Fruitcake: Memories of Truman Capote & Sook

After compiling Sook’s recipes, Marie Rudisill, compiled a fruitcake cookbook, Fruitcake: Memories of Truman Capote & Sook. Clearly, the publisher wanted you to remember her connection to her cousin and while this does have Sook’s recipe, it has a wide assortment of other fruitcakes.

In her book Rudisill states:

Fruitcake, to Southerners, is a birthright.

While I would argue that the fruit makes a fruitcake, Rudisill says it is the flour. OF course, there is only ONE flour for Southern baking, White Lily. After 125 years in the South, White Lily was bought by Smuckers and the milling was moved out of the South. The moving of White Lily was tantamount to firing on Fort Sumter or burning Atlanta. It was a cruel blow. White Lily has never been the same! I still have a lone bag of White Lily milled in Knoxville, Tennessee and I cannot bear to open use it as it would constitute the end of an era. (And after two years, it a bit stale. Still, I’m not using it.)

One of the oldest Southern fruitcakes is the 1866 Fruitcake, most commonly known as the Lee Fruitcake.

Marie Rudisill discovered a copy of this recipe folded up inside a copy of A Life of General Robert E. Lee by John Estes Cook. It was in the dresser drawer of Bud Faulk who was an ardent Civil War collector. There was also a rattlesnake skin. It seems Bud had rattlesnake that lived for years in his dresser and when he died, so did the rattlesnake. Rudisill swears that every time she visited Bud’s cemetery, she would fine a rattlesnake coiled on his grave.

Lee Fruitcake

1/2 cup candied lemon peel
1/2 cup sliced candied orange peel
1 1/2 cups finely cut citron
1 1/2 cups candied pineapple
1 cup candied cherries
1 1/4 cup dark seeded raisins
1 1/4 cup white raisins
1 cup chopped California walnuts
1 cup chopped pecans
1/4 cup sifted enriched flour
1 cup butter
2 cups brown sugar
4 eggs
2 1/2 cups enriched flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon all spice
1teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon nutmeg
1/2 teaspoon cloves
3/4 cup grape juice

Combine the peels, fruits, nuts; sprinkle with 1/4 cup of flour and mix well.
Thoroughly cream butter and sugar. Add eggs and beat well. Sift together 2 cups of flour, the baking powder, salt and spices; add alternately with grape juice. Pour the batter over the floured mixture of peel, fruit and nuts. Pour into a large tube pan until 3/4 full. Do not flatten batter. Bake in a very slow oven at 250F for about 5 hours. Remove from pan and pack in air tight tin with a double layer of cheesecloth soaked in bourbon.
Bake at least three months before Christmas. Do not let the cake dry out and keep lacing it with bourbon.

Notice it says you need to bake it three months in advance, so you have an out on this one. Truth is, you can bake it and eat it right away, but soaking for 12 weeks in bourbon can’t be all bad.

Elizabeth David's Christmas

I love Elizabeth David, but I can’t name a single one of her childhood neighbors. During her lifetime, she never completed a proposed Christmas book of recipes. Years after her death, he long time editor, Jill Norman, pulled out her notes for the project, and arranged it into book form.

The fruitcake in Elizabeth David’s Christmas collection was a surprise to me. It is an old Southern scripture cake. The origins of these cakes go back to the mid-1800’s. They were popular among women as a way to pass on not only baking, but a robust lesson on the Bible. In order to make the cake, one must first read the Bible verses to find the ingredients. No one knows the true origin of this cake, but I love to think of Elizabeth David mixing one up.

A Christmas Recipe for an Old Testament Cake

4-1/2 cups of 1 Kings IV 22
1 ½ lb of Judges V 25
2 cups of Jeremiah VI 20
2 cups of 1 Sam. XXX 12
2 cups of Numbers XVII 8
2 cups of Nahum III, 12
2 teaspoons of 1 Sam. XIV 25
Season to taste with 2 Chron. IX 9
Six Jeremiah XVII 11
1 1/2 cups Judges IV 19
2 teaspoons of Amos IV 5
A pinch of Leviticus II 13

Directions Proverbs XXIII 14

Bake 1 to 2 hours


SOLUTION: Operative words in each verse:

Fine flour
Butter
Sweet cane
Raisins
Almonds
Ripe figs
Honey
Spice
Eggs
Milk
Leaven
Salt

Beat

I did so want to make you grab your Old Testament and find the key, but Elizabeth was such a sport. Now get thee to the kitchen.

