why does fruit cake exist?????????

Answer 1

Fruitcake


A modification of the traditional fruitcakeFruitcake is a heavy cake made of dried or candied fruits and nuts that are soaked in brandy or rum, often used in the celebration of weddings and Christmas.

The earliest recipe from ancient Rome lists pomegranate seeds, pine nuts, and raisins that were mixed into barley mash.

In the Middle Ages, honey, spices, and preserved fruits were added and the name fruitcake was first used. Robert Sietsema finds that inexpensive sugar from the American Colonies and the discovery that high concentrations of sugar could preserve fruits created an excess of candied fruit. The fruitcake was the way to use them.

In the 18th century, Europeans were baking fruitcakes using nuts from the harvest for good luck in the following year. The cake was saved and eaten before the next harvest. Fruitcakes proliferated until a law in Europe restricted them to Christmas, weddings, and a few other holidays. Even so, the fruitcake remained popular at Victorian Teas in England throughout the 19th century.

Mail-order fruitcakes began in 1913. The management of Ringling Brothers Circus liked the fruitcake from Collin Street Bakery, a local bakery in Corsicana, Texas. They ordered them as gifts to be mailed to friends around the country. Collin Street Bakery, using the old European recipe of baker Gus Weidmann and salesman Tom McElwee, grew quickly, and have shipped their fruitcakes to nearly 200 countries worldwide and numerous multi-national corporations and famous individuals.

The modern fruitcakes are fundamentally butter cakes, with just enough dough to bind the fruit. The cakes are saturated with liqueurs or brandy, and covered in powdered sugar, both of which prevent mold. Brandy or wine-soaked linens are used to store the fruitcakes. Many people feel fruitcakes improve with age. Some cakes have been eaten 25 years after baking.

Recently, in Waukesha, Wisconsin, a man discovered a 43 year old fruitcake in his mother's attic that his aunts had sent to him in 1962, while stationed at an Army base in Alaska. The cake arrived wrapped in brown paper with a red "fragile, handle with care" sticker on it, and the label "Old Fashioned Fruitcake". The man who found this treasure says "Now it's just old". [citation needed]




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Fruitcake in popular culture

A slice of fruitcakeIn the United States of America, the fruitcake has become one of the most ridiculed desserts and the butt of many jokes centered on its heaviness and long shelf life.

Former Tonight Show host Johnny Carson joked that there really is only one fruitcake in the world. It is passed from family to family -- a joke also frequently attributed to the writer Calvin Trillin, who denies being the source. Trillin says he was just passing along a theory he "had heard from someone in Denver". He continues, "There is nothing dangerous about fruitcakes as long as people send them along without eating them." The Fruitcake Lady makes appearances with current host Jay Leno and offers her "fruitcake" opinions.

Comedian Jim Gaffigan has used fruitcake in his bit to question its relation to regular cakes with the line, "Fruit, good; cake, great; fruitcake, nasty crap."

For the last nine years about 500 people have shown up in Manitou Springs, Colorado each January for the Great Fruitcake Toss. "We encourage the use of recycled fruitcakes", says Leslie Lewis of the Manitou Springs Chamber of Commerce. The all-time Great Fruitcake Toss record is 420 feet.

In the UK, fruitcakes are far moister and richer than their American counterparts, and remain extremely popular. The traditional Christmas cake is a fruitcake covered in marzipan, and then in white satin or royal icing. They are often further decorated with snow scenes, holly leaves and berries (real or artificial), or tiny decorative robins or snowmen.

Fruitcakes have been banned on airplanes. Due to their density, it is possible for a weapon to be baked inside the cake to avoid detection.

Answer 2

OK so one day there was some really really really bored people and they had all this crap lying around their house right. and since they were stuck in a snow storm and there was nothing good on t.v they did what every other bored group of teenager do....they went into the kitchen and combined all the junk that they could find around the house and put it all together baked it and called it fruit cake. after trying the cake and see that it sucked they went outside(after the snow storm was over of course) and threw it at some cows who ate the fruit cake(because cows will eat anything i mean come on they eat grass....) and this created the x gene that later made the x-men....so basically some kids were bored and went into the kitchen :)

Answer 3

I take it from your question that you do NOT like fruitcake. haha

The fruitcake you buy commercially is NOT real fruitcake. A real dark rich cake made with good fruit is fabulous (especially when soaked in rum)!! Besides, true tradition should not be tampered with - simply find a good recipe and pass it on - good for the tastebuds and the memories.

The novel above explains why and how the cake originated, so no need to go into that again.

Answer 4

LOL!!! To pass something around for Christmas. What are we going to do with all the fruits (the real ones)? Make a fruit cake.

Answer 5

You can make cake healthier by making it at home yourself and replacing some of the ingredients. Rather than oil try using plain or vanilla yogurt, applesauce, or if it's a white or yellow cake, use pineapple juice. I highly favor and recommend using yogurt. It makes the cake SOOOOO moist. Whatever the cake mix calls for in oil, use that much yogurt or applesauce. Instead of using icing, use a little bit of fat free whipped topping or yogurt. Trust me, you are cutting out so much fat and NONE of the flavor. It's so good. For the eggs, use egg whites only or egg substitute. I don't have answers to your other questions, but I do recommend the use of yogurt instead of oil. Try it in brownies, too. So GOOd!

Answer 6

bcos some likes to eat fruit together with the cake? lol

Answer 7

I wish I had someone who loved me enough to make me fruit cake!!!

Yummy ... fruit and rum in a cake thing-a-ma-jig!!!

Answer 8

To give everybody something to joke about, to complain about, to use as doorstops, etc.

Answer 9

It's just a bad dream.

Answer 10

to give us something to give to the people we really don't like on the holidays.