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jennifer rose

Dec 18, 2006, 8:13 PM

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What are your Christmas plans?

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Well, who's going to send me a fruitcake? I'd like one with the green citron.

Staring at Strangers

Gringal

Dec 19, 2006, 9:06 AM

Post #2 of 23 (1034 views)

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Re: [jennifer rose] What are your Christmas plans?

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I feel that fruitcakes should be re-gifted quickly before the mold is visible, or used as doorstops. However, my neighbor likes them. In fact, she got a sample at a Costco and experienced Nirvana. She didn't get around to buying one that day, so we brought her one on our next expedition. I was given a slice. I took a bite. Gave the rest to mi esposo who will eat almost anything. He gave up after two bites. Maybe somebody will explain and I will become enlightened. Now keiflings(?), full of butter and rolled in powdered sugar, are another matter. Bring them on.

esperanza / Moderator

Dec 19, 2006, 9:28 AM

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Re: [jennifer rose] What are your Christmas plans?

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Which of the many fruitcakes who post here would you like to have on your doorstep?

http://www.mexicocooks.typepad.com

Ed and Fran

Dec 19, 2006, 10:24 AM

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Re: [esperanza] What are your Christmas plans?

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When I was young (and foolish) I didn't much care for fruitcakes. But in my old age I have developed a liking for them.

They're pretty scarce around these parts. Maybe it's time for another trip to the D.F.

There's no accounting for people's tastes.

Regards

E&F

Marlene

Dec 19, 2006, 10:31 AM

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Re: [Gringal] What are your Christmas plans?

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Quote

I feel that fruitcakes should be re-gifted quickly before the mold is visible, or used as doorstops

http://www.fotosearch.com/.../ARP106/fruitcke.jpg

Anonimo

Dec 19, 2006, 11:17 AM

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Re: [jennifer rose] What are your Christmas plans?

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I'm making pannetoni, after Susan makes the candied peels. No green stuff, just all natural dried and candied fruits.
A test bake, from about a week ago. I'm working on perfecting it.

Buon Natale, Feliz Navidad,
Anonimo

esperanza / Moderator

Dec 19, 2006, 12:24 PM

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Re: [Anonimo] What are your Christmas plans?

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Baking panettone in a clay flowerpot works really well.

http://www.mexicocooks.typepad.com

Rolly

Dec 19, 2006, 2:06 PM

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Re: [esperanza] What are your Christmas plans?

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"Which of the many fruitcakes who post here would you like to have on your doorstep? "

I resemble that remark!

Rolly Pirate

E-visit me http://Rollybrook.com
This is a good time to be living in Mexico.
A clean house is the sign of a broken computer.

esperanza / Moderator

Dec 19, 2006, 2:26 PM

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Re: [Rolly] What are your Christmas plans?

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Muuuuuuaahhhhhhhhhh!

Merry Christmas!

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Anonimo

Dec 19, 2006, 3:01 PM

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Re: [esperanza] What are your Christmas plans?

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No lead in clay flowerpot, Esperanza?

"Brevity is the soul of wit."

Saludos,
Anónimo

Rolly

Dec 19, 2006, 3:16 PM

Post #11 of 23 (949 views)

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Re: [esperanza] What are your Christmas plans?

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I should look that good, and angelic.

Now back to to the OP -- What's for Christmas?

This morning on the way to the market, Doña Martha and I discussed Christmas Eve -- 3 kinds of tamales, ponche and maybe buñuelos.

Saturday Santa Claus is going to deliver computers to the families of Martha's two daughters. The four kids range from 3th to 9th grade. I was discussing it with the mothers at lunch today (God, how I over ate today!) They said the 8 and 9 grade boys are already hanging out at an internet cafe, so they guess they'll have to get the internet. They said getting the computers is a dream come true for the kids. I said I hoped it doesn't turn into a nightmare for the parents.

Here in Lerdo the kids start with hands-on computers in the 3rd grade. They begin English class in the 4th grade.

Rolly Pirate

E-visit me http://Rollybrook.com
This is a good time to be living in Mexico.
A clean house is the sign of a broken computer.

esperanza / Moderator

Dec 19, 2006, 4:13 PM

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Re: [Anonimo] What are your Christmas plans?

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No, Anónimo, the lead isn't in the clay the pots are made of. Any lead content is in the paint used to decorate them. You wouldn't use a painted pot to bake in.

http://www.mexicocooks.typepad.com

Anonimo

Dec 19, 2006, 5:08 PM

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Re: [esperanza] What are your Christmas plans?

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Good to read that, Esperanza. I think I'll be giving panettoni for Christmas presents.

Buen provecho,
Anonimo.

