Princess Elizabeth had just become a teenager when she met the dashing 18-year old Philip at Dartmouth in 1939; over the next few years they grew closer and closer, until rumors of their engagement began to circulate as early as 1945, no doubt abetted by their obvious enthusiasm whenever they went dancing (‘People Will Say We’re In Love’, from the hit stage play ‘Oklahoma’, seemed to follow them everywhere they went).  It took fretful years for all the complications to be resolved – Philip was, despite his noble background, from a Greek family and a different Church.

(Archive.org has the full text of the book “Her Majesty The Queen The Story Of Elizabeth II” by Helen Catheart online here if you want more details)

Princess Elizabeth had been a devoted member of the Girl Guides all her life, and, when the engagement was announced, there was much discussion among Guide groups around the world about how they could pitch in and help celebrate.  Rationing was still a patriotic duty in many countries, and concerned groups rallied to the task of collecting scarce materials for the event.

The Australian Girl Guides decided they wanted to send Elizabeth a wedding present, and Irene Fairbairn, Secretary of the Girl Guides of Australia, had a suggestion – a Wedding Cake.  ‘Would they like to do that?’ she asked, and the response is part of Australian guide lore – ‘Could they? WOULD THEY ! ! ! and THEY COULD ! ! !’

The most difficult ingredients to obtain would be butter and sugar, both of which were in such short supply (especially in England) that ration coupons were still in effect, allowing each person a few ounces of butter each week, and even less sugar.  Many Australian Guides sacrificed their rations, went door-to-door for contributions, while newspapers got in the spirit. Pennies and shillings came trickling in.

There were many hurdles.  Fairbairn had to get permission from Buckingham Palace to donate the cake, and arrange for a baker once the ingredients arrived.  Arranging for transportation for the ingredients was also tricky, with few ships making the voyage and cargo space at a premium; Mrs. Fairbairn managed both.  Next she needed a recipe, and the caterer for one of Australia’s biggest hotels came up with one suitable for such a royal occasion.

Cake Ingredients

56 lb. bag icing sugar
79 lb. castor sugar
50 lb. bag flour
6 tins powdered milk, 6 lb.
10 oz. ground cinnamon
10 oz. mixed spice
6 bottles essence lemon
1 tin almond meal, 28 lb.
60 lb. sultanas
10 lb. lemon peel
15 lb. seeded raisins
10 lb. crystallised cherries
12 lb. currants
7 lb. self raising flour
1 bottle Australian brandy
20 lb. brown sugar
10 lb. almond kernels
12 dozen eggs
30 lb. butter

Mrs. Fairbairn got all the permits in order on a Monday – a ship was leaving for England on Wednesday that week, with not further shipments scheduled – and so once again the Guides flew into action, boxing up the ingredients in a whirlwind of activity, breathlessly documented by the local press.  This photo was printed in every Australian newspaper that week, of happy Guides taking the boxes to the ship:

Girl Guides loading Wedding Cake Ingredients

In England, Guides received the boxes, and delivered them to an Edinburgh baker, which baked the cake delivered it to the wedding banquet.  It stood out among the collected ceremonial cakes – a 9 feet high,  500 pound fruitcake, decorated with intricate sugarwork, including both their armorial bearings and scenes from their lives.

There were 11 other cakes given to the 21-year old Princess and her 26-year old groom;   the ‘Australian’ cake was considered the main wedding cake, and was cut using the Duke’s Mountbatten sword, a present from the King.  One tier was eaten at the banquet, and one a year later, for the christening of Charles; a third was sent back to Australia, and presumably eaten by Guides there. The heroic Mrs. Fairbairn continue to have an outstanding career in the Guides, and later in life was given the prestigious awards of Order of the British Empire and Commander of the British Empire; although she did ruefully note that she never tasted a slice of the most famous cake in Australian history.

Giving and receiving fruitcake is a well-established Christmas custom in Britain, founded upon hundreds of years of tradition.  There are many varieties – more than we have here in North America – ranging from extremely light loafs to dark, moist, rich and astonishingly heavy blocks of fruity goodness.  They are often covered in marzipan and hard white icing, and decorated – snow scenes, holly leaves, snowmen, santas, robins, and occasionally real berries.

Nowadays a fruitcake is received with a pleasant thank-you, but it wasn’t always so mildly received – for many centuries it was a highly-valued and coveted gift, that bestowed much honor on the recipient and implied great largesse on the part of the giver.

Mixing dried fruit with honey, spices, and grain to create a unique and long-lasting concoction is an old idea – the Romans did it, and so did the Crusaders – but the ingredients weren’t available to the Brits, until well after the Normans had taken the country, back in the 13th Century or so.  Shipping  to and from the continent had become semi-regular, and dried fruit began to arrive from Portugal and the Mediterranean, to the delight of the English upper classes. Most people didn’t have a great deal of variety in their diet (potatoes, grain and occasionally mutton)  – the delicous combination of honey, dried fruit, and nuts was exotic and unusual, a complete delight to the nose and palate, wafting the eater into a fantasy of exotic ports and warmer climates.

Giving sweet gifts at New Year’s was an old Roman tradition, which the English maintained after they left. Fruitcakes, enormously hard to make, were  highly valued; and anyone who could hope for a Christmas fruitcake waited with greedy, lip-smacking anticipation.  Wealthy higher-ups gave a fruitcake to their most important employees as a tangible symbol of their value, leaving less-worthy underlings motivated to strive harder, and maybe someday take a fruitcake of their own home to their families.