Martha Stewart's Christmas

Being famous is creepy.

You tell a story to a camera who relays it to millions of people. Those people then know a story about your life. Come to think of it, it is even kind of weird blogging. I realized as I wrote this that there are people who read my blog who know more about me than some of my friends (unless, of course, they read my blog.) Anyway, here is my point. If you packed a 12-pound fruitcake into a giant metal tin and threatened to beat me with it unless I told you the names of my childhood neighbors, I would end up dead. Granted, I did move a lot as a child, but I digress...

I love Martha Stewart, but not in the wait in line 5 hours to have a book signed way. I have never met her. Still, I know the name of her neighbors in Nutley, New Jersey. Neighbors who died before I was even born! Mr. and Mrs. Maus were German immigrants who had, at one time in their loves, been bakers. They had a large kitchen in their basement just for baking and Little Martha loved to go over and help them bake. (I have no doubt she was a big a pain-in-the-ass then as she is now!) Years later, Martha inherited a large yellowware mixing bowl that she treasures. In fact, she has stated that if anything ever happened to the bowl she would just stop baking. (Note to ANYONE: Do not touch the bowl. If she asks you to wash it, or move it, or stir in it, feign a heart attack.)

So now, I know more about Martha Stewart's childhood neighbors than I do about mine. In addition to the bowl, Martha got a really fine fruitcake recipe. She has used it in several of her cookbooks and gives full credit to Mrs. Maus as the creator. You can make two cakes out of the recipe or about six small cakes.

Mrs. Maus' Fruitcake

1 pound (4 sticks) butter, at room temperature
2 cups sugar
12 eggs
6 pounds candied fruits and fresh nuts (choose from the following: citron,
lemon peel, orange peel, cherries, apricots, walnuts, pecans)
1/2 cup molasses
2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
2 tablespoons allspice

For The Glaze

1 cup apricot jam
1/3 cup brandy

For The Garnish

Whole dried apricots
Pecan halves

1. Preheat oven to 275 degrees. Butter two 9-inch cake pans or 2 loaf pans. Line with waxed paper, butter again, and flour.

2. Cream butter and sugar until creamy and light. Add the eggs one at a time, beating batter until
fluffy. Stir in the fruits, nuts, and molasses, blending well. Sift the flour with the allspice and stir into the batter cup by cup until well mixed. Spoon into the prepared cake pans. Set pans in a shallow pan with 1 1/2 to 2 inches hot water. Bake for 3 to 3 1/2 hours, until done. Test with toothpick. Cool in pans on a cake rack.

3. Remove from pans, pull off waxed paper, and glaze with strained apricot jam heated with brandy. Decorate with dried apricots and nut halves and glaze again. Let glaze harden before wrapping in cellophane. Keep in cool place. To serve, slice very thinly.

Hey, if it is good enough for Martha and Mrs. Maus, you should give it a try.

Favorite Fruitcakes

One of the best fruitcake books out there is Moira Hodgson’s Favorite Fruitcakes. Hodgson is a Brit and they have a much greater appreciation of fruitcakes. Favorite Fruitcakes collects a variety of “famous” fruitcake recipes or perhaps they are just “famous” cooks. Anyway, this is great compendium of fruitcake facts and zippy recipes.

This recipe is from Craig Claiborne. It was his mother’s favorite recipe. Claiborne took her mixed fruit and nuts and weighed them out replacing the candied fruit with candied ginger and the mixed nuts with black walnuts.

Craig Caliborne’s Walnut and Ginger Fruitcake.

