This Christmas Fruit Cake is a wonderful staple in the homes of Canadians during some of their most special days. Packed with dried fruits such as pineapples, cherries, raisins and dates, mixed with pecans and soaked in rum, this recipe tastes unique and delicious. Try it with a cup of tea!

Front view of Canadian Christmas Fruit Cake on a Christmas platter with slices in the background

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She’s back, ladies and gents!! Aunt Lori is back in the Foreign Fork kitchen today, and she is going to be teaching us how to make traditional Canadian Christmas Fruit Cake.

Christmas Fruit Cake in Canada is a long-standing tradition in the country. The fun part? The country is hugely divided on it. Many love the fruit cake and the nostalgia that it brings, while others can’t even get themselves to taste it. Still, though, Christmas fruit cake is a must in the homes of many Canadians during the holiday season.

Aunt Lori’s recipe for Canadian fruit cake features candied cherries, candied pineapple, various other candied fruits, and pecans. The cake is cooked with a water bath so as to keep the dough moist and delicious.

Wedding Traditions

Not only is this recipe a great holiday treat, it’s also a Canadian wedding tradition! In Canada, many couples will pass out fruit cake to their guests. They will ask their guests to sleep with the cake under their pillow that night as a token of good luck for the new couple.

On the couple’s one year wedding anniversary, they will normally eat a slice of their wedding fruit cake in celebration!

What is In this Canadian Christmas Fruit Cake?

Butter or margarine
Lemon juice
Baking powder
Eggs
Granulated sugar
Flour
Seeded raisins
Dates
Mixed candied fruit
Candied cherries (red and green)
Candied pineapple
Chopped pecans

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How Do I Make Canadian Christmas Fruit Cake?

Rinse the candied fruit with water. Then soak the fruit in rum overnight to remove the stickiness and rehydrate.

Mix all of the dried fruit in a bowl. Sift one cup of reserved flour over fruit and mix until all of the fruit is coated in flour.

In a separate, VERY large bowl, cream together butter and eggs.

Add the lemon juice and beat again.

Add sugar, flour, and baking powder and beat until creamy and smooth.

Mix all fruit and nuts into the batter by hand.

Line wax paper into two 10.5”x5” loaf pans and 4 individual loaf pans and divide the batter among them.

Fill a 9×13 pan with water and place it in the bottom of the oven as a “water bath” for the cakes.

Put the cakes in the oven and bake at 250 degrees for about 2.5 hours, or until a toothpick is removed clean.

How to Store Christmas Fruit Cake

It is vital to know how to store your Christmas fruit cake properly, because it is almost NEVER eaten the same day that it is made. Typically, Christmas fruit cake “ripens” for at least a month before consumption, but some people choose to let their cake rest for up to four months.

To correctly store the Christmas fruit cake, first wrap it very tightly in wax paper. Then, wrap that in aluminum foil, making certain that there are no holes or air pockets.

Keep the cake in your fridge for the desired amount of time. The longer you “ripen” the cake, the more flavor it will have when you finally eat it!

Christmas Fruit Cake with Rum

You can choose to store your Christmas fruit cake with the process I described above, OR you could take the entire process a step further with “feeding” your cake.

During the process of feeding your Christmas cake, you periodically soak the cake with more rum (or your alcohol of choice). When it comes time to eat your cake, it will taste distinctly of rum! This process normally takes about a month, but can extend for up to 3 months.

To begin, first wrap your cake in a rum-soaked cheesecloth. Then follow the previously mentioned steps of wrapping it next in wax paper and, finally, in aluminum foil. Continue to store it in the fridge between “feeding” sessions.

Every week, remove the cake from the fridge and unwrap. Use a skewer to poke holes into the top of the cake about every two inches. The holes should extend halfway down into the cake.

Use a spoon to scoop rum and pour into each hole of the cake. Before re-wrapping, use a pastry brush to brush the remaining rum into the surface of the cake. Rewrap and place in the fridge again.

Continue this process until the Christmas fruit cake is ready for consumption. As aforementioned, this process can last anywhere from 1-3 months, depending on how strongly you would like your cake to taste of rum.

Why is My Christmas Fruit Cake Crumbly?

If your Christmas fruit cake is crumbly, you most likely didn’t add enough moisture into the batter/cooking process. Luckily, this recipe is designed to keep your cake beautifully moist.

First, soaking the fruit in the rum overnight rehydrates it. This means that the cake will not need to pull moisture from the fruit!

Secondly, the water bath ensures that your cake recipe is surrounded by moisture while cooking, therefore keeping your cake wonderfully moist as well.

If you liked this Christmas fruit cake recipe, be sure to check out these other great dessert recipes as well!: