Subject: RECIPE: Fruitcake
From: [email-masked] (Charles Wingate)
Date: 20 Mar 87 05:37:31 GMT
Newsgroups: mod.recipes

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.RH MOD.RECIPES-SOURCE FRUIT-CAKE-1 C "8 Jan 87" 1987
.RZ "DARK FRUITCAKE" "An extravagant traditional fruitcake"
This is about as rich a fruitcake as you could possibly want to make. It
started life as a \fIBetter Homes and Gardens recipe\fR, but has been
changed beyond all recognition.
.IH "1 7-lb cake" "1 3-kg cake"
.IG "16 oz" "candied citron" "500 g"
(or candied fruit and peels)
.IG "8 oz" "candied cherries" "250 g"
.IG "1 cup" "dark raisins" "150 g"
.IG "1 cup" "golden raisins" "150 g"
.IG "1 1/3 cups" "Calmyra figs," "200 g"
cut into pieces
.IG "1 1/3 cups" "pitted dates," "170 g"
cut into small slices
.IG "1\(12 cups" "pecan halves" "170 g
(or walnut halves if necessary)
.IG "\(12 cup" "brandy" "12 cl"
.IG "3 cups" "white flour" "300 g"
.IG "2 tsp" "baking powder" "10 ml"
.IG "2 tsp" "salt" "10 ml"
.IG "1 Tbsp" "ground cinnamon" "15 ml"
.IG "1 tsp" "ground nutmeg" "5 ml"
.IG "1 tsp" "ground allspice" "5 ml"
.IG "1 tsp" "ground cloves" "5 ml"
.IG "4" "eggs"
.IG "1\(34 cups" "packed brown sugar" "350 g"
.IG "1 cup" "orange juice" "25 cl"
.IG "\(34 cup" "melted butter," "170 g"
cooled
.IG "\(14 cup" "light molasses" "6 cl"
(treacle)
.PH
.SK 1
Mix fruits together in a bowl.  Pour brandy over fruits.  Turn fruit mixture
over every 20 minutes.  Soaking time is a matter of taste, but two hours is
typical.
.SK 2
Preheat oven to
.TE 300 150 .
Prepare tube pan: grease sides and bottom.  Line bottom and sides
with greased brown paper.
.SK 3
In a very large bowl, mix flour, spices, baking powder, and salt.  Stir until
spices are evenly blended throughout.
.SK 4
In a third bowl beat eggs until fluffy.  Add brown sugar, orange juice,
molasses, and butter. Mix, making sure that all the sugar dissolves.
.SK 5
Pour off any liquid from fruit mixture and add the fruit and the nuts to the
dry ingredients. Mix until all fruit pieces are coated.  Then pour in the
liquids and mix gently until you have an evenly-mixed batter.
.SK 6
Pour batter into pan and bake at
.TE 300 150
for 1 hour.  Cover pan with foil and bake for 1 hour more or until toothpick
inserted in center comes out clean.  Cool for 30 minutes before removing
from pan.  Peel off paper very carefully.
.SK 7
Put cake in cake tin lined with foil.  For the next 3 to 4 weeks, sprinkle a
little brandy
over cake twice a week.  Keep cake covered and store the tin in the
refrigerator.  If you prefer to omit the brandy, cover top of cake with very
thin slices of apple instead.
.NX
This makes a HUGE cake.  If your tube pan isn't at least
.AB "10\(mu4 inches" "25\(mu10 cm"
there is a fair chance that it will run over; in that case, use several loaf
pans instead (fill loaf pans about half-way).  A pan with a removable center
will make extracting the cake much easier.
.PP
Except for mixing the
liquids, an electric beater is useless for this recipe.
.PP
In the USA, candied fruits typically come in packages of the indicated sizes.
If you have to measure by volume, use
2\(12 cups of candied citron and 1 1/3 cups
of the candied cherries.  I prefer citron instead
of the mixture because there's no bitterness from the rinds,
although the cake isn't so colorful.  Calmyra figs are
the light-colored figs most commonly seen in North America.
.SH RATING
.I Difficulty:
moderate.
.I Time:
2 hours preparation (including soaking the fruit), 2 hours baking, 
several weeks mellowing.
.I Precision:
Measure batter ingredients carefully.  Fruit and nut quantities are somewhat
flexible.
.WR
Charles Wingate
University of Maryland, Computer Science Dept., College Park, Maryland, USA
seismo!mimsy!mangoe   or   [email-masked]