The worst part of the fruitcake tradition is over. I had almost
forgotten how much work it is to make fruitcake. After all these years I
still managed to underestimate the prep time. By the time I got out all
the ingredients, cut some of them up, cream the butter and sugar then
the eggs and liquids, then mixing up the wet and dry ingredients and
lining the pans, spreading the batter into the pans, it was more than an
hour and a half. The worst part is stirring the wet and dry ingredients
together. You need a nice big spoon and strong wrists.


I did try something different this year. In the past I have dumped the
fruit into the four to dredge it and then added the wet. This time I
did it slightly differently. Instead of adding the fruit to all the
flour I started off with one cup of it in the bottom of the bowl and
tossing the fruit in that. Then I added the liquid to the rest of the
flour and was able to use the beaters to mix them together. The dredged
fruit was added and stirred in. Man, that dough is heavy.

The cakes are in the oven. Cooking time is 2 hours at 300F.