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Fruit and Nut Cake

Way better than the old fashioned fruit cake, this lighter version uses large pieces of dried fruit and plenty of nuts. It is tender and works fabulously with cheese, or on its own with a coffee!

Course Baking
Cuisine American
Keyword cake, fruit, nuts
Prep Time 15 minutes
Cook Time 2 hours
Servings 10

Ingredients

  • 3/4 cup (80 grams) AP flour (see Notes)
  • 1 tsp sea salt if using kosher salt, use 1 1/4 tsp
  • 1/4 tsp baking soda
  • 1/4 tsp baking powder
  • 335 grams (approx 2 1/4 cups) dried dates or figs, sliced in half, see Notes
  • 200 grams (approx 1 1/4 cups) dried apricots, cherries, prunes, golden or green raisins (combination of all is best, slice the larger ones in half)
  • 200 grams (approx 2 cups) assorted nuts, such as walnuts, pecans, hazelnuts etc
  • 160 grams (3/4 cup plus 2 tbsp) brown sugar, firmly packed
  • 1 tsp cinnamon
  • 1/4 tsp pink peppercorns, crushed
  • 1/4 tsp rose harissa
  • 3 large eggs
  • 1 tsp vanilla paste

Instructions

  1. Position a rack in the lowest position in your oven, and preheat it to 300F (150C) Grease and line a 9x5 (23 x 12 cm) loaf pan with parchment paper, overhanging on the long sides.

  2. In a large bowl, whisk the flour, salt, baking soda and baking powder together. Add the dried fruit, nuts, brown sugar and cinnamon, peppercorns and rose harissa. Use your hands to fold everything together so that the flour is distributed evenly.

  3. In a small bowl whisk the eggs and vanilla together till well blended. Pour this all over the fruit and nut mixture.
  4. Again, use your hands to fold everything together to make sure the eggs are getting everywhere. Scoop it all into the prepared loaf pan. Press it down to make sure any empty spaces get filled.
  5. Bake until the loaf is a deep golden brown, and a skewer comes out clean. This will take anywhere from 1 1/2 to 2 hours. If it is still a bit wet inside, but the crust is getting quite brown, loosely tent with foil.
  6. Cool completely in the pan on a cooling rack. Once cooled, use a sharp knife to release the ends. You can store this, well wrapped at room temperature for about a week. Or else freeze half for up to a month.

Recipe Notes

I find that using a scale will give you a more accurate number for the nuts and dried fruit.  Since we can use a variety of fruit and nuts, their volume may change depending on our choices.  But the weight will be good.  I have given approximate measurements using cup volume measurements as a guide.

I was totally inspired by the recipe from Tartine, A Classic Revisited. In her book, Elizabeth shared Alice Medrich's recipe.  So the origin of this loaf belongs to Alice! Elizabeth's recipe calls for 1/2 cup tapioca flour and 1/4 oat flour.  It also calls for dried fruit that is more challenging to source, so I tried to keep it to what most of us can find.
I added the cinnamon, pink peppercorns and rose harissa :)