fruitcake

jamarattigan wrote a delicious post the other day, in which she extolled the virtues of the much-maligned fruitcake. Though she couldn’t quite convince me to try another slice, she served up several memories of fruitcakes past.

My family used to bake huge quantities of fruitcake, which my father gave to hapless victims preachers he met on the Sawdust Trail during the holidays. The recipe called for lots of expensive ingredients, but “It’s a worthy sacrifice for God,” my father liked to say.

We all chipped in. We’d crack walnuts and pecans around the kitchen table while my  mother scraped orange rinds and chopped the candied fruit. My oldest sister, Coral, helped my brothers measure the wet ingredients into a galvanized washtub; then two by two, we’d all take turns mixing in the flour and spices. My mother and father baked the loaves in our tiny oven—countless pans, a few at a time—and we helped them wrap the cooled cakes with gauze and tin foil. Every few days or so, my father baptized the loaves with bourbon. By the time those fruitcakes reached their ultimate destination, they’d been doused with liquor more times than the county drunk!

A few years ago, my sister and I visited one of the houses where we made those fruitcakes. The current owners showed us all the remodeling they’d done. When we toured the yard, we spotted the galvanized tub! We couldn’t fit it into the trailer when we moved, so we’d left it hanging on a nail. And there it was, was waiting for our return, Oh tidings of comfort and joy: The tub’s been repurposed for gardening. I’m still smiling about that. I’ll take flowers over fruitcake any day!

Here’s Coral, standing near the garage door of that house. The infamous washtub’s in the foreground.