Most of us, when we think of fruitcake, think of a horror that is a brick of candied fruit so heavily processed it has lost all flavor glued together with something akin to half-dried wallpaper paste, with a density roughly akin to solid lead. It has no real flavor beyond cloying sweetness, no texture beyond “tough” and seemingly no purpose except to surprise someone opening a time capsule. Ick.
Okay, the honey cake I came up with wouldn’t be recognized as a fruitcake in the “soak it in brandy and keep if forever” sense. But it’s what I think of when I think about fruit cake – rich and spicy, moist with fresh apple and flavorful with dried fruit. It came out well enough that I think I’ll start making it for the High Holy Days, when apples and honey are combined in the wish for a sweet and prosperous year.
APPLE HONEY CAKE
1 cup white sugar
1 cup vegetable oil
2 eggs
3/4 cup honey (Use a dark flavorful honey if you have access to one.)
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
1 1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1 teaspoon ground ginger
1/4 tsp ground clove
3 cups peeled, finely chopped apples
3/4 cup golden raisins
3/4 cup dark raisins
1/2 cup dried cherries
3/4 cup chopped walnuts (optional)
Preheat oven to 325o F. Grease and flour an 11×13 inch cake pan or 9 inch bundt pan.
In a large bowl, stir together the sugar and oil. Beat in the eggs until light, then stir in the honey and vanilla. Combine the flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, ginger and clove; stir into the batter just until moistened. Fold in the apples, both kinds of raisins, dried cherries and nuts.
Pour into prepared pan. Bake 60 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted in the cake comes out clean. If baked in the bundt pan, let stand in pan for 15 minutes before turning out on a wire rack to cool.
Enjoy.
Oh, and the poppy seed wafers? Those didn’t come out so well (kind of tasteless), so I’m not posting that recipe quite yet.