½ pound candied ginger in 1/4" cubes (about 1 cup)
1 ½ cups golden raisins
3 ¾ cups walnuts, preferably black walnuts, broken in pieces
3 cups sifted all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
Salt to taste
1 pound (4 sticks) butter, cut in 1-inch cubes
2 cups sugar
6 eggs, separated
1/3 cup Madeira or sweet sherry


1. Preheat oven to 275 degrees. Lightly butter a 10-inch, 12-cup Bundt pan. Sprinkle with flour; shake pan to coat inside. Shake out excess.
2. In a mixing bowl, combine ginger, raisins and walnuts.
3. Sift together the flour, baking powder and salt. Sift this mixture over ginger and nut mixture.
4. Put the butter in the bowl of an electric mixture. Start beating while gradually adding the sugar. Cream the mixture well and gradually beat in egg yolks. Beat in Madeira.
5. Pour and scrape this mixture over nuts and blend the ingredients thoroughly. This is best done by hand.
6. Beat the egg whites until stiff and thoroughly fold in, until they do not show.
7. Pour batter into the prepared pan, and smooth over the top with a spatula. Set pan on a baking sheet and place in oven. Bake about 2 1/4 hours, or until cake is puffed above pan and nicely browned on top or until internal temperature is 200 degrees on a thermometer.
8. Remove cake from pan shortly after baking. Tapping the bottom of the pan with a heavy knife will help. Store cake for at least 10 days. If desired, add occasional touch more of Madeira or sherry (or Cognac or rum, if desired). Keep closely covered, wrapped in cheesecloth or foil, and refrigerated until ready to use.

Check out Lucindaville’s Fruitcake post for sources for great fruit and nuts.

Italian Cooking In The Grand Tradition

My friend, Jim, had me over to cook with him a few weeks ago. He is quite the Renaissance man, a woodworker, furniture maker, restorer, artist, musician, singer and darn good cook.


He has a behemoth of a stove that came from an old hotel that once graced Shirley.



He is working to restore it to its original form, but in the meantime, it cooks like a dream. As we were talking about food, he told me one of his favorite cookbooks was Italian Cooking In The Grand Tradition by Jo Bettoja and Anna Maria Cornetto. The authors had been successful models on the runways of Paris, but I guess they just got hungry, so they opened a cooking school. He told me to take a look at his dogeared copy and I was hooked. As I am always in search of fruitcake recipes, this grand old Italian Christmas cake caught my eye.

Crostata di Ricotta
Christmas Cheesecake

For the pasta frolla (pie pastry)
2 1/2 cups flour
10 tablespoons unsalted butter, at cool room temperature, cut into pieces
3 large egg yolks
1/2 cup plus 1 tablespoon sugar
Grated zest of 1/2 lemon

For the filling:
1 pound ricotta cheese
1 cup confectioners' sugar
1/2 cup citron, cut into slivers
3/4 cup coarsely chopped almonds
1/2 cup dark raisins, soaked in a good-quality rum to cover

1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Butter and flour a 9-inch flan tin with removable sides.
2. Put the pastry ingredients into the large bowl of an electric mixer. Using the paddle attachment, mix the pastry just until it masses around the paddle, 2 or 3 minutes. If using a food processor, take the butter directly from the refrigerator. Put all ingredients into work bowl and process just until mixed.
3. Cut off 1/3 of the pastry and set aside. Lightly flour a marble or wooden surface and roll out the large piece of dough into a circle slightly larger than the flan tin; drape it over the rolling pin and unfold onto the tin. Pressing lightly with the fingers, fit the pastry into the tin. Cut off the excess of the pastry and add to the pastry you set aside. Set the tin aside.
4. Prepare the filling. Put the ricotta through a food mill and add the sugar, mixing with a wooden spoon. Add the remaining ingredients, including the rum in which the raisins have soaked, then pour the ricotta filling into the prepared shell.
5. Roll out the reserved pastry on a lightly floured wooden board and cut it into strips 1 inch wide. Lattice the strips on top of the pie. Bake for 40 minutes, or until lightly browned. Cool on a rack for 10 minutes before turning out. Serve warm or tepid.

