This is my son’s 3rd Xmas and he is most excited as he has started identifying & understanding the ‘hullabaloo’ attached to Xmas. He even helped in decorating his very own Xmas tree & Santa Claus. Though Santa came in a bit early & he got his gifts earlier than 25th. In all this Xmas spirit in my house how can I not bake Xmas Fruit Cake. Though honestly speaking, I almost didn’t make it.
I was scouring for a good fruit cake, I realised that most eggless versions use boiled fruit recipe, which I am not very keen on. Finally my search took me to Joy of Baking & I came across an eggless version of fruit cake. I made slight changes to suit our tastes as well as with what is available. I reduced all the spices by 1/2 as V wasn’t keen on a very strong & tangy flavor. Also, I ran out of Vanilla essence so used Almond as it was available. I also used curd in place of buttermilk & replaced currants with tutti-fruiti.
Eggless Xmas Fruit Cake
And not to forget I cajoled V into helping me out in this one as I was being too lazy. 
He happily obliged & we managed to put it in oven finally with lots of bickering. That’s what couples are for, I guess!
Eggless Fruit Cake -
Recipe Source – adapted from Joy of Baking
Ingredients -
- 1 1/2 Cups – All Purpose Flour
- 1/2 Cup – Pitted Dates, packed
- 2/3 Cup – White Sugar, granulated
- 1/4 tsp – Salt
- 1/2 tsp – Allspice Powder (Garam Masala)
- 1/2 tsp – Nutmeg, freshly grated
- 1/2 tsp – Cinnamon, ground
- 1 tsp – Baking Soda
- 1 Cup – Curd
- 1/2 Cup – Unsalted Butter, melted
- 1/2 tsp – Almond Extract
- 1/2 Cup – Tutti-Fruiti
- 1/2 Cup – Raisins, golden
- 1/2 Cup – Raisins, dark
Method -
- Pre-heat oven at 165 C. Grease & dust a loaf pan.
- On a chopping board, spread 1/2 cup flour. Coat the dates in the flour & chop them corasely on the board. The flour prevents the dates from breaking down & becoming soft & mushy.
- In a large bowl, place the remaining flour & dates mixture. Add spices, sugar, salt & baking soda. Stir to combine.
- In a separate bowl, whisk together buttermilk, melted butter & vanilla extract.
- Stir in buttermilk mixture & remaining dry-fruits into the dry ingredients. Mix well.
- Immediately pour into the prepared pan. Smooth the top & bake for 50-55 mins or till the cake is golden brown & pulling away from sides.
- Remove from oven & allow to cool in the pan for 10 mins on a wire rack. Remove from pan & allow to cool to room temp.
As advised by Joy of Baking, this cake tastes excellent when warm or at room temp. We felt that sugar was a wee bit too much for our taste. So next time I surely will reduce it to 1/3 rd cup. The cake was soft, moist, spicy & perfect for Xmas.
Enjoy the cake while singing carols or visiting local markets. 
Sending this to Jingle All The Way Event, hosted by Kavitha Iyengar of Edible Entertainment.
