Do you like fruitcake?

[Caroline1]

I'm sure that childhood experiences sway all of our opinions, and I grew up as the daughter of a fabled fruit cake maker. She baked them in April and May, wrapped them individually cheese cloth and put them in a huge air tight container and every month she doused them with more booze. She probably made about 40 of them, using most for gifts, but fruitcake was also served when friends dropped in for coffee any time during the holiday season. I can't recall anyone ever saying, "No, thank you."

But there seems to be an almost universal dislike of fruitcake. I suppose we should differentiate between "store bought" and "baked at home with love" kinds of fruitcake. But I have had some good bought fruitcakes. I've also had some that were horrid. Which probably demands the conclusion that really rotten home made fruitcake is possible.

So I'm curious whether you like or dislike fruitcake? And if any of you hate it no matter what, I'm curious why? 'Tis the season, and all that jazz.

[Kajikit]

I don't think I've ever met a fruit cake I didn't like... the ones with TONS of fruit in them are the best but they should really have real cherries. Those little jelly fake ones aren't a patch on the real thing.

[lemons]

Mostly "not" on average fruitcake. But when it's made with dried fruit, I'm a happy kid. And last year I did a riff on the recipe for black cake here on CH, which was stunning. I have two recipes for fruitcakes, one dark and one blonde, that I've made in the past, which I refer to as Ava Gardner and Grace Kelly. The dark one ages well; the blond one, which is in what's more or less a pound cake base, needs to be eaten within a week or so.

When they're good, they're very good, and when they're bad they're horrid.

[umbushi plum]

i LOVE fruitcake, its one of the only desserts i like! (along with apple pie and bannana cake or muffins and a few others) i have always liked it, and i am a totally savoury kind of girll!

[KaimukiMan]

Nope, don't like it. Not even "good" fruitcake. I'm glad so many of you do. I don't like candied fruit, never have. Don't like the taste, don't like the texture. Hard to believe that there is anything that much rum won't fix, but such is life. I also don't like spumoni ice cream, even good spumoni. I will agree that a good fruitcake is less offensive than a bad one, and the comments above about the large chunks of neon colored dried fruit made me laugh (don't forget the nuts that someone forgot to chop). Those are really really bad.

[pikawicca]

When I was in high school, I had the great good fortune to meet up with Polly Hutchins. She made a fruit cake with dried cherries, chocolate chips, and walnuts. None of that icky gelatinous fruit stuff. I make this treat to this day, and everyone loves it.

[buttertart]

Recipe please, on the Home Cooking board? Sounds great. Thanks.

[Roland Parker]

I appreciate a good fruitcake and I’m especially fond of British style fruit cakes, which I never fail to consume on my frequent visits to England and Scotland.

I have a recipe which was my mother’s grandmother. Like many women of her particular background, she rarely cooked, but she had certain dishes she always made on special occasions and the Christmas fruitcake and plum puddings were two of those dishes.
Her fruitcake recipe came out of an earlier family recipe, and since she was a mild teetotaller she modified the recipe to eliminate the alcohol, substituting orange juice in its place. The cake is not musty as fruitcakes can be, and it can’t keep forever, although it will keep a long time, up to three months in the fridge at the least. I still make the fruitcake every year and it’s a family favourite.

[Bill Hunt]

Maybe our trips to the UK are a tad early, as I have never encountered a UK fruitcake. I'll keep my eyes peeled for these and give them a try on our next Oct trip.

Thanks,

Hunt

[Bill Hunt]

I love fruitcake. However, 99% of these put me off, because of the candied fruit. I can eat the cake and the nuts, an just a tiny bit of the fruit. Almost all kill it for me, because of the candied fruit - just flat too much. Cut that by 90% and you might have a deal.

Hunt

[janeh]

Hunt - You might like the Alton Brown recipe which calls for dried fruit rather than the candied stuff.

[Bill Hunt]

I'll look into that. I am normally not a fan of his TV persona, but if he's got a good recipe, then I will not complain.

Thanks for the info,

Hunt

[scubadoo97]

I'm a closet fruitcake eater. Seriously, I like it but the number of haters seems artificially high. I wonder if some haters hate it because it's the expected response. Wonder if they've ever had a good one or given it a chance. What's not to like, spiced cake with fruit and nuts

[Avalondaughter]

I don't like them, but I don't think it's just because I've only eaten "bad" ones. I am simply not a fan of spice cakes (I don't like gingerbread cake or carrot cake either) and I don't like most dried fruits. I don't like dates or raisins or candied orange peel. I can't stand those green things either. A fruit cake is an amalgam of most things I don't like in my desserts, so I'm not likely to ever enjoy one.