Over time, it became easier and cheaper to make fruitcakes, as ingredients became more available.  The growth of the British empire ensured a steady stream of molasses, sugar, raisins, prunes, dates, cherries, pecans, walnuts, corn syrup, almonds, lemon, spices, pineapple, apricots and other sweetstuffs.  Still labor-intensive, they held their value but became more available to commoners, so much so that the Scottish Baker’s Guild freaked out, and had this law passed against female home bakers:
‘The said day the baxter traid taking to their consideration the great loss sustained by this traid through several women within this town thus working in their own houses plum cake, seid cake, sugar biscuit, and other pastry, and bringing the same to the several bakehouses of the freemen of this traid to be by them fired, and which pastry they thereafter sell and vend through the town, for remeid whereof for the future, the said traid hereby statutes and ordains that no freeman of this traid in time coming shall give the use of his oven for firing the above pastrie so wrocht as aforesaid being for sale, and that under the penalty of ten merks Scots.’ (1) (one merk was about a shilling, making this penalty serious and crippling to the poor offender! and yes, I know Scotland is not England!)

In the late 1700′s a new Christmas tradition arrived – charitably giving fruitcake (then called plum cake, as all dried fruits were called ‘plum’) to groups of impoverished women and children, going from door-to-door singing carols; at which time giving fruitcake became an English holiday tradition.

Adding rum, brandy, or other alcohol took the fruitcake to another level of deliciousness, which inevitably instigated another British tradition: creating laws defining, confining or condemning anything overly pleasurable! Victorian England decided the fruitcake was far too tasty to be anything but ‘sinful’; laws were passed restricting its use.  You could consume a fruitcake at the religious holidays of Christmas and Easter, or at such significant times as weddings, funerals, or christenings; any other time was strictly illegal.  Queen Victoria is said to have waited a year to eat a fruitcake baked for her birthday, so as to be a model of restraint for her subjects; which may have prompted Charles Dickens to write, ‘a fruitcake is a geological homemade cake’.

Of course, if there is one thing the English enjoy more than passing laws against all things pleasurable, it is breaking those laws.  Much like Prohibition in America a century later, it became a common practice to break the law at home; an invitation to a Victorian Tea was often a chance to illicitly indulge in a piece of cake as well.  The practice became so common that the laws proscribing cake-eating dates were repealed later in the century.

Somehow during that era a wedding custom emerged, that is occasionally practiced even today, assigning fruitcake almost-mystical properties – by placing a piece of dark fruitcake beneath their pillows, unmarried wedding guests will dream of their future husband or wife!  Who knows where or when this idea came from; one must certainly empathize with the countless maids and washer-women toiling the next day over sheets and pillowcases stained with smooshed cake.

Ah, there is so much more to say about fruitcakes, but I have decided just to stick to the topics of the Brits infatuation with them.  So musing about Johnny Carson and German stollen, Truman Capote and pannetone, mail-order cakes and the Butter Letter of Pope Innocent VIII, will have to wait for another time.

(reprinted from last June)

Her  most frequent requests are for:

(a) flourless chocolate
(b) allergy-specific, such as spelt, egg-free, or dairy-free cake
(c) traditional fruitcake

Flourless chocolate cake is much like a Genoise cake – using air suspended in the batter during mixing to give volume, it uses low heat from melted chocolate to create an aerated chocolate custard, used to build the cake – a very delicious and safe option for gluten-free diets!

Flourless Chocolate Cake by Sweet Thea (photo credit Suzanne Paxton)

Spelt is an ancient grain, which has had a considerable revival as a health alternative in the last several years.  The organic farming movement has embraced it because it uses fewer fertilizers than many grains, and it has a lower gluten-content, allowing some people with wheat allergy or intolerance to use it.  Slightly crunchy with a nutty flavor, it can be sprouted, and has even been used to make vodka and beer!

a Sweet Thea Spelt Cake

Egg-free cakes are also quite popular.  Many young children are hypersensitive to eggs, and some people remain allergic for their entire lifetime – some to egg whites, others the yolk, while some can’t tolerate either.  This allergy can cause a severe overreaction of the immune system, leading straight to a hospital emergency  room – not fun!  Eggs work in a cake as an emulsifier – they help the ingredients to mix smoother – and other options are available – even applesauce can work as an emulsifier.

Dairy-free Cakes are very important, as dairy products affect many people poorly. Some  are lactose-intolerant, while others are allergic to specific dairy-based items.  The best way to manage these reactions is by avoiding milk proteins altogether. This is hard to do in an average supermarket, where most processed foods use dairy products or derivatives in their composition!

Fruit Cake is most often requested by couples of British descent,  where it has been traditionally used since the Victorian era, when it was a symbol of prosperity and goodness; there is even an old wedding custom that has an unmarried wedding guest sleeping with a piece of the fruitcake underneath their pillow, so that they may dream of their future spouse!

Fruit Cake on the Top Tier

Thea is enthusiastic about bringing her preference to fresh, natural ingredients to her specialty cakes, and will be happy to design one for you. While many bakers prefer not to make specialty cakes, as it incurs additional cost and labor (and non-traditional ingredients can be fussy work in the kitchen!), Thea can generally deliver a delicious and beautiful high-quality cake for you, for only about an additional fifty cents per slice.

When you book your consultation with Thea, let her know about your specialty requirements – you will not need to sacrifice anything to have your dream cake on your special day!

Guests: 70

Wedding Planner: DreamGroup Productions

Petal Perfect

Bottom tier: black & white with fresh raspberries (chocolate & vanilla)

Middle tier: passionfruit

Top tier: fruitcake