See, I promised you not all those horrible fruitcakes are the same. Go ahead, tell everyone at the table there is fruitcake for dessert. When you bring this to the table watch how their little crestfallen faces light up. You will be the hit of Christmas.

Sook's Cookbook

Yes Virginia, it’s “Fruitcake Season.” I know what you are thinking but stop. Fruitcakes are wonderful. Unfortunately, in the United States we suffer from the mistaken notion that the “fruit” in fruitcake is some sort of afterthought when it should be the main ingredient. (Hey, that’s why they call it “fruit” cake.)

In the coming days I will be pointing you to various resources for your cakes, but to start us off, I am giving you the most famous fruitcake ever made. It was first made by Truman Capote’s cousin, Sook. As a child, Truman would follow is cousin down to the river bank to that palace of sin operated by the Indian, Mr. Haha Jones. There they would purchase the bourbon whisky needed to make the cake.


As an adult, Truman Capote recounted this ritual in what may be his most famous work, A Christmas Memory. Years later, Capote's aunt, Marie Rudisill, gathered the recipes into Sook's Cookbook.

Here is Sook’s cake so you can make your own memories.

Sook’s Famous “Christmas Memory” Fruitcake

2 1/2 pound Brazil nuts
2 1/2 pound white and dark raisins; mixed
1/2 pound candied cherries
1/2 pound candied pineapple
1 pound citron
1/2 pound blanched almonds
1/2 pound pecan halves
1/2 pound black walnuts
1/2 pound dried figs
1 scant tablespoon nutmeg
1 scant tablespoon cloves
2 tablespoons grated bitter chocolate
8-ounce grape jelly
8–ounce glass jar grape juice
8-ounce glass bourbon whiskey
1 tablespoon cinnamon
1 scant tablespoon allspice


Batter

2 cups pure butter
2 cups sugar
12 eggs
4 cups flour


Cut the fruits and nuts into small pieces and use enough of the flour to dredge them, making a thin coat over all. Cream the butter and sugar adding one egg at a time, beating well. Add the flour. Add the dredged fruits and nuts, spices, seasoning, and flavorings. Mix thoroughly by hand. Line your cake tin with wax paper and grease well, then flour. The pan should be large enough to hold a twelve-pound cake.
Pour the mixture into the pan and put it in a steamer over cold water. Close the steamer and bring the water to a rolling boil. After the water boils, lower the heat and steam the cake on top of the stove for about four-and-one-half hours. Preheat the oven to around 250 degrees, and bake for one hour.

Now, one can simply drive to a liquor and buy your cake bourbon, but if you happen to know a friendly bootlegger, pay him a visit. It's a much better story.

Mediterranean Clay Pot Cooking

It seems fair that we should follow up Dione Lucas with one of her most successful students. Paula Wolfert, who left college to cook after being mesmerized by Lucas, has a new cookbook, Mediterranean Clay Pot Cooking. Wolfert did her mentor proud, as she was recently inducted into the Cookbook Hall of Fame by the James Beard Foundation.

I love cooking in clay pots. There is something so genuine and truly lovely about them. I confess that one of the "things-I-need-to-do-before-I-die" is to make my own clay pots for my kitchen.

In the meantime, Spanish cazuelas are my favorite and Wolfert recommends an 11-or 12-inch Spanish cazuela or straight-sided flameware skillet for this recipe. There really is no more perfect dish than this, succulent shrimp, fresh garlic, a hit of heat all in a nice oil. Add some bread and you cannot go wrong.

Sizzling Shrimp with Garlic and Hot Peppers

1 pound peeled small (about 60) or medium-large, deveined (24 to 30) shrimp
1 scant cup extra virgin olive oil, preferably Spanish
1 tablespoon finely chopped garlic
1 teaspoon mildly hot dried red pepper such as Aleppo or Marash
½ teaspoon sea salt
¼ teaspoon sweet pimentón de la Vera (smoked Spanish paprika)
4 to 6 slices chewy country bread

1. Rinse the shrimp and wipe dry with paper towels. Leave them at room temperature for 10 to 15 minutes so they are not ice cold when they hit the pan.

