Advent: Fruitcake

I love fruitcake.

I didn't always, even though that round red tin with incongruous scenes of a Victorian snowscape and also a cowby in front of the Alamo containing Corsicana's best from the Collins Street Bakery was at my house every year, with its vivid green and red maraschino cherries studding a thick, heavy, pecan-laden cake. I didn't much like nuts as a kid and so didn't often partake, despite the beautiful "cathedral cut" that my mom tried to imitate from my paternal grandad. He also soaked it in alcohol, apparently. Maybe I wouldn't have noticed the nuts then!

Anyway, as I grew older and learned to like nuts, I learned to love fruitcake. And not just that Texas specialty, but fruit-and-nut desserts from all over the world. In fact, our annual shipment of fruitcake from Simply Delicious in Shropshire arrived earlier this week, complete with standard English fruitcakes covered in marzipan. Mmmmm!

Sure, there are a lot of jokes about fruitcake, deservedly so. Some of the loaves you can buy in the stores--and I'm thinking of that small, rectangular block one with the unnaturally-colored fruit bits that some monks or somebody makes--are, forgive the pun, God-awful. But done well, by bakeries, or even at home (and I'm going to try to find my recipe for icebox fruitcake and fruitcake cookies), as long as you don't use that plastic container of cancerous-colored fruit, you'll be fine. But keep telling those jokes: then there will be more fruitcake for you!

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Ice Box Fruit Cake

1 lb marshmallows
1 can Eagle Brand milk
1 lb pecans, chopped
1 lb cherries (candied), chopped
1 lb walnuts, chopped
1 lb orange slices, chopped
1 lb raisins, chopped
1 lb graham crackers, rolled

Microwave marshmallows 2 minutes. Stir and repeat until melted. Pour in milk. Mix well. Pour oer all other ingredients and mix well. Pack in a well-buttered bundt pan and refrigerate overnight. To unmold, place pan in hot water to soften butter. Turn upside down on heavy foil and wrap. Good for months in ice box.

Note: You can also make mini-bundts, which is how I first had this.

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Thanksgiving Cookies aka "Fruitcake Cookies"

3 cups raisins
½ cup bourbon
¼ cup butter
½ cup brown sugar
2 eggs
1 cup unbleached all purpose flour
½ cup whole-wheat flour (pastry)
1 ½ teaspoons baking soda
1 teaspoon cinnamon
¼ teaspoon nutmeg
1 cup each coarsely chopped: cranberries, walnuts

In a medium bowl, soak raisins in bourbon for at least 1 hour. ½ hour before preparing cookies, place butter in a large bowl to soften at room temperature.
Gradually cream brown sugar into butter until light and fluffy. Beat in eggs. Stir in raisins along with their liquid. Set oven at 325°F.
Rinse and dry raisin bowl. In it, wire-whisk together flours, soda, and spices. Stir dry mixture into liquid mixture to almost completely moisten. Stir in cranberries and walnuts to finish.
Drop dough by teaspoonfuls onto buttered cookie sheets and bake for 14-15 minutes—or until firm. Transfer to cool cookies on wire racks.

museum docent