Papirex

Dec 20, 2006, 7:39 AM

Post #14 of 23 (896 views)

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Re: [Anonimo] What are your Christmas plans?

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Anonimo, Your pannetoni looks delicious. We have a friend here in Cuernavaca that used to run a small catering business during the Holiday season. Fruitcakes were his specialty. Since he shut it down, I have had no reliable source for genuine fruitcakes.

I came to the conclusion that people that make all the jokes and slam fruitcakes have never seen a genuine fruitcake, much less ever tasted one. A real fruitcake will usually only be found in a good bakery, not in a grocery store, and they are expensive.

The imitations sold in grocery stores sometimes look like a fruitcake, but I think they are made of recycled cardboard. The visual tip off is that they have no real candied fruit in them, just chopped maraschino cherries that have been treated with food coloring.

My Mexican wife, knowing how much I love fruitcakes, brought one home 3 or 4 years ago from Sam’s Club. Not wanting to hurt her feelings, I ate a piece of it, expecting that I would have to choke it down. Damn! It was the real deal. I think we bought 4 of them that year; everybody loved it. Most of our family here had never tasted a fruitcake before.

Of course, it goes without saying, Sam’s Club has never had them again. I saw some fruitcakes in their tobacco department a week ago though. I will need to look at them carefully to see if there are any maraschino cherries in them before I chance it and buy one of them this year. I can’t count the number of times I have bought what looked like a fruitcake, and ended up throwing it in the garbage.

The last time I saw a fruitcake in a bakery in Anchorage, it was small, and it was $40 Dollars. If it were genuine, that would be a fair price. I passed on it though. I’m no cheapskate, but I think I might cry if I had to put a $40 Dollar cake in the garbage.

As someone said, there is no accounting for an individuals taste, but some people simply have a plebeian palate.

When I was a kid, fruitcakes were traditional in most families in our town during The Holidays. They always came in a metal cake box. Many people liked to pour a shot or two of rum or brandy on them a week or two before eating them. A real fruitcake is always very moist, but a little rum makes them heavenly.

I have never seen a fruitcake become moldy. They stay fresh for months, especially if they are in a metal cake box.

For anyone that really doesn’t like fruitcakes, I wish you happy Holidays anyway. And a pox on you.

Rex

"The supreme happiness of life is the conviction that we are loved" - Victor Hugo

jennifer rose

Dec 20, 2006, 8:18 AM

Post #15 of 23 (889 views)

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Re: [RexC] What are your Christmas plans?

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It took me a long time to learn to enjoy fruitcake. Yeah, I'd always snickered, and now I'm happy that others don't like them. More for me.

When I was in first grade, the guy across the street gave my mother a fruitake, iced with marzipan and adorned with marzipan fruit. Each day after school, I'd sneak into the kitchen cabinet, pick off some icing and a marzipan fruit, leaving a bare space of fruitcake. I wondered why my mother didn't get after me for doing that, but I wasn't going to risk asking questions. Finally, forty years later, I broached the subject, shortly before my mother died. "You were doing me a favor," she said, adding that she deplored marzipan.

When she moved to Mexico, she started making fruitcakes, beginning in the late summer and dousing them weekly or whenever with brandy or rum. Dense with fruit and nuts, barely revealing any cake, they were a hit with her Mexican friends, a few of whom admitted eating the entire cake without sharing with their families. Finally, one year I decided to try a piece. It was wonderful. "Could she make me one without dates and perhaps extra citron?" I wondered. She did, and that was the last cake she made.

The Costco cakes aren't very expensive this year, perhaps a shade or two under or over $100 MN. The first ingredient is cherries, followed by nuts. No dates, and, sadly, no citron. But they look better than nothing.

Staring at Strangers

esperanza / Moderator

Dec 20, 2006, 8:42 AM

Post #16 of 23 (883 views)

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Re: [jennifer rose] What are your Christmas plans?

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Remembrance of fruitcakes past...*sigh*. Right now, fruitcakes are our madeleines.

My mother, que en paz descanse, made fruitcakes every October. Like Jennifer's mother's fruitcakes, they were dense with fruit (candied pineapple, currants, apricots, citron, etc) and nuts (pecans, brazil nuts, almonds). The small amount of cake that held the fruit together was deep coffee brown.

Once the cakes were baked--some rectangles, some rounds, some from an angelfood pan with a hole in the middle--she wrapped them in cheesecloth and put them to rest, stacked in a 20-pound lard tin. Every little while over the course of the year, she would douse the cakes with good Kentucky bourbon mixed with rum. The new cakes rested till the following Christmas, while the fruitcakes from the year before were served at my parents' annual Christmas Eve party.

