1 1/2 cup golden, seedless, and puffed seeded, raisins, combined
4 cup white flour
1 tsp baking soda
1 1/2 cup dried currants
1 tsp salt
1 cup plus 2 tb blackberry cordial or oth, er wine
1 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp cloves
1 tsp allspice
1 cup alaskan sourdough starter
1/2 tsp mace
6 tbsp butter
3 cup candied fruit, green and red cherries, p
1 cup white sugar
1 cup brown sugar
3 eggs, well beaten
1 cup chopped nuts
2 tbsp grated lemon rind
Directions
Soak raisins and currants in 1 cup wine overnight. Remove starter from
refrigerator and set, tightly covered, in warm place overnight. It
should be in at least a two cup container as it will just about
double its volume overnight. In the morning, cream butter with sugar
and beat in eggs and lemon rind. Drain wine from raisins into
creamed mixture. Stir in starter and 3 cups of the flour sifted with
the soda, salt and spices. Sprinkle the remaining 1 cup of flour over
the fruit and nuts in a large bowl. Toss and shake until well-coated.
Add to batter and mix thoroughly. Turn into loaf pans which have been
generously buttered. Let stand in warm place for 30 minutes. Bake in
oven preheated to 300 with a pan of water on floor of oven and rack
as near as possible in middle of oven. Bake about 2-1/2 hours for
medium-sized loaves watching carefully to see that they do not brown
to quickly. Test with toothpick. Remove from oven, turn pans on sides
and allow to set for a few minutes before taking from pans. When cold
drip 2 tbsp. of wine over each cake. As soon as it is absorbed, wrap
tightly in cellophane freezer paper and store in refrigerator or
freezer. They improve with age.
From: Breads and Coffee Cakes with Homemade Starters Shared By: Pat
Stockett
Servings: 6 servings
Alaskan Sourdough Fruitcake Recipe brought to you by Recipe Ideas
Categories: Cake; Dessert; Fruit
The History of Recipes
We can follow the history of written recipes back into the distant past, certainly as far as the Egyptians, and maybe even further. In practice though, sadly, these early cook books were just simple hieroglyphic or cunieform instructions for food preparation.
In fact, the oldest recipe discovered so far, according to historians are some ancient tablets in the Sumerian language describing the making of bread which is then used to make a drink, quite possibly a form of beer as it is recorded as having made people feel blissful and exhilarated. Later, there are a couple of cookery books from the 1300s - one book titled `Forme of Cury`, and another named `Curye on Inglish`. The titles are a little misleading though, these have no connection with the spicy food that is served today, but instead recipes for the types of meals enjoyed by the rich and powerful of the time. Later on in the 1400s, the Crusaders brought back a variety of foods, spices and herbs from middle-east cuisine, including spices such as coriander, parsley, and basil. These new culinary innovations prompted an explosion in books on cooking, the majority of which are now in private collections. For the decades that followed, the powerful families of Wesstern Europe competed to lay on the best banquets, and because of this chefs and their recipes were greatly in demand. Notwithstanding that, it wasn`t until the 19th century that fine cooking and cookery books became popular. Mrs Beeton in the UK, and Fannie Merritt Farmer in the US, dedicated the best years of their lives to collecting, verifying, and writing down recipes to help cooks of their time. The arrival of television brought us TV cooks and the spin-off recipe books. Which pretty much brings us up to date and the invention of the internet, allowing everybody to search through massive numbers of recipes such as those found on the site you are now reading. |
We hope you enjoy this Alaskan Sourdough Fruitcake recipe.
