Shockingly Tasty Fruitcakes

Published on Friday, August 22, 2008, by CHOW Food Team / Edit Post

Shockingly Tasty Fruitcakes

Shockingly Tasty Fruitcakes

Start now, finish aging by Christmas

Fruitcake plays a role in plenty of yuletide jokes. No surprise: The scary green cherries and dense, leaden consistency are pure holiday hilarity. But it doesn’t have to be that way. Determined to create fruitcakes that would actually get eaten—and be enjoyed—we tested three varieties. We also perfected the aging methods (these recipes were in development for a year and a half!). These fruitcakes are straightforward and delicious. Get started now to have yours ready for the holidays.

Types of Fruitcakes

All variations on fruitcake contain sweetened dried fruit and alcohol, and can generally be categorized as dark, black, or white. Here are our versions.


Spiced Dark Fruitcake

This iconic fruitcake is made with molasses, dried fruit, and warm
spices like cinnamon and nutmeg, plus a kick of citrus.


Caribbean Black Fruitcake

This one’s made with burnt sugar and rum, giving it a rich, chocolaty flavor.


White “Groom’s” Fruitcake

Buttery and citrusy, this fruitcake is more akin to a candied-fruit-laden
pound cake, and is the perfect vehicle for converting fruitcake-haters.

Notes from the Test Kitchen

Ingredients

Bad fruitcakes are generally bad because they use poor-quality candied fruit or way too much booze. Buy good candied fruit from high-end grocers like Whole Foods or Dean & DeLuca. Or make your own.

Aging

Though all of our fruitcakes were tasty enough to eat freshly baked, their flavors became more balanced and nuanced as time went on. When testing, we stored batches in different ways and for different lengths of time. After enclosing the cakes in resealable plastic bags, resealable plastic containers, and cheesecloth, and even burying them under pounds of powdered sugar both in and out of the refrigerator, we learned that each of the three came out best with a different method and different amount of aging. If you’re concerned about how these cakes can last as long as they do, see our sidebar to the right addressing fruitcake fears.

Fruitcake Fears Addressed

By Roxanne Webber

Will I get sick if I age fruitcake for a month?
If the water activity (which is a measure of the free water available for organisms to grow) is below 0.85, “harmful microbes should not grow,” says Dr. Michael Doyle, regents professor of food microbiology at the University of Georgia and director of UGA’s Center for Food Safety. “Usually fruitcake is below this water activity,” he says. That means that there’s not enough moisture in the cake to allow harmful microorganisms to grow. Alcohol, especially on the surface of the cake, also helps deter microbial growth, he says.

These cakes have a lot of alcohol; should I be concerned about getting drunk?
If you have dietary or religious concerns surrounding the consumption of alcohol, you’re going to want to pass on these cakes. Though most of the alcohol used in the batters will dissipate during baking, there will be trace amounts left, says Barry Swanson, PhD, a professor in the Department of Food Science and Human Nutrition at Washington State University. And in the case of our dark and white fruitcakes, which are brushed with additional alcohol after baking, “pretty much anything you soak in afterwards is going to remain,” he says.

(Back to top)

ALLProject
POST A COMMENT |9 Comments

COMMENT

  • I friggin love fruitcake & I have been looking for a long time for the best batter to suit the fruits and nuts that I like to use. That white 'grooms' fruitcake looks as though it'll be the one to fit the bill, so thanks for putting this up. I cannot wait to try that recipe! : )

  • My mother made the world's best fruitcake, the traditional dark kind but light on spices. People who've never had anything except the cheap, nasty grocery store version don't know what they're missing. She made up a batch of at least five cakes the first week in December, wrapped them in cheesecloth soaked in brandy and put them on a closet shelf to age. Then we all counted the days until they...+READ

    My mother made the world's best fruitcake, the traditional dark kind but light on spices. People who've never had anything except the cheap, nasty grocery store version don't know what they're missing. She made up a batch of at least five cakes the first week in December, wrapped them in cheesecloth soaked in brandy and put them on a closet shelf to age. Then we all counted the days until they were "ready." She used only the best ingredients and had to stop making them when the cost per cake went into the stratosphere.-COLLAPSE

  • I like it, and I don't care who knows it. IF YOU HATE IT FOR WHATEVER REASON, KEEP IT TO YOURSELF.

    I actually had caps lock on accidentally but i'm going to keep it that way.

  • ..sorry for my ham-handed typing...I actually do kno how to spell...LOL

  • Fruitcake gets a bad rap and endless mocking only because it is "fashionable" to do that. In my experienced, when I've asked people who declafre a hate for fruitcake exactly what it is they don't like, 95% of them admitted that they never even tasted it.

    As for me...I think there there are few things that go as well with a cup of good coffee or fine tea.

  • I recommend the fruitcake recipes in the book "The Man Who Ate Everything." They are on the light, non-traditional side. On the other hand, I also like traditional, dense, red and green cherry encrusted fruitcake, and there must be a lot of people like me, or they wouldn't keep on making them!

  • I've been making fruitcakes for decades now. For the last several years I've played around with a recipe from Richard Sax's "Classic Home Desserts"called 'Mother Church's Spirited Dark Fruitcake", which isn't terribly dark, more like the white groom's fruitcake. It had too much butter, which baked out- and, for me anyhow, it tended to fall apart. But the combination of prunes, golden raisins,...+READ

    I've been making fruitcakes for decades now. For the last several years I've played around with a recipe from Richard Sax's "Classic Home Desserts"called 'Mother Church's Spirited Dark Fruitcake", which isn't terribly dark, more like the white groom's fruitcake. It had too much butter, which baked out- and, for me anyhow, it tended to fall apart. But the combination of prunes, golden raisins, candied ginger, and pecans was a winner. No spices, citrus, molasses, but it makes a lot of people happy. I'm going to try the groom's cake recipe for the cake part, but stick with the prunes, etc. I use a lot more ginger than the recipe calls for, which gives it all the spice it needs, and the flavors just meld together so nicely.-COLLAPSE

  • Beautiful photos! Love the layout!

  • I no longer have the fruit cake recipe given to me by a late friend - but could make a good stab at recreating it, as it was very forgiving. It yielded a dense (full bundt/angel food pan) cake, which kept indefinitely in the fridge. Adventurous bakers could fiddle with the principle: a 10 oz jar of your choice of preserves, good quality dried fruit (chopped - note: dried, not candied),...+READ

    I no longer have the fruit cake recipe given to me by a late friend - but could make a good stab at recreating it, as it was very forgiving. It yielded a dense (full bundt/angel food pan) cake, which kept indefinitely in the fridge. Adventurous bakers could fiddle with the principle: a 10 oz jar of your choice of preserves, good quality dried fruit (chopped - note: dried, not candied), applesauce/other fruit sauce, chopped nuts (optional), rum/brandy/liqueur. I once made it with rum, almond meal, turkish apricots, apricot preserves, and Trader Joe's apricot sauce. Another time, because I found a jar of pear preserves in a fancy shop, I did an all-pear one with almond meal and amaretto. Both were outstanding. Polly generally used a mix of whatever she had on hand, always with good results. She made this in fall and winter, not particularly as a holiday sweet. If I ever attempt to recreate it, I will aim for loaf pans, which are better for gift-giving.-COLLAPSE