Like most of us, guests at Christmas turned their noses up at the idea of fruitcake. Then they tasted my mother's cakes and bowed low. You could get a pretty good buzz from half a slice.

I'd love to taste one of her cakes today.

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NEOhio1

Dec 20, 2006, 9:14 AM

Post #17 of 23 (874 views)

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Re: [esperanza] What are your Christmas plans?

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Oh those fruitcakes grammma started making just after Labor day, and they too sat for the entire year while we indulged in the previous years bourbon and rum soaked delights.
My father-in-law refused any alcohol, even wine, on his property - even when every one of his children was over 50 and we tried as a unit to ask for just a glass of wine apiece at the Christmas table and he refused and made the brother-in-law with the wine in his trunk take that car down the street to be parked. But the FIL was known to eat an entire 3 or 4 batches of rum and bourbon balls all by himself.

One of the most interesting cakes we had recently for Christmas dinner was a Martha Washington cake - dense and delicious - and for those of you whose families go bug-eyed at the mention of serving fruit cake you can probably sneak this past them on Thanksgiving with its pedigree.

2 3/4 cups golden raisins
2 cups dried currants
1 cup orange zest
6 ounces candied lemon peel
3/4 cup chopped candied citron
1/3 cup candied angelica
1/3 cup red candied cherries
1/3 cup green candied cherries
1/2 cup brandy
4 1/2 cups sifted all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon ground mace
1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg
2 cups butter, softened
2 cups white sugar
10 eggs, separated
2 teaspoons fresh lemon juice
1/3 cup sherry
1 cup sherry

Place raisins and currants in a bowl, and add enough water to just cover them. Soak overnight.
Chop orange and lemon peel quite fine; do the same with the citron, angelica, and both types of cherries. Pour 1/2 cup brandy over fruit, and allow to stand overnight.
Sift together flour, mace, and nutmeg.
Beat egg yolks until thick and light, then beat in 1 cup of sugar a little at a time. Stir in lemon juice. Beat egg whites until stiff peaks form.
In a large bowl, cream the butter, and then add 1 cup sugar a little at a time; beat until smooth. Combine yolk mixture with creamed mixture. Add flour and 1/3 cup sherry alternately to the creamed mixture. Stir in all the fruit, and fold in stiffly beaten egg whites. Pour batter into a well greased and floured 10 inch mold or tube pan. This cake can also be made in 2 large loaf pans.
Place a pan of hot water in the bottom of a preheated 350 degree F (175 degrees C) oven. Place cake pans in oven, and bake about 20 minutes. Reduce heat to 325 degrees F (165 degrees C); continue baking 100 minutes for large cake, or 40 minutes for loaf cakes. Cakes are done when a toothpick comes out dry. Turn cake(s) out on rack to cool.
Wrap cake(s) in cheesecloth soaked in sherry, and store in airtight container for a month or more. If the cheesecloth dries out in the mellowing period soak it again with the same spirits, and rewrap the cake

Anonimo

Dec 20, 2006, 10:20 AM

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Re: [RexC] What are your Christmas plans?

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Back in the early 90s, we were introduced to a guy in Cuernavaca whose real profession was in air travel. But he made fruitcakes during the holidays. I wonder if...
Nah; must be a coincidence.

"Brevity is the soul of wit."

Saludos,
Anónimo

Papirex

Dec 20, 2006, 10:32 AM

Post #19 of 23 (860 views)

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Re: [Anonimo] What are your Christmas plans?

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My friend used to work for one of the airlines in Mexico. He used to travel all over the world. His name is Alberto Avelina. Ring a bell?

Rex

"The supreme happiness of life is the conviction that we are loved" - Victor Hugo

wendy devlin

Dec 20, 2006, 11:07 AM

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Re: [NEOhio1] What are your Christmas plans?

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Recently baked a fruitcake similiar to NEOhio's recipe above.
Have tried different recipes over the years but quite like this year's version.

Adapted the recipe from the Christmas Fruitcake from my Culinary Arts Institute encyclopedic cookbook, 1959 ed.

arbon, lover of fine fruitcake, likes me to consult Mrs. Beeton's All about Cookery 1961. before trying anything traditionally British. Her recipe was similiar but written with ounces of flour etc.

This year's cake:
3 cups raisins(i mixed sultanas and dark)
4 cups mixed peel, citron, candied cherries(to taste:)
1 cup broken walnut meats(hand cracked from this year's crop...by far the most labor intensive part of the recipe)
1/2 cup slivered almonds,
1/4 cup fruit juice(used grape)
2.5 cups sifted flour
3/4 tsp sea salt
1.5 tsp baking powder
1/2 lb shortening
1 cup white sugar
1/2 c brown sugar
2tsp cinnamon
1 tsp cloves
1tsp vanilla
5 farm fresh eggs, well beaten
(recipe called from 1/2 tsp allspice and 1tsp mace but didn't have on hand)

mix, mix, mix.
Load into spring-form pan wiht two thickenesses of greased brown paper(used last week's foil butter wrappings)
Baked two hours at 275 F.

