Fruitcake

Did you know Fruitcake takes MONTHS to make? I didn’t, but thank the lord I decided to make this recipe in September, the perfect time before the holidays arrived.

Surprisingly, for as much as people make fun of Fruitcake, it’s actually one of the more difficult cake recipes. Claire’s recipe involves a ton of dried fruit; I managed to find dried cranberries, apricots, cherries and golden raisins. I couldn’t find dried currants or crystalized ginger, so I just made due with ground ginger. I also had leftover dried prunes from the Mascarpone Cake with Red Wine Prunes that I decided to throw in as well. I also used Grand Marnier and walnuts I had in the pantry.

Before putting the cake together, I combined all the dried fruit the day before, slicing up the dried apricots and prunes so everything was of similar size. The dried fruit soaked in the Grand Marnier, lemon juice and orange juice for 24 hours, becoming extremely fragrant in the best way.

The next day, I toasted the walnuts and chopped them up. Then I spent, no joke, about 45 minutes preparing the cake pans; Claire directs for the pans to be buttered and lined with parchment paper twice, with the sides an inch taller than the pans. I ended up using two 10-inch cake pans, as I did not have two 9-inch pans, so all of this just took way longer than usual.

Finally, it was time to actually make the cakes; I combined the dry ingredients in one bowl, then mixed the butter, brown sugar, molasses, orange and lemon zests in a stand mixer. When the wet ingredients were mixed thoroughly and fluffy, I added the eggs, vanilla and flour mixture in portions to give it time to combine.

I took the bowl off the mixer to fold in the fruit and nuts as Claire directed. It took a bit of time to get this all combined; the cake is extremely dense compared to other batters, so it takes some muscles to mix it up. I split the batter in half and placed it in the cake pans. Claire says to make a shallow, wide dip in the center of the of the cake, as this helps even out what would become a dome when the Fruitcake is baking in the oven.

Since the cakes are so dense (and heavy, holy crap!), both took about 2 hours and 45 minutes to bake!

After the cakes were completely cool in the pans, I used a skewer to poke holes all around them. Then I poured about two tablespoons of Grand Marnier over the cakes. I carefully took the cakes out of the pans; between each cakes’ weight, the density and the tall parchment paper linings, it wasn’t the easiest feat. One cake did have a small crack in it; it wasn’t big enough to split the cake in two, but something I knew I needed to be cautious about since I’d be “feeding” these cakes Grand Marnier for the next couple of months.

Before I ever started this Fruitcake recipe, I did a little research on the best methods other bakers suggest to get a successful end product. Not that I don’t trust Claire, but I didn’t want to put in all this work for months to end up with something lame at the end. Terry Adido, the blogger of Grated Nutmeg, has a great blog post outlining tried and true steps to properly age a fruitcake. He suggests to cover your Fruitcake in plastic wrap, then foil, and a plastic grocery bag before placing it in an airtight container. I looked for cookie tins like he uses online, but since I had to use 10-inch cake pans, I couldn’t find anything that would properly fit the cakes. Luckily, I discovered my cupcake carriers were wide enough, so I used those. For the weekly feeding process, Terry also encouraged using a spray bottle rather than just drizzling on the alcohol, so I bought one and transferred the Grand Marnier to that (I basically had enough left for the rest of the “feedings”). I dated the cakes with the day both were originally wrapped, also noting the cake that had a crack in it. Once the cakes were layered up, I placed them in a dark cabinet that’s away from both heat or cold temperatures.

For the next 2.5 months (I went a little longer than Claire directed since I read from other bloggers that you can go three months), I fed the cakes on a weekly basis by unwrapping them carefully, spraying them with Grand Marnier, wrapping them back up and placing them back in the dark cabinet. I didn’t really notice any differences in the cakes the first few weeks, however the crack did become more noticeable in the one cake. I never saw any signs of mold, which was my main concern with this long process, so that was a relief! By the last month I could definitely tell the Grand Marnier created a glossy seal over the cakes. I swear by the end, each cake layer weighed about six pounds!

By mid-December, I took the cakes out of the wrappings for the final time. I couldn’t find marzipan, and truthfully it didn’t sound very appetizing to me, so I simply spread a cup of jam over the bottom Fruitcake layer and placed the other layer on top. I made the whipped frosting and gave the entire Fruitcake a smooth layer coating. Then I placed some of the frosting in a piping bag with a petal tip; I piped a large flower on the top of the fruitcake, which turned out very pretty. I happened to have oranges and pecans, so I used those to spread around the bottom of the Fruitcake for décor.

Let’s be honest, do I like Fruitcake after doing all this work? Not really. However, it was much better than I anticipated. The holiday spices mixed with macerated fruit and Grand Marnier came together really well; I was surprised how much flavor I got from just one bite. While I have no intention of eating a full slice, I think Fruitcake is a fantastic project for any baker to take on. It’s completely different from any other cake I’ve ever made, and it’s interesting to see how the alcohol feeding impacts the density of the cake over time. If nothing else, this recipe will be a great conversation piece at Christmas this year (what I would give to watch my nieces and nephews give this one a try)!

Claire recently made a one-day fruitcake for NYT Cooking; see how it compares to the longer version!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RG3d5JlL3xs