Black Cake

This has been tested and verified as the real deal by folks who know. Greer and her family are from Jamaica- see her happy face below. For those of us unfamiliar with the Jamaican Black Cake, it's like fruitcake.

Hold on; don't go running from the room. It's good fruitcake.

Yes, there is such a thing.




My Dad found this recipe last December, 2007 that is, in the New York Times. I don't know what possessed him to be interested in it, or to forward it to me. Maybe it struck him as similar to mincemeat with all the booze and fruit? He's a Big Project cook (which reminds me of the latest revamp of Fine Cooking mag. There is a new section in each issue dedicated to weekend projects- the first is croissants, we're definitely making those!) The major project of mincemeat is a recipe for another time involving a whole cow's tongue, suet, and pounds of dried fruit, fresh fruit and bottles of booze... and canning. Talk about a project.

We made the black cake together last year and liked it. We are fruitcake fans, but really this isn't that gross green maraschino cherry thing, promise! In fact, we liked it so well that this year we both separately planned to make it. Dad arrived here for Christmas with a sample of his and I had the fruit soaking for mine. We had plenty of cake, that's for sure!!

Below is the Christmas Eve dessert scene at Greer and Stefan's house following the amazing feast of cioppino and the rest. As I think about it, I'd like to get them to make some more cioppino and invite me over- I hope my telepathic desires will be received...
You can see the whole Black Cake in the foreground- AND the plum cookies with the shaved pecorino cheese. Delicious!



Don't be afraid that the ingredients are going to cost a fortune and that you'll have 4 cakes- dive in and make this!

BLACK CAKE from NY Times December 2007

1 lb. prunes
1 lb. raisins
1/2 lb. golden raisins
1 lb. currents
1 1/2 lbs. dried cherries (or 1 lb. dry cherries, 1/2 lb. glace cherries) (I used all dry cherry)
1/4 lb. mixed candied citrus (I used citron)
2 c dark rum, plus more for brushing cake
1 1/2 cherry brandy
1/4 lb. blanched almonds
1 c white or light brown sugar for burning (or 1/4 c molasses which is what I used)
1 lb. butter
1 lb. brown sugar (Dad used dark and I used light-dark is probably better)
10 eggs
zest of 2 limes
2 t vanilla extract
1/2 t angostura bitters
4 c A.P. flour
4 t baking powder
2 t cinnamon

1. Combine prunes, raisins, currants, cherries, candied peel, rum and brandy. Sit for at least 2 days.

2. Grind fruit and almonds to a rough paste, leaving some chunks of fruit intact. Add more brandy or some wine if needed. Can work in batches in the f.p. or blender.

3. If burning sugar, melt 1 c sugar until it is almost black. It will smoke. Add 1/4 c boiling water, turn off heat. It will splatter.

4. Cream butter and brown sugar to smooth and fluffy. Mix in eggs 1 x 1. Add zest, vanilla and bitters.

5. Combine flour, baking powder and cinnamon and fold into butter mixture. Stir in fruit paste and black sugar or molasses. If the batter is light, add more molasses or sugar- should be medium-dark brown.

6. Divide between 4 8" (or 3 9") buttered and papered pans. (Recipe calls for 2 layers of paper, but I'm skeptical). Bake at 250 degrees- yes TWO hundred fifty degrees- for 1 hour. Reduce oven temp to 225 and bake for 2-3 more hours. Will test clean.

7. While cakes are hot, brush with rum. Brush with more rum when cakes are cool. Turn out and serve. Wrap, and store in a cool, dry place for up to one month.

Happy Baking!
-Janet

Travel back to 1942

My New Year's resolution for 2008 was to read The Art of Eating, by M.F.K. Fisher.  A compendium of her writings on food from 5 previous books.  I've failed at finishing it in one year -- I have a tendency to read one essay then put it down then read another.  I've, sadly, spent more time last year with it being put down than reading.  But I'm determined to finish it this year, along with The Odyssey by Homer. 

One of the books that this includes is How to Cook a Wolf, teaching people to cook well using the ration books that they received in war time. It somehow seems appropriate in our current financial crisis mode.  So, I've been turning down corners and saying, "I've gotta make this." So today I did.

War Cake

M.F.K. Fisher

2 cups flour, white or whole wheat
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 cup shortening (bacon grease can be used, because of the spices which hide its taste)
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1 teaspoon other spices (cloves, mace, ginger..)
1 cup chopped raisins or other dried fruit (prunes, figs, etc.)
1 cup sugar, white or brown
1 cup water

Sift flour, soda and powder together.

