman-Marcus Traditional Fruitcake

I'd had the Neiman Marcus Traditional Fruitcake on my list of cakes to review for some time now--I mean, it's Neiman Marcus. But often it would be sold out or unavailable. I managed to find it, available but backordered, at the end of October, and so ordered the 2 pound cake for $32.32, delivery included (nice!). They had promised the cake by November 21 at the latest, but it turns out I got it quite a bit earlier than that. As you know I was wrapped up in my own fruitcake making so didn't get around to trying it until just recently.

So here we go. Here's the tin:

Yup, that's an alligator texture on the label. This has to be the most fashion-forward fruitcake I've tried. That big sticky line marring the sticker came with the cake; that would have been pretty upsetting if I was buying this to give but I'm not so it's not a big deal (and knowing Neiman-Marcus I'm sure they would send me another one if it had been).

Here's the cake itself:

Pretty--there's a bit of candied orange on top in additional to the standard cherries and pecans, which adds a sort of "foody" vibe to the cake. The ingredients themselves are fairly typical for a mass-produced fruitcake (which is the category I think I'm going to put this in)--with a surprise:

Cocoa. There's cocoa in the cake, something I don't believe I've ever seen unless the cake was tryng to be chocolately). The fruits: pineapple, cherries, oranges, dates, raisins. The nuts? Walnuts and pecans both. There is both rum and brandy in this cake, which you can definitely taste--I'm sure one was for soaking the fruit, the other for soaking the cake and/or in the batter. There's also honey in the mix--not sure if I can smell or taste it specifically but props to them for including it, I'm sure it adds to the flavor. There is shortening, including partially hydrogenated, in the mix, which isn't fabulous--I'd prefer butter. There are various preservatives, caramel color, and food colorings at the end of the list that don't thrill me--I'm guessing the colorings are from the fruit, but caramel coloring? Is this necessary?

Here's a photo of a slice:

The taste is sweet and pretty darn boozy, which is nice--we don't often see a boozy mass-produced. There are big chunks of moist fruit, no problem there--this cake is not dry. The flavor is a bit more complex than just sweet, there's slight bitterness from the orange peel and walnuts and definitely a caramel or dark fruitcake flavor. The cocoa does not add a "Hey--there's chocolate in here!" flavor, but adds to the overall dark spicy effect.

I think I've mentioned this in previous posts, but it's interesting how much my opinion is influenced by how hungry I am. "Well okay," you're thinking, "she's supposed to be a reviewer and she's telling me she's not 100% unbiased?" Yes, that's what I'm saying, but to my credit at least I'm self-aware enough to notice my bias. The first time I tried this was as a "breakfast dessert" after I'd eaten my breakfast. At that time I thought "meh." This last time I ate it AS my breakfast. I also let it warm up just the tiniest bit, which allows the flavors to deepen and expand a bit (like fine wine--I let my fruitcake "breath"). The second time around, this cake tasted much better--still perhaps not as fresh as a homemade fruitcake, but not quite as just straight-up sweet and sweet as the first time I tried it.
My conclusion on this cake? It's OK. At $32.32 plus shipping for 2 pounds, it's not a bad deal, the ingredients are not horrible, and it's certainly one of the prettier fruitcakes I've ordered from a large company. I think that the mass-produced fruitcakes have a new winner.

[NOTE: as of this writing the fruitcake is sold out; it obviously has a following!]

Making a fruitcake: it’s a labor of love

Preparing to make a fruitcake today. As many of my readers know, I am not a fruitcake maker, or even a baker, in general. However, I recognize that the homemade ones are usually the most delicious. Because of this, I always intended to make a fruitcake this year. My friends are having their annual fruitcake tasting right after Thanksgiving, which is why I might be starting a bit earlier than some. I did purchase a Neiman-Marcus fruitcake, which is on back order (how could I resist? this is, after all Mondo Fruitcake), and might consider the purchase of a couple more, but mostly I’m focused on this one.

When I make something, I tend to start with something traditional or time-tested as a baseline before moving onto variations—for example, I almost always follow a recipe to the letter the first time. So for this fruitcake, I haven’t selected any fancy recipe, but rather the Dark Fruitcake recipe out of my Joy of Cooking cookbook (the 1997 publication, which I believe was skewered by some because it also contained fancy/exotic recipes, but I love it to death—it’s my Bible when it comes to cooking).

This gosh-dern fruitcake. I’m sure anyone who has made one will agree with me that it's a freakin’ scavenger hunt to assemble all the ingredients needed.

