Christmas Cake Week: Gluten Free Fruitcake!

Here is cake number four in this week’s Christmas Cake Series.

Fruit cakes often get a bad wrap for many reasons sometimes for its’ dowdy dark appearance and other times for the fact that it clocks in at a whopping ten pounds. I remember my parents receiving fruitcakes in the mail that were so dense and dark they looked more like deadly assault weapons than a seasonal highlight.

When I began creating my Christmas Cake Week series, I purposefully put “fruitcake” at the top of my list because I’ve never seen a gluten free version in the decade that I have been gluten free. It was as simple as that. Plus, I was determined to make one that was laden with fruit and drunk as that relative that manages to either knock over the Christmas tree or pass out in the spare bedroom. Why not get a little nutty? Like a misbehaving relative, the fruitcake always seems to get ignored, shunned or excommunicated and I just had to pull it back into the gluten free fold.

Thankfully, my gluten free fruitcake lives up to its’ name in both myth and legend, but no trees needed to be knocked over and no doors needed to be locked in order to bring her to life. There were some boozy moments, but only when it came to the batter. Oh, and did I mention that it is gluten and dairy free? It works with either vegetable shortening or butter, so if you need to watch the dairy, I got you covered.

All you need to do is make this cake, present it at your Christmas party and watch it get devoured.

I like to serve it on a cutting board with a knife so everyone can decide for themselves how deep they want get into the holiday spirit.

Gluten Free Fruitcake

80 g. or 2/3 cup glutinous rice flour
80 g. or scant 2/3 cup sorghum flour
80 g. or ½ cup + 3 tablespoons tapioca flour
80 g. or ½ cup + 2 ½ tablespoons cornstarch
60 g. or ¼ cup + 2 tablespoons potato flour
1 cup firmly paced dark brown sugar
1 teaspoon baking soda
3 teaspoons guar gum
¼ teaspoon kosher salt
1 ½ teaspoons ground cinnamon
1 ¼ teaspoons ground cloves
1 ¼ teaspoons freshly ground nutmeg

½ cup (1 stick) unsalted butter or vegetable shortening to make dairy free
4 large eggs
3 tablespoons light coconut milk
1 cup whiskey
2 tablespoons pure vanilla extract

½ cup dried apricots + 4, sliced thin for decorating the top
½ cup candied cherries + 7, cut in half, for decorating the top
¼ cup dried razz cherries + 2, cut in half for decorating the top
½ cup candied orange peel
½ cup currents
½ cup prunes
½ cup diced candied pineapple
½ cup raisins
1 cup chopped pecans + 12 whole pecan halves for decorating

½ cup melted and strained apricot preserves with 1 tablespoon lemon juice for glazing

Preheat oven to 350°F and grease a 14 x 4 inch tart case with a removable bottom with vegetable shortening.

Measure out all your flours and whisk to combine. Now spoon measure out ½ cup and place into a large glass bowl. This will be used to coat the dried fruit.

Now take the 2 ½ cups of the flour mix and add the brown sugar, baking soda, guar gum and spices. Whisk to combine.

Pour the mixture into the bowl of your stand mixer with the paddle attachment and add either the butter or the vegetable shortening, if using, and mix on medium speed until the mixture looks like clumped peas. Add the eggs and coconut milk and mix till smooth; mix on high till fluffy. Reduce the mixer speed and add the whiskey and the vanilla and mix on low at first and then slowly increase the mixer speed to high and whip for 30 seconds.

Remove the bowl from the stand mixer.

Dice all the dried fruit, except the raisins and currents and chop the pecans. Cut the fruit listed for the decorations as instructed above.

Add all the dried fruit to the reserved ½ cup of flour and toss generously to combine well.

Fold the dried fruit into the batter.

Pour the batter into the tart mold and level with an offset spatula dipped in water.

Now take the dried fruit set aside for the decoration and arrange in the pattern you see here.

Brush the fruit and the cake with the apricot and lemon juice wash.

Bake for 30-40 minutes and the cake is slightly risen over the top of the pan and firm to the touch. The cake is done when the cake has pulled away from the sides of the pan.

Allow to cool completely on a wire rack in the pan before removing and serving.

Serves 10

All photos by Knoxy