 Fruitcake
is the butt of so many mean-spirited jokes this time of year but
I am not ashamed to admit to you that I for one, am absolutely in
love with fruitcake. Aside from that unique flavor of glacéed
fruit and crunchy nuts, fruitcake holds a special place in my heart
for more personal reasons. And, as you shall learn, fruitcake has
been a part of American history -- on a train, in a family and in
a war.
Fruitcake was one of the most popular cakes served on an American
icon -- the Streamliner Passenger Train.
Memorable trains like the Sunset Limited, Sante Fe Chief and
California Zephyr are just a few of the elegant, chrome trains
with the sleek lines that traversed the country during the late
1930s and up to the late 1960s, carrying passengers home for the
holidays in class and style along with good food. To my still
brooding disappointment, in 1970 Amtrak took over all passenger
rail service in America. Alas, luxury rail travel is now just
a memory, relegated to the history books and railroad memorabilia
sales on E-Bay.
The Great Northern Railway was created in September 1889 from
several railroads in Minnesota. The line grew to the point where
tracks spread from Lake Superior at Duluth, Minnesota, then pointed
West through North Dakota, Montana and Northern Idaho, eventually
reaching the Emerald City of Seattle.
One of the greatest legacies of the Great Northern Railway was
the delicious, regional cuisine prepared onboard the dining car.
 Mr.
Hazen J. Titus, Superintendant of Dining Cars for Northern Pacific,
realized that innovation in the kitchen would lead to greater
numbers of passengers buying tickets on the “North Coast Limited”
or the “Empire Builder” just so they could eat one of those famous
“Great Big Baked Potatoes” or a fine filet of “Lake Superior Trout
Almandine.” Mr. Titus also realized the need for fresh dairy products
and in 1909, he built the company dairy farm just east of Seattle
in Kent, Washington so that the trains had an endless supply of
farmhouse eggs, cream, milk and cheese.
One of Mr. Titus’s most famous menu creations also debuted in
1909, the “Great Northern Fruitcake.”
Titus hired Master European Baker Frederick Kaul specifically
for the task of baking the fruitcake that had won a gold medal
at the London Catering Exposition of 1889 and the “Grand Prix
Classe” medal at the 1889 World’s Fair in Paris. The bakery ovens
in St. Paul could handle 18 five-pound fruitcakes at a time.
Ladies entering the dining car in December were welcomed with
a holly corsage and slice of this award-winning fruitcake. In
fact, the Great Northern Fruitcake proved to be such a popular
Christmas treat that the company packed it into decorative Holiday
tins and sold it to passengers on the train. In 1949 alone the
company sold over 7 ½ tons of fruitcake.
Imagine reclining in an overstuffed wing chair in the “parlor
car,” the snow-capped Bitterroot Mountains of Montana towering
above as you savor a fine wedge of fruitcake and a nip of brandy
with your afternoon tea.
In 1960 airplane travel was still off limits to most middle-class
families. Back then, whether by air, train or ship, people traveled
in style. Men wore suits and ties; woman always had on their best
Sunday hat and long gloves. Now mind you, this was forty years
before you would even hear the dreaded words “terminal security
administration,” and “airline hub and spoke system.” Our family
made many trips onboard the Streamliners of the Union Pacific
to Grandfather Ralph Pink’s home in Twin Falls, Idaho.
 My
mother and father would save the entire year for this fantastic
adventure. For just a few more dollars than a ticket in “air-conditioned
coach comfort,” we could ride in the ultimate streamliner accommodations:
the Pullman compartment. The compartment really wasn’t any bigger
than a pillbox and the “washroom facilities,” were at the end
of the car, but we had our own little private room with a big
picture window to gaze out at the rolling river as the train sped
up through the winding Columbia River Gorge before breaking out
onto the high dessert plains of Eastern Oregon.
Service on the train was always impeccable, from the conductors
to the valets, attendants, bartenders, dining room managers. And
the standard by which all customer service was and is forever
measured were the waiters in the dining car.
These men should all find a place of honor in the Customer Service
Hall of Fame. Do you have a favorite steakhouse, a favorite waiter
who has served three generations of your family, always remembering
you prefer your old-fashioned cocktail with two lumps of sugar
and three drops of bitters? That is what the service was like
onboard the streamliner. Every effort was made to make you feel
special, and you did.
