Grandmas Fruitcake
by: Andrew Krause
This is the recipe that my grandmother brought with her when she and her family left Russia in the early 1900"s. As a child around 1920's or so, while living on a farm in Pennsylvania which at that time there were a great amount of of people comming from Europe, you needed to be able to do for yourself, she learned from her mother how to make a most delicious white fruit cake. A white fruitcake is a fruitcake that does not have any molasses which is very bitter. Not having the molasses in the fruitacke gives it a lighter color, this gives it the name white fruitcake.
This fruitcake in the days in which my mother lived as a child with her parents was only made during Christmas because the only time you could get walnuts, cherries, and some other ingredients was in the fall of the the year, remember now they didn't go to the store to buy what they needed, they had to grow them, raisins were dried by the people themselves, they even had to shell their own walnuts, and candy their own cherries,and such. The pineapple and coconut I do believe they must have purchased.
To keep with tradition the only time of the year that I make or sell this fruitcake is during the Christmas holidays, and in my mind you cannot get a better fruitcake.
Here we go - now gather up your ingredients and set them on your table, all ingredients need to be at room temperature.
1 pound butter
12 eggs
1 pound sugar
1 pound flour all purpose
1 pound white raisins
1 pound walnut meats
1 pound red and green candied cherries
1 pound bakers flaked coconut
1 pound candies pineapple
1 tablespoon of baking soda dissolved in 1/4 cup warm water
2 cups brandy--any brand
Soak the raisins, walnuts, cherries, coconut and pineapple with 2 cups brandy overnight in a stainless steel bowl.
In a 5 quart mixing bowl cream butter and sugar, then add eggs slowly, then add your flour and blend well, add the baking soda and water and mix a minute more, add all other ingredients and mix until well blended.
Now you are going to bake it in a 2 pound pan, or in the pan of your choice, foil or hard pan, line the pan with wax paper or baking paper or better yet a pan liner the size of the pan.
For 2 pound pan:
Place 1 pound 12 ounces of the mixture in the pan and level it with a spoon, don't bang it on the table.
Bake it at 350 degrees for 1 hour to 1 hour 20 minutes, depends on your oven and how brown you want it. It's done when a pick is placed in the center and it comes out clean.
Let it cool on a rack for a while and then sprinkle it with 1 ounce of brandy and then another ounce when it is cool and then pack it away for about 3 days in your refrigerator and then enjoy.
About The Author
Andrew Krause is a Chef and Pastry Chef for over 30 years, at persent I own a Gourmet Bakery called The Cheese Confectioner. You can visit my site at http://www.andies.cashhosters2.com
POOR MAN'S PUDDING
Mix together 1 cupful of chopped suet, 1 of raisins, 1 of currants, 1 of molasses, 1 of milk, 3 1/2 of flour, a teaspoonful of soda, and a little salt. Flavor with nutmeg and cinnamon. Steam 3 hrs., and serve with a liquid sauce.
BROWN BETTY Florence Rawley Dawson 1889
Butter a deep pudding dish and place a layer of finely chopped apple in the bottom. Then add a layer of very fine bread crumbs. Sprinkle with 2 tablespoons sugar, 1/4 teaspoon cinamon and a little butter. Then add another layer of apple and continue until the dish is filled, having the crumbs for the top layer. Bake in a moderate oven until quite brown. Serve with sweetened cream or hard sauce.
DELICATE RICE PUDDING Flora Converse Haven, 1881 published in Daily Bread 1901
Soak 1 cupful rice in water over night, in the morning boil 1 quart of milk until soft. Add while hot, the yolks of 4 eggs, butter size of an egg and a little salt, sweeten and flavor to taste. Bake. When done, beat the whites stiff, sweeten, then spread over pudding and brown.
LEMON SHERBET M Harmon Woman's Favorite 1902
Rub the yellow rind of three lemons with lumps of sugar, to get the flavor. Press the juice of six lemons and remove all the seeds. Put the sugar and juice with one pound of powdered sugar into one-half gallon of water. Beat to a stiff froth the whites of five eggs, stirring in two tablespoonfuls of pulverized white sugar. Then slowly stir it in the lemonade and put it immediately in a freezer, with salt and ice around the freezer (the same as for ice-cream) and turn it until it is frozen as hard as you wish it. This is very delicate and resembles a dish of snow.
