With the Christmas holiday season fast approaching, naturally our thoughts turn to that essential part of the festivities – a traditional Christmas fruitcake.

This recipe for a wholefood fruitcake is known to my family and friends as ‘the best fruitcake ever’. I’ve been baking this cake for many years, tweaking and adjusting the recipe here and there, although the most important ingredient – the pineapple – always stays. It gives the cake a wonderful moistness that is often missing in the more usual dark fruitcake recipes.

Ingredients

8oz (225g) (1 cup) wholemeal (wholewheat) flour

2 teaspoons baking powder

4oz (115g) (0.5 cup) butter or margarine

4oz (115g) (0.5 cup) brown sugar (light brown or darker molasses sugar, according to taste)

10oz (285g) (1.25 cups) dried mixed fruit (currants, raisins, sultanas according to your preference)

2oz (56g) (0.25 cup) glace cherries, chopped

15oz (425g) can crushed pineapple or pineapple pieces

1 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda

2 large eggs, beaten

Notes

Sultanas are also known as seedless white raisins.

If using pineapple pieces empty them onto a plate and mash well with a fork. Use about half the juice in the can for the recipe.

If you want a vegan version of this cake, simply use your usual egg replacer and a non-dairy margarine. If you omit the glace cherries (they may be coloured with cochineal), add an extra 2oz or equivalent of your preferred dried fruit.

Method

Set oven to Gas Mark 4 / 350deg F / 180deg C. Grease and line 8 inch (20.5cm) cake tin.

Combine butter, sugar and fruits in a pan and simmer for about 15 minutes until fruit is nice and soft. Add extra juice from the can of pineapple if necessary.

Remove pan from heat and add the bicarbonate of soda. (It will froth a lot!) Allow to cool.

Mix the beaten eggs into the fruit mixture, then fold in the flour and baking powder.

Transfer to the cake tin and bake for about 75 minutes, or until a skewer or toothpick comes out clean from the centre of the cake.

Cool in the tin, then turn out onto a cooling rack.

Eat the cake just as it is or, if you like your fruitcake with a kick, add brandy, whisky or rum to it. When the cake is completely cool turn it upside down, insert a skewer a few times into the base then drizzle over 2 tablespoons of your favourite tipple. Wrap the cake in foil and leave it for a week. You can repeat this process as many times as you wish before Christmas!

And finally, here are a few interesting facts about fruitcake.

There was an early form of fruitcake in Roman times. It was made from cooked barley mixed with raisins, pine nuts and pomegranate seeds and formed into a cake. Roman soldiers liked to take this cake with them on long marches as it kept well and was easy to carry.

In the Middle Ages fruitcake became more sophisticated with the addition of preserved fruit, spices and honey. A 15th century recipe also calls for ale, yeast and boiled cream.

All kinds of dried fruit used to be known by the generic term ‘plums’, hence Plum Cake and Plum Pudding.

Wedding cake is most often an iced fruitcake. There is a tradition that unmarried women attending a wedding should sleep with a slice of the cake under their pillow in order to dream of their future husband. (I did this once and dreamed of a long deceased film star who, in life, had been at least six inches shorter than me!)

Whatever your recipe, I hope that you enjoy your fruitcake this Christmas!