Darlene was a good friend of Grandma Donna. Of my grandma’s few fruit cake recipes, I chose to try this one first because it required the fewest ingredients and had the shortest baking time. I like that’s it’s lighter and less fussy than traditional fruit cake, something I would enjoy for breakfast with a cup of tea. If you don’t usually like fruit cake, you might like this one!

Ingredients

• 2 cups flour
• 1 tsp salt
• 1 cup candied cherries or mixed fruits
• 1 cup Earth balance
• 1 cup granulated sugar
• 4 eggs
• 1 cup slivered or blanched + sliced almonds
• 2 tsp almond extract or ¼ cup of light rum

Yield: 1 loaf

Preheat oven to 300^o

Take ¼ cup of the flour and dredge the fruit and nuts. Dredging, if you are unfamiliar with the word, as I was, just involves stirring the fruits and nuts in the flour until they are coated.

In a separate bowl, combine the remaining flour and salt.

In another bowl, cream the Earth balance and sugar and beat until fluffy. Add eggs and continue to beat. Add the almond extract or rum.

Next, add the dry ingredients and mix well. Stir in the dredged fruit and nuts.

Grease and flour a 9×5” loaf pan (or line with parchment paper, my preference for ease of pulling the loaf out of the pan). Spread the batter in the pan being careful to press out any air pockets, and bake for 90-100 minutes or until done.