Put remaining ingredients in a pan and bring to a boil. Cook five minutes. Cool thoroughly. Add the sifted dry ingredients and mix well. Bake 45 minutes or until done in a greased loaf pan in a 325 to 350 (F) oven.

Whenever I would ask my grandmother how to know if something was done, she'd say, "It feels done".  Not helpful to a little kid.  But as I was trying to talk to J about this cake, I was trying to explain why I was letting the cake cook a bit longer, after I touched it.  And I said, "It just doesn't feel done."  Grandma was right. 

This warm-spiced fruit-type cake is just that: warmly spiced with cinnamon, ginger and cloves that would have covered up any bacon taste, but I used butter instead.  What drew me to it was the fact that you boil the fat with the spices and sugar instead of creaming them together.  After you boil it for 5 minutes and let it cool completely it gets a bit syrupy. The dried fruits are softened and not the hard overly chewy bits in some fruitcakes.  This must also add to the overall moisture of this cake.  The texture is moist and dense.  Just lovely. It was a bit difficult to get out of the pans, but I think if you cool it completely, it will come out better.   Ms. Fisher says that the cake would keep well.  I can see my grandmother making something like this and wrapping it in wax paper. 

Full disclosure:  The photo included here is from my second try at making this cake. I bet my grandmother never left her cake in the oven to begin working on her blog like I did.  This time, I doubled the recipe and as you can tell, we liked it so much we didn't wait to take a picture, we just dove right it.  Luckily we have one in the freezer.  (Please notice the cake plate: a gift from my Mother and Father-in-laws.  A wedding gift to them, and the best "re-gifted" Christmas gift I've ever received.)

Until I started to read How to Cook a Wolf, I always wondered why my Grandma had a jar of bacon grease on the stove -- Now, I realize now that she was born in 1899 and was 29 when the Depression hit and old habits are hard to break.

 

Robb

Who you callin' a fruitcake?

Well everyone, this will be short. M and I are about to head over to J and K's house for dinner. Sort of a pre Thanksgiving dinner as M and I are heading to Indianapolis (see previous post's pic of my home state). The folly isn't that we are flying on Wednesday before Thanksgiving, the folly really is that we are driving to Indianapolis. Yes, driving. All 753 miles of it. In, according to Google, 12 hours. Somehow, I doubt that time will be right.

Anyway, J and I baked today. We realized we hadn't seen each other since our last installment on cheesecake. Remember all that superfluous information about a bain marie?

We still haven't figured out what to do with all that left over cheesecake. Although, if there is a way to incorporate it into something, I bet we find it. Julian suggested using it in a buttercream. That sounds completely interesting. Wonder how that would come together.

This time we baked the Less Fruity Fruitcake (p 66). We finally found all the fruit cake mix candied orange, lemon, cherries and pineapple and citron that we could handle. I bought the fruit cake mix and J bought the citron, interestingly we independently picked up 4 tubs each. We'll be ready for future candied fruit needs!!

This recipe rocked. I thought the rum added just a hit of spice, and warmth. It definitely brought out flavor. This is the first recipe, I think, where we got to cream the butter and the sugar. It was brown sugar, but we did get to cream. Honestly, if you've made any regular cake, this followed that method. After the creaming, add the dry ingredients in thirds with the milk/molasses mixture in between.

Then scoop into muffin tins and bake. This was so simple and the results were so outrageously good that both J and I thought we'd do it again.

It is so good, that I'm taking all the little beauties with me to my family in Indiana.

I'm sorry for the rush on this, but I was afraid I'd forget to write it if I waited for us to get back from Indiana.

One last thing, I had a idea flash while standing in line at Wal Mart. I call this cake:

The Cheater's Cake

1 box of yellow cake mix
1 can of pumpkin, (15 oz or so)
1 bag of chocolate chips (11 or 12 oz or so)
1 tablespoon of pumpkin pie spice

2 tubs of cream cheese frosting

To the cake mix, add the chocolate chips, stir to dust the chips. Then add the pumpkin. Continue adding all the ingredients called for in the instructions for your particular boxed cake mix, leaving out any liquid. After you have incorporated all the other ingredients, add the liquid (water, milk) a little bit at a time. When the batter seems to be right for cake batter, stop adding liquid. (When I did it, I only used 1/2 of the water.)

Pour into two 9" round cake pans.

Bake according to package directions. Then cool.

Frost with tubs of cream cheese icing.

Changes from first attempt: I found that 1 tub wasn't quite enough to really frost it. And the cake could use a bit of Pumpkin Pie Spice to add a bit of zing.

It's the first cake in a long time that M and I ate all of. It was quite nice.

Well, that's all for this pre Thanksgiving post.

Bake through, or since it's the holidays, Eat Through.

Robb