making fruitcake

We spent part of last weekend visiting with my grandmother, so we could learn her tricks to making her Christmas fruitcakes. As it turned out, we wound up making two different fruitcakes with two different recipes, and both were pretty awesome.

So, here's her traditional cake...
We start with her recipe that has a date from 1964. I'm guessing if it's still around after that long, it must be pretty good.

 Grandmother and I getting started with the cooking...

 There's mixing of the candied fruits, the nuts, and the dates...

 There's mixing of the actual cake mix...

 And then the combination of the two...

 Then of course we pack it tightly in the bundt pan...

 And bake that bad boy. It took us almost 3hrs to bake this one, but it was quite worth the wait...

 Afterwards, we found the secret ingredient - bourbon. The cake hadn't been out of the oven more than a couple of minutes before she started pouring the bourbon on it. She then informs me that when it cools, it'll get a little more added to it too.

The second fruitcake was just a simple no-bake cake. She mixed everything together and added it all into a glass pan. After a couple days in the fridge, it's good to serve. Oh, and of course, there was bourbon in that one too...

It was definitely a good day!