Having some for breakfast.

Like Bill Cosby told his wife when he fed the kids cake for breakfast,
"Honey! It's got eggs, milk and flour. Just like pancakes."

thriftqueen

Dec 20, 2006, 11:17 AM

Post #21 of 23 (848 views)

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Re: [Gringal] What are your Christmas plans?

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I refuse to apologize, I love a good piece of fruitcake. Fruitcakes are like cooks, there are cooks, then there are good cooks. Alas, in my advanced age I have developed a sensitive to wheat and milk. That limits the goodie intake considerably.

We are in Albuquerque, NM for the holidays, we are in the middle of a heavy winter storm. Roads around the state are closed. However, one positive note, the inside of the casa is warm. Our Christmas eve will feature all the traditional NM foods, posole (which I will be making), tamales and all the wonderful Americano junk food that we love. But best of all we are with our children and grandchildren. Feliz Navidad y Prospero Ano Nuevo to all my fellow posters. Ginger

Papirex

Dec 22, 2006, 11:05 PM

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Re: [Anonimo] What are your Christmas plans?

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I saw a very unusual fruitcake this week. We are going over to Puebla to pass the Holidays with one of my wife’s cousins. My wife and her Mom wanted to bring some kind of a dish for the Christmas dinner. I suggested we go over to the Liverpool gourmet food department and order something like a roasted turkey so they wouldn’t need to cook anything at home. According to the Liverpool Internet site, they only sell cooked gourmet foods at some of their stores in Mexico City, and in Cuernavaca. Hey, can we pick a town, or can we pick a town?

The next day we went over to Liverpool. For anybody that has never been in a Liverpool, they are a very upscale department store; they are what Nordstrom could be, if Nordstrom would only make the effort.

They won’t take orders for any of their gourmet foods before the 15th of December; we went there on the 21st. They were sold out of turkeys. My ladies started looking at all the foods they sell, and decided to bring everything for the dinner in Puebla. Just like most meat markets do here, Liverpool will give you a sample of whatever you are interested in, in a paper cup so you may taste it before ordering it.

Our cousin in Puebla used to own some restaurants, and he is a fine chef. Doris called him and told him he is taking the day off on Christmas. An added bonus for me is that he speaks fluent English.

They ordered a roasted pork leg, and a kilo of this, and three kilos of that, etc. They bought everything for a holiday dinner, including several salads and breads. Before I could say OH SHUCKS! They had spent over $4,000 Pesos for a dinner for 15 people.

Since we are taking the dogs with us, I also spent over $1.200 Pesos for baths and haircuts, two new (clean) dog beds, new dog jackets, and collars. That will be their Christmas presents this year.

One thing we saw was the fruitcake. It was an 8-inch round cake; the price was only $290 Pesos, not bad. It was so unusual looking that I passed on it though. The cake had no fruit at all in it. The top was heaped with real candied fruit though, about 2 inches thick on the edges, and at least 3 or 4 inches thick in the center.

I was leery of how it would taste with the fruit separate from the cake. I also told Doris that if I poured a shot of brandy or a shot of rum over it, I thought that probably it would just run off the fruit and maybe off the plate too.

Maybe it is just a type of fruitcake I have never seen before, but I didn’t want everybody to be disappointed, especially me. Anybody ever seen a fruitcake like I have described?

Rex

"The supreme happiness of life is the conviction that we are loved" - Victor Hugo

(This post was edited by RexC on Dec 22, 2006, 11:34 PM)

bfwpdx

Dec 26, 2006, 8:47 PM

Post #23 of 23 (740 views)

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Re: [wendy devlin] What are your Christmas plans?

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I remember running into fruit cake phobia in the US during my 30 odd years of being a US alien resident. I was always amazed at the degree of hostility expressed towards fruit cakes . Then I found out that these people had never ever tasted a real homemade one. That totally blew me away, as where I come from people wouldn't feed a store bought Christmas cake to the cows, and why would they when everyone's mother made their own? I have made my own for over 40 years and my daughter-in-law now makes a wonderful one (and she is American). Here in Canada (or at least the part I come from), they also are our traditional wedding cakes as they are in UK (where fruit cakes are also traditional Easter cakes....) or so I understand. Arbon can say if this is correct or not...There is nothing nicer to have with afternoon tea than a slice of fruit cake, but then Americans don't know about the joys of afternoon tea, so maybe THAT is the problem???