2. Combine the olive oil, garlic, and hot pepper in the cazuela. Set it over medium-low heat and warm the pan slowly, gradually raising the heat to medium or medium-high until the oil is hot. Continue to cook until the garlic sizzles and just turns golden, 2 to 3 minutes.

3. Immediately add all the shrimp and cook until they are firm and curled, 2 to 4 minutes, depending on their size.

4. Sprinkle with 2 tablespoons hot water and pinches of sea salt and pimentón. Serve at once right from the pot with the bread for soaking up the delicious oily sauce.

If you are interested in clay pots or great kitchens, here is a photo from the L.A. Times of Wolfert in her kitchen surrounded by pots.


I could cook there.

Gourmet Cooking School Cookbook

Dione Lucas was among the first to teach cooking from a television studio in 1947. She held private classes were attended by such individuals as Salvador Deli, Helen Hayes and Paula Wolfert, who took 6 classes and immediately dropped out of college for a career in food

Dione Lucas’ books led to the growth of French cooking in America, though she never rose to the fame of Julia Child. Many people swear by Lucas' omelet recipe, others wax poetic on her more complicated dishes. Her squab was another favorite, not so much for the recipe but because she states that it was a favorite dish eaten by Adolph Hitler, which debunks the theory of his vegetarianism.

Her Gourmet Cooking School Cookbook gives this detailed but excellent recipe for beef with sour cream.

Boeuf Stroganoff
(Fillet of Beef with Sour Cream)

MARKETING LIST
2 pounds fillet of beef (center cut)
Salt butter
brandy
garlic
1/2 ounce (1 package) dried mushrooms
meat glaze
tomato paste
four
1 1/2 cups heavy commercial sour cream
fresh dill

PREPARATION TRAY
meat, trimmed and cut into pieces
garlic, chopped
dried mushrooms, soaked, drained and chopped
mushroom stock, strained
fresh dill, chopped

1. Remove any skin, fat and sinew from the mat, and cut it into thin fingers 2 1/2 inches long, 1 inch wide.

2. Heat in a heavy pan: 4 tablespoons (2 ounces -- 1/2 stick) of salt butter. Stir it until it is golden and sizzling.

3. Now, put in your beef, a few slices at a time, being careful that the pieces do not touch. This is the trick to browning meat quickly and evenly without allowing any juice or steam to form, thereby stewing instead of sautéing your meat. Remove browned pieces with a slotted spoon or tongs-- never stab with a fork!-- and set aside until all the beef has been cooked.

4. When all the meat is brown, put it back in the pan and flame it with: 1/4 cup of brandy

5. Remove the meat from the pan again and stir into the juices: 2 tablespoons (1 ounce-- 1/4 stick) of salt butter

6. Remove the pan from the heat and add: 2 teaspoons of finely chopped garlic. (Chop garlic in a little salt with a sharp knife.) 1/2 ounce of chopped dried mushrooms (These give a completely different flavor from our fresh mushrooms, and the two are not interchangeable. Put the 1/2 ounce of dried mushrooms to soak in 1/2 cup of warm water for at least 1/2 hour. Drain the mushrooms, saving the liquid, chop them very fine and add them to the garlic sauce.)

7. Stir slowly over heat for 2 minutes, but don't brown the garlic.

8. Stir in, off the fire: 1 level teaspoon of meat glaze, 1 level teaspoon of tomato paste, 3 tablespoons of plain flour, the strained mushroom stock

9. Stir over the fire until it thickens, but don't let it boil.

10. Beat in, a dab at a time: 1 1/2 cups of heavy sour cream, using a wire whisk.

11. Mix in: 2 good tablespoons of freshly chopped dill

12. Heat the sauce, but keep it below the boiling point or the sour cream will curdle. It should just be steaming. Then put your meat in, but do not keep it in the sauce over a flame or it will continue to cook. It can stay warm indefinitely over hot water, with a cover on, or on an electric hot tray.