[WTBD]

Ha - fruitcake is such a joke in my native USA, and so revered in my adopted UK. My first experience with British fruitcake was at a friend's wedding. Everyone was talking about the cake: 'can't wait... it will be so good... this is the best part of the wedding reception' etc. I saw the fondant outside and automatically presumed either chocolate or sponge filling. I laughed when it was finally cut to reveal the inside...until I realized the joke was on me! They were serious! (And it was better than I expected.)

Fast forward to my own wedding to a Brit. His mother made us a fruitcake that put our bakery-bought individual-sized chocolate ganache cakes to shame. Even my American relatives had to agree it was nothing like they had feared - but they were grateful for the chocolate option as a fallback.

His mum reliably makes fruitcake every xmas and I'm lobbying to learn her methods so I can pass it down through the family... Who would have thought?!

[im_nomad]

I am from Newfoundland and this is also a tradition where I come from, to have fruitcake for a wedding cake, and I have to say, I hope it stays alive. It is also tradition to sleep with a slice under your pillow is it not...as a single person, you will dream of the one you're meant to marry. My sister had fruitcake as her wedding cake, made by my mother, and decorated by, I believe, her mother-in-law to be. She kept the top layer for my oldest neice's christening.

I MUCH prefer a fruitcake wedding cake to any other.

I will also mention that in addition to loving fruitcake, I also love stollen, barm brack, and boiled raisin cakes.

[WTBD]

I think you're right about the traditions: a slice under the pillow for singles, and save the top tier for the 1st kid's christening. My husband and I didn't save any of ours, but we are fortunate to have a regular supply. The xmas leftovers often last until my birthday in February.

My favorite part of the fruitcake-as-wedding-cake tradition is that, in many cases, it is made by someone in the family. I'd rather have a homemade cake than an expensive, gooey one (although having said that, my sister's lemon-and-raspberry sponge cake was divine. It also cost $800. That's some *fruit cake* !)

[buttertart]

I agree on the fruitcake as wedding cake (I'm from Ontario) and the putting a slice under your pillow to dream of your intended was also observed in our household.
At Christmas, we called it Christmas cake (and I imagine you do too?).
Especially good either with a layer of marzipan and royal icing with tooth-shattering silver dragees - or plain, with a nice piece of old Cheddar cheese (aged 4 or more years). The combination - taught my mother by a neighbor from Yorkshire - divine.
I make my (dear departed) mother's recipe at least every other year and have lately assumed the other family recipe fruitcake making from my mother-in-law, who at 85 is still cooking - wonderfully - for the family, at 85.

[dolores]

Good fruitcake. Yum. As a kid, my father worked for a long gone commercial bakery who gave out fruitcakes at Christmas time.

My mom and I baked, all the time. When it came to fruitcakes, we tried the 'more cake than fruit' and 'more fruit than cake' varieties, and decided the latter was the best. I can still see the magazine recipe she has somewhere, between two sheets of plastic, with the picture of the fruitcake I like the best.

Claxton makes a good fruitcake.

[Will Owen]

I have always adored fruitcake, even those foil-wrapped slices I used to buy for 15¢ from the industrial-baked-goodies rack. The thicker and stickier and more laden with the stuff fruitcake haters REALLY hate, like the green candied stuff, the more I loved them. And the highlight of every year was the one that arrived from my great-grandma, which she had baked right after the Christmas before, wrapped in cheesecloth in a tin, and doused it regularly with brandy through the year - the ONLY time she would ever touch any kind of liquor! As gluttonous as I was, even I could master only one sliver at a time, so rich and deep and complex it was...well, okay, maybe two slivers!

[ipsedixit]

No, but then that's probably because I've never had real good quality fruitcake.

[im_nomad]

Count me in the "love it" category...particularly the rum soaked dark fruit cakes, made by Mom.

[Val]

The only kind I have ever liked was a gift my parents received each year ordered from Figi's from a family friend...it did NOT contain citron...just pineapple, cherries and nuts...that was very good.(is it still fruitcake without citron? I may be calling it the wrong thing!)..the citron stuff really is revolting to me, I don't like anything that contains citron.

[beelzebozo]

alton brown's fruitcake recipe.

seek it out.

it is amaaaaaaaaazing

[Athena]

The Alton Brown recipe looks interesting - it's a variation of a classic boiled fruitcake - rich and dense.

[janeh]

Here's the link to Alton Brown's free range fruitcake, which I've been making for years. Yum!

http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/al...

[alliedawn_98]

I really like fruitcake. I've only had bought fruitcakes that were good to me. Claxton Fruitcakes from Georgia are my favorite but maybe I'm biased because I grew up within 50 miles or so of Claxton. I'm the only one out of both parents and a sister that likes fruitcake. However, both of my children and my SO love it! I did try to make my own last year but it wasn't very good at all and I spent a lot of money on something that mainly ended up in the trash. I really want to be able to make a delicious fruitcake but have no clue where to start!

