In defense of fruitcake: This much-maligned treat has a rich tradition

Fruitcake is a holiday baked good that's either revered, reviled or regifted for someone else. Is there any dessert that gets less respect?

You don't hear "nuttier than a pecan pie." Nobody talks about using a cheesecake or even a poundcake as a doorstop.

Ada Dewey of Ogden, 92, made Christmas fruitcake for at least 70 years. "But I stopped making it two or three years ago, because my family doesn't like it. The recipe makes two or three loaves, and I would just end up having to eat it all myself."

What is it about fruitcake that appeals so much to Dewey? The fruit, of course.

"I use cherries and citrus fruits and dates and nuts. I get a package that's called Festive Holiday Fruitcake Mix, where all the fruits are cut up for you, but I add extra cherries," she said. "I used to make my mother's recipe with boiled raisins, but then I began doing one that uses applesauce, and I like that one better. It just makes the best cake."

But she's learned not to try to share it. When Dewey brought a loaf of pumpkin bread to her daughter's home, she was told, "If that's a fruitcake, don't bring it in."

Fruitcake actually has a long and rich culinary history.

It's a descendant of "marchpane," a large cake at feasts in medieval times. The marchpane was crowded with candied fruit and nuts, and its base was a paste of almond and sugar, much like today's marzipan. Today, many British fruitcakes are decorated with a sheet of marzipan and frosted with hard white icing, a possible nod to the ancient marchpane.

Just about all the European countries have some form of a sweet cake or bread studded with dried fruit and/or nuts. For instance, 12th-night cake in England, Dundee cake or "black bun" in Scotland, Italian panettone, stollen in Germany and Scandinavian raisin bread.

Making a fruitcake in the 18th century was a major undertaking, according to the "Oxford Companion to Food," by Alan Davidson.

"The ingredients had to be carefully prepared. Fruit was washed, dried, and stoned (taking the pits out), if necessary; sugar, cut from loaves, had to be pounded and sieved; butter washed in water and rinsed in rosewater. Eggs were beaten for a long time, half an hour being commonly directed. Yeast, or barm from fermenting beer, had to be coaxed to life. Finally, the cook had to cope with the temperamental wood-fired baking ovens of that time. No wonder these cakes acquired such mystique."