If you want to be a thoroughly unruffled hostess, you can brown your beef and make your sauce in the morning, refrigerating them in separate bowls until about an hour before you serve. At the last minute, you can heat the sauce gradually, stirring it to keep it smooth and watching that it doesn't boil. Then add the meat, which will be room temperature by this time, and add your fresh dill to the sauce now, heat the two together, and there's your perfect Stroganoff, prepared in advance, yet served precisely au point.

It seems terribly drawn out, but read through the recipe and give it a try.

Drinkology Eats

A booze hounds book for chow hounds. James Waller joins forces with caterer Ramona Ponce to expand his "mixology" franchise. I have given away many of his Drinkology: The Art and Science of the Cocktail to all my budding cocktail shakers and those who were looking to brush up on their mixing skills. Drinkology EATS: A Guide to Bar Food and Cocktail Party Fare offers up the nosh to keep the drinking going.

I thought of this because of one single recipe. It answers quite effectively, the age old question of what to do with all that leftover turkey. While this recipe is for chicken, I think you can safely substitute turkey. And, you can dispense with the cubes and just let the leftovers be as ragged as they can be. Waller and Ponce recommend using Dona Maria mole. It is concentrated so half a can will do.

Chicken Cubes with Mole

about 4 ounces condensed commercial mole, such as Dona Maria
2 cups chicken broth
2 large chicken breasts, about 1 1/2 pounds
1/4 cup sesame seeds

In a small saucepan, combine the condensed mole and chicken broth. Cook over low heat, stirring constantly, until the sauce is thickened, even-textured, and hot.

Broil the chicken breasts until cooked through, about 7 minutes on one side and 4 minutes on the other. (Slice one of the breasts at its thickest part to make sure it is completely cooked; if still pink in center, return to broiler for 1 - 2 additional minutes.)

Allow the breasts to cool slightly before handling. Cut them into 1 -inch cubes, discarding the irregular pieces. (You should end up with at least 24 cubes.) Spear each cube with a cocktail pick, dip it into the mole, and arrange the mole-coated cubes on serving tray. Sprinkle with sesame seeds and serve.

Somewhere on that leftover turkey, you have 24 cubes, or maybe just 12. Try this on any leftover turkey and add some rice and beans. It makes for an easy and different approach and gives a positive spin on, "Turkey, again."

How To Eat

We love Nigella. Not for the obvious reasons, we know she is easy on the eyes, but because she's just so much fin in the kitchen. She obviously loves to cook for herself and others and she's not afraid to eat and we especially love that about her. Gearing up for that big old Thanksgiving extravaganza, I wanted to offer up something both comforting and light on this day before overindulgence.

Try this lemony risotto for a lovely pre-Thanksgiving meal.

Lemon Risotto

2 shallots
1 stick of celery
60g unsalted butter
1 tbsp olive oil
300g risotto rice, preferably Vialone Nano
1 litre vegetable stock (I use Marigold stock powder)
Zest and juice of 1/2 an unwaxed lemon
Needles from 2 small sprigs of fresh rosemary, finely chopped
1 egg yolk
60ml (4 tbsp) grated Parmesan, plus more to sprinkle
60ml (4 tbsp) double cream
Malden salt to taste
Good grating pepper, preferably white

1. Put the shallots and celery into a Magimix and blitz until they are a finely chopped mush. Heat half the butter, the oil and the shallot and celery mixture in a wide saucepan, and cook to soften the mixture for about 5 minutes making sure it doesn't catch. Mix in the rice, stirring to give it a good coating of oil and butter. Meanwhile, heat the stock in another saucepan and keep it at simmering point.

2. Pour in a ladle full of the stock into the rice and keep stirring until the stock is absorbed. Then add another ladle full and stir again, continue doing this until the rice is al dente. You may not need all of the stock, equally, you may need to add hot water from the kettle.

3. Mix the lemon zest and the rosemary into the risotto, and in a small bowl beat the egg yolk, lemon juice, Parmesan, cream and pepper.

4. When the risotto is ready - when the rice is no longer chalky but still has some bite - take it off the heat and add the bowl of eggy lemony mixture, and the remaining butter and salt to taste. Serve with more grated Parmesan if you wish, check the seasoning and dive in.

Now that is how to eat.