Advent Calendar for 2011- Fruit Cake

Advent Calendar for 2011-  Fruit Cake

 A favorite topic of mine at this time of year. Cooking and baking and making surprises is a real treat.

 Fruit cake, my Aunt used to make the most awesome fruit cake I have ever eaten. No, it did not taste like  this stuff in the store today.  It was true fruit cake.

 Today's fruitcakes have so much citron in them that they are bitter and unpleasant to eat.
 I think the only peel she used in hers was orange zest and not very much.  Remembering walnuts, pecans, candied cherries, candied pineapple, dates, the white raisin's and never got the recipe from her.

She generally made them in September near Labor Day weekend and she changed the cloth over them weekly that had been saturated with some type of wine, bourbon, brandy or rum.  A dark red wine was very tasty with one that was light in fruits and heavier on cake.  So the wine was soaked into the cake base.

I recall at least two types each Christmas.  O yes she used figs in hers sometimes, recall it was really her own recipe.

 If you read old cook books and I mean old you will learn that marketers today give you lots of citron and very little candied fruit so the fruit cake tastes like orange and lemon peels.

 I like a good fruit cake and I found that some southern regions have some that are very near to the flavor of her Fruit Cakes.  

 I much prefer now days to make drop cookies and add a small amount of candied fruits w citron to the
 cookies.  I do not use but maybe 3 pieces of citron  per cookie and it does not overwhelm the flavor of the cookie, also soak the mix in bourbon or rum prior to using them generally.