Children were
not treated as a nuisance on the train. We were welcomed into the
dining car like we were kings and queens, escorted to a beautifully
appointed table dressed with china, crystal and silver. In recognition
of Portland being the “City of Roses,” a lone, fresh red rose was
placed in a sterling silver vase. I still can taste the breakfast
on the train -- French toast with whipped butter, dusted with powdered
sugar, a small sprig of parsley and a fresh orange wedge on the
side. To drink, a steaming mug of hot chocolate.
While I never had
the pleasure of tasting the Great Northern Fruitcake, I did have
a treat waiting for me in Twin Falls when I debarked the Union
Pacific Streamliner “City of Portland,” at Shoshone, Idaho --
Aunt Bertie’s fruitcake.
Bertie was a “dowager,”
an unpleasant moniker of the past bestowed upon aging women who
never married. I could have cared less about Bertie’s marital
status. She was a great cook, one of many on both sides of my
family who have influenced my tastes and passion for food and
cooking.
 In
Aunt Bertie’s world, fruitcake was not only a sweet to adorn the
Christmas cookie plate but an offering to family and friends for
the good blessings that came from living a simple life.
She had emigrated
from Russia around 1890, landing in Twin Falls, Idaho. At that
time, vast flocks of sheep literally roamed the entire Southern
half of the state. Her Father, Max Pink, opened a small company
that bought and sold sheep pelts, the wool going to mills and
the hides to tanneries for producing supple leather. My Grandfather
Ralph, Bertie’s Brother, took over the company and ran it until
he died at the age of 85 in 1978.
Through the hardships
of immigrating to a new country, living through the Great War,
the Depression and a Second World War, Bertie learned the value
of frugality.
When it comes to cooking,
frugality does not mean sacrificing taste. It means appreciating
what one has available, coaxing every single drop of flavor from
the most meager of ingredients.
Bertie did not have
the luxury of going to a market for bitter melons flown in fresh
from Taipei. Fresh fruit was only available when it was ripe on
the tree or the vine. Any fruit that was not eaten fresh or packed
into jams and jellies was dried and preserved for the family’s
fruitcake.
But fruit wasn’t really the secret ingredient in Bertie’s fruitcake.
The secret ingredient was in fact booze, and lots of it.
In 1936, no woman
would be caught dead buying a bottle of hooch for fear that she
would be branded a “tottie” and become the target of the town’s
wagging tongues. Bertie would send my Grandfather downtown to
buy rum, bourbon and brandy. Bottles and bottles.
Once the fruitcake
was baked, Bertie wrapped it in layers of cheesecloth and tied
the bundles with cotton string. She placed the fruitcake on a
sheet of oil cloth and then doused it with gurgles of spirits.
I should imagine that each small fruitcake packed a full fifth
of liquor.
I would come to learn
from my father about another one of my family’s fruitcake secrets.
The best fruitcake, fruitcake that is moist, tender, each flavor
of each fruit distinctive, sweet yet tart, is a fruitcake that
doesn’t come out of the oven one week before Christmas. No, the
most memorable fruitcakes are aged, often for longer than you
would ever imagine.
Every December my
father revisits the tale of two horrific months spent in the bowels
of Western Europe during World War II. Just a farmboy who had
turned 19 that October, father found himself shivering in the
midst of a frozen battlefield in December of 1944. The fight came
to be known as the Battle of the Bulge, one of the fiercest battles
waged by the allied armies.
The soldiers had little
more than cigarettes and stale biscuits with which to celebrate
Christmas, but my father tells of one special gift that arrived
from his Aunt Pearl -- a fruitcake.
This particular fruitcake
had been patiently waiting on a shelf in Aunt Pearl’s pantry since
1939. Five years. Five years waiting to find a soul to nourish.
And this particular fruitcake started its journey to Europe at
a depot in Central Oregon -- onboard a train.
And so you see, this
is not merely a lesson about rail transportation, a Holiday cake
or the affairs of the world in 1944. It is, quite simply, a Christmas
story. It is the story of a train that took a little fruitcake
to a boy fighting a war in a foreign land. A fruitcake from home.
A fruitcake that blurred the horrific images of war and gave peace,
comfort and good will.
Great Northern
Fruitcake
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