Friendship Fruit Cake {plus Starter Recipe} (2024)

FAQs

What alcohol is best in fruitcake? ›

What alcohol should you use? Strong, flavourful spirits with a high ABV are ideal for feeding fruitcakes. You can use rum, brandy or whisky for spice, or if you like citrus flavours, try an orange liqueur. Cherry brandy and amaretto will also work well if you prefer these.

For a rich and delicious fruit cake and plum cake, it is a must to pre-soak fruits. Like many traditions and family recipes, this process of preparing fruit for Christmas cake is different in each household. It also depends on the cake recipe and how are fruits & spices incorporated into it.

Making Friendship Fruit Cake Starter

To make the starter, you combine apricots, peaches, maraschino cherries, and pineapple with brandy and sugar in a large jar or bowl. You stir the mixture a couple of times a week, and by day 20, your concoction is ready.

Whiskey serves as a great substitute for brandy in a fruitcake. Although whiskey comes from fermented grain mash while brandy is made from fermented grape mash, the process is so similar, that the flavor will be similar as well.

Fruitcake with alcohol can last years, and in some rare cases, it can last decades. For those looking to prepare fruitcakes with alcohol for storage, you'll want to make sure to brush the fruitcake with alcohol fairly consistently across its time in storage.

Wrap it in several layers of cheesecloth and saturate the cheesecloth with rum or brandy. Place in a sealed container or zip bag. If the cloth starts to dry out, add more booze. Your fruitcake should be ready to eat in 7–10 days but it will keep for many weeks when properly aged in alcohol.

Have you ever had fresh or dried fruit sink to the bottom of a cake or loaf? Don't worry, it's a common problem and generally happens when the cake batter isn't heavy or thick enough to hold the weight of the fruit as it bakes.

One of the most common misfortunes among bakers is that they are using too much baking soda or baking powder. Know that too much baking soda or baking powder in cakes will not just lead to a metallic and bitter taste, but it can also make a big mess in the oven as it will rise beyond expectations.

The ratio of wet to dry ingredients determines a cake's moisture level. If there's simply too much flour and not enough butter, a cake will taste dry. On the other hand, if there's too much milk and not enough flour, a cake will taste too wet. Finding the right balance between wet and dry ingredients is key.

An Elvis Presley cake is a single-layer classic yellow cake that's topped with a pineapple glaze. Much like a poke cake, the syrup and juices of the pineapple will seep into the cake through fork holes, resulting in a decadent, ultra-moist cake.

What's in a Robert Redford cake? ›

Queen Elizabeth cake is a lightly sweet, moist, and low-fat date cake, topped with a brown sugar, butter and broiled coconut mixture. "Queen Elizabeth cake" is named after the Queen of Canada, Elizabeth II, and may have first been made in 1953 for her coronation.

Yes, it is absolutely possible to make fruit cake without alcohol. You can replace the alcohol with fruit juice, such as orange juice or apple juice, to soak the dried fruits, adding flavor and moisture to the cake.

Soaking fruits in alcohol is a common practice when making fruitcakes for several reasons: 1. Flavor Enhancement: Soaking fruits in alcohol imparts a rich, deep flavor to the fruits. The alcohol helps to infuse the fruits with its unique taste, creating a distinctive flavor profile in the fruitcake.

Baking with booze—such as bourbon, rum, port and vodka—can add additional flavor, texture and even change the consistency of many baked goods. Take pie dough for example, adding a splash of vodka produces a super flakey dough and develops less gluten in the dough than water.

Just like wine, preserved fruit also has tannins that are released into the cake, adding complexity. The alcohol also counteracts the sweetness of the candied fruit.