[bulavinaka]

The great thing about being the only one in the family who likes fruitcake is because of its shelf life, you can take your sweet time eating it! Yum yum!

[Kelli2006]

I love good fruitcake but 99.5% of commercial cakes are more suited to doorstops and paperweights than ingestion. I don't like the cakes with candied fruits dyed fruit in leaden cakes.

I made 2 fruitcakes last week and they are aging as I type in a metal tin in a dark cool corner of my basement.

[adamshoe]

Wow!! You're typing in a metal tin tucked away in your basement!! Talk about dedication...LOL. Re: fruitcake- it's those scary citron things that turn me off . What ARE they, anyway. Were they really fruit that just met a horrible end?! Adam

[Louise]

Citron is a citrus fruit. It met its end in a vat of sugar syrup. And it is delectable in traditional Christmas cookies such as lebkuken and pfeffernusse.

[cimui]

i really like a good fruitcake, rum soaked or non-rum soaked. the ones i dislike have those really nasty, neon-colored, hard, candied fruit, in indelicately large chunks, or a disproportionate amount of fruit peel.

so you can send one of yours my way any day, caroline1!

[bulavinaka]

I was fortunate to be the son of a mom who worked with a very kind and generous man. This self-made man is one of those rare individuals who comes along maybe once or twice in a lifetime. Having been brought up during a very difficult time - the Depression - and having experienced a very very modest if not extremely difficult life leading up to this trying period, he never forgot from where he came from.

He hired my mom and others like her because he saw a lot of what he saw in himself - people who most likely came from walks of life that didn't include silver spoons and were basically good, hard working people with a sense of loyalty.

Treating all of his employees like family, he showered his employees with lots of perks. Among them were free breakfasts, siestas and 25-cent lunches. And these were no ordinary cafeteria meals. The chefs he personally interviewed and hired were mostly from Europe. Having a fancy for European cuisine - mostly French - he insisted on offering what he ate to his employees.

During the holidays, his pastry chef would make a long list of fantastic pastries, desserts, and other treats that all of the employees were welcomed to eat as well as take home. Among them was the obligatory fruitcake, which the pastry chef made one for each employee's family. Not being of regifting quality, I guess I never knew growing up that fruitcakes were something to be laughed at, because when my mom would bring those home each year, I actually looked forward to it - candied fruit, butter, loads of liquor and all. If a fruitcake is made with a lot of love and care, it's going to end up in our tummies, not in our closets.

[cstr]

It's my favorite re-gift item!

[wontonfm]

I thought I didn't until I had a fruitcake from this abbey in Virginia: http://www.monasteryfruitcake.org/products.asp

Totally delicious with great fruit and nut chunks.

WON
http://whatsonmyplate.wordpress.com

[grampart]

As long as it's from the Collin Street Bakery in Corsicana Texas, I love it.
http://www.collinstreet.com/

[BerkshireTsarina]

Absolutely! We've been ordering one for ourselves and some for gifts for more than 20 years. They are so good, I cannot understand why people automatically say they hate fruitcake. On the other hand, I have been introduced to other fruitcakes (a number of them home baked) that are detestable. I guess I detest fruitcakes that are: gummy, sticky, clingy sweet, kind of like fruited mud. And I love the fruitcake from Collin Street Bakery because it's a CAKE first, a nice consistency (not like the sticky ones I described) of firm cake chock full of first quality dried pineapple and cherries, etc. and NO raisins, and tons of pecans. It is a highlight of winter's holiday season for us. Grampart, right on!

[Athena]

I've had a look at the Collin Street Bakery link and it looks like American fruitcake is very different from the English fruitcake I grew up with which did not have pineapple or pecans in it. I love the whole process of making the cakes (been using Jane Grigson's recipe for the last 15 or so years) from soaking the fruit in black rum to preparing the cake tins to the heavenly smell when they bake to finally tasting it on Christmas Day.

[grampart]

With all due respect to your traditional recipe, I think the rum-soaked part is what has turned off many would-be fruitcake eaters in this country, I've been eating the
"regular" Collin Street cakes for over 50 years, but recently the apricot/pecan version has become my favorite.
http://www.collinstreet.com/pages/apr...

[Athena]

Yes, different cultures = different traditions and recipes.

[The Professor]

Just curious...why do you think would the rum soaked part be a turnoff? I don' t disagree that it is probably true for some folks...but why?

[grampart]

I guess it's because most of the booze soaked fruitcakes I've sampled over the years have: too much booze, cheap booze, not been "aged" properly, or a combination of all three. I like my liquor; just not in fruitcake. And don't even get me started on bourbon balls.

[Will Owen]

Bourbon balls - yum! You can send me any you get!