My friend Laura graciously stepped up to be the candied fruit coordinator for three of the fruitcake bakers for aforementioned party, and purchased, received, and stickily sorted all of the candied fruit: lemon and orange peel, citron, pineapple, and Morello cherries (from Market Hall Foods). They are very nice quality and I'm sure that will reflect well on this fruitcake.

It was up to me to come up with the dried fruits and spices, then. Not too difficult in a metropolitan area such as Chicago, but I did have a bit of a tussle with the currants and mace. I should have just found a gourmet shop but ended up wandering aimlessly through several fruit/international food markets near me, finally giving up and purchasing dried blueberries instead of the currants. Honestly, I don’t think it’s going to make that much of a difference (and OK, I admit, the recipe is not being followed to the absolute letter--but who cares but me, really?)

I started all the fruit out with a red wine soak last night. This is what the makers of my favorite fruitcake do. Today’s the day to put it all together and get it baked. I’ll report back soon!

Review: June Taylor Christmas Cake

I bought the $55, 1-pound June Taylor Christmas Cake online, and then paid an additional $14.90 for shipping to the middle of the country (from Oakland, California, where June Taylor is based). So $69.90 later, a very small, one-pound loaf arrived. Needless to say, this is a very expensive cake, $3.40 per ounce without shipping, $4.37 per ounce if shipping is included, so I certainly had my hopes up.

The cake is shipped with an explanatory note, describing how the cake is made. They certainly keep things local with this cake, even the wrapping paper: per the note, "June watercolors the cake wraps before a letterpress design is printed on them." Here's what that looks like:

The ingredients, listed in this note, ascribe the origins of each ingredient, which are truly locally sourced from around Oakland: the port and brandy in which the dried fruits are macerated is from Alameda, the almonds are from Chico, the Bing cherries are from Escalon. If I lived in the Oakland area I certainly would be proud of the bounty in that area on reading this list. Here's the ingredient list from the back of the wrap:

I hope that's clear (but it probably isn't, knowing me). There are candied citrus peels in this cake, but the rest is dried fruit, including plums, apricots, and cherries. And, unfortunately for this writer, there are a lot of grapes and golden raisins. A LOT of those little guys. Locally sourced, yes, but still a lot of them. Regardless, this is a nice clean, wholesome list of ingredients. 

Upon unwrapping the cake, you find a cute little loaf wrapped in cheesecloth. Per the little note, "your cake has been washed with an aged brandy and wrapped in cheesecloth to keep it moist:"

Looks very similar to the Robert Lambert or other smaller fruitcakes I've had. Here it is unwrapped:

And finally, here's a slice:

A nice proportion of fruit to cake, but not very pretty--everything is very brown. Definitely not a super festive-looking cake. 

So on to the taste. Well I've been hinting at it with the reference to ALL the grapes/raisins: this cake had that sort of grapey, burnt taste that is not my favorite. I think this also may be due to the inclusion of the dried plums. Come to think of it, port wine is also grape-based, a fortified wine, so gosh, that's a heck of a lot of grape in this cake. 

The cake itself has a nice dense crumb and a rich flavor due to the brown sugar, spices, and alcohol, but I have to admit that I was a bit disappointed with the flavor. I was expecting something a bit more dynamic or original. Certainly, June Taylor calls this a "traditional Christmas cake," so is certainly not marketing this as anything more than that, and in that sense it fits the bill. 

I did find the cake to be just a bit dry when I first tried it. Referring back to the note packed with the cake (a very useful reference, that), they recommend that it "can periodically be refreshed with more brandy." So before wrapping it up, I brushed a bit of cognac on the outside, re-wrapped in the cheesecloth and put in a storage bag. I also followed the instructions on the note to "refrigerate until the cake is cold and using a sharp knife thinly slice the cake and bring back to room temperature to serve." The next time I tried it, I did just that, let it come back to room temperature before trying it, and that also helped--the flavors and aromas expanded and became more complex. 

So I can say I tried to give this cake the benefit of the doubt. This is certainly a delicious, well-made cake sourced from local ingredients and made with care. If you care about food made from "quality ingredients" from "local farmers and artisan producers" (again from that note), then certainly this would be an excellent cake to purchase. And this cake is indeed an experience: the entire experience shows a desire by June Taylor to create a beautiful, well-crafted cake, even down to the wrap. 

However, face it, this cake cost a lot of money, and for that money, didn't deliver anything terribly original. If you're trying to balance quality with value, I would recommend checking out the Jampot (Holy Transfiguration Skete), Old Cavendish, or even one of the Bien Fait cakes for something similar at a lower price.