It's going to be lemon elderflower

March 20, 2018 7:23 AM

Continuing to break protocol and tradition, the big news of the week (official press release, tweet) is that the Royal wedding (Rachel Meghan Markle, Henry Charles Albert David Mountbatten-Windsor) cake will not be fruitcake. It will be lemon elderflower, to symbolise Spring (appropriate), made with organic flour and designed by California-raised pastry chef Claire Ptak (Easter, Christmas), who runs Violet Cakes, and baked by her team. Claire specialises in "American style cakes". Quashing rumours it was to be banana cake, the cake will be covered in buttercream and adorned with flowers. Meghan, from Yorkshire via California, previously interviewed Claire for The Tig. Royal Fondling. Recipes from Cygnet Kitchen, Belvoir Fruit Farms, Hannah Bakes.
posted by Wordshore (46 comments total)

Whoa. That banana cake thing is I think just a racist "joke". Not sure it deserves to be memorialized on the blue.
posted by hollyholly at 7:42 AM on March 20, 2018 [5 favorites]

apparently they literally wanted a banana cake, because Harry likes banana desserts and because it represented some cryptic insta whimsy from early in their relationship?

which is not to say that there hasn't been seriously racist bullshit thrown at markle, and part of me wonders if they ultimately went with lemon elderflower to avoid fueling that ugliness :/ (unless the anon-source tipster was being a massive ass, of course, idk)
posted by halation at 7:50 AM on March 20, 2018 [4 favorites]

I'm an American prone to Anglophilia, but learning that you traditionally serve fruitcake at weddings might have put that to rest forever.
posted by Bulgaroktonos at 7:50 AM on March 20, 2018 [11 favorites]

Whoa. That banana cake thing is I think just a racist "joke". Not sure it deserves to be memorialized on the blue.

Completely wrong. Maybe do a tiny bit of research before frantically typing out the worst possible assumption?

Telegraph:

"Former royal chef, Darren McGrady, has spoken about how when growing up, the young princes loved anything banana flavoured, from flan, ice cream and pudding, to a more elaborate caramel and banana cake. And in the early days of their courtship last autumn, Meghan instagrammed a picture of two bananas spooning, with the massage, “Sleep tight, xx”. Those who read Meghan’s Instagram posts for clues, as though ancient runes, ponder as to whether a shared love of bananas might be one of the things that brought them together."

AndNowUKNow (contains Meghan's banana Instagram):

"And this isn’t the couple’s first time capturing news headlines because of fresh produce. Thirteen months ago, Markle posted a picture on Instagram of two bananas spooning with the caption ‘sleep tight xx,’ which many interpreted as the actress confirming her relationship with Prince Harry."
posted by Wordshore at 7:52 AM on March 20, 2018 [8 favorites]

Oh! I happily stand corrected. Something about the tone of that last-sentence remark just put me on edge. Sorry everyone, sometimes the world doesn't suck.
posted by hollyholly at 7:53 AM on March 20, 2018 [4 favorites]

Wait, fruitcake? Like the heavy pound cake with weird bits of fruit in it? Is this one of those British words that means something completely different than it does in America?
posted by Cash4Lead at 7:58 AM on March 20, 2018 [2 favorites]

Wait, fruitcake? Like the heavy pound cake with weird bits of fruit in it?
yep!

Is this one of those British words that means something completely different than it does in America
nope!

you can even make your own!
posted by halation at 8:02 AM on March 20, 2018 [3 favorites]

Lemon elderflower sounds delightful. Not the royal family solicited my opinion.
posted by praemunire at 8:04 AM on March 20, 2018 [3 favorites]

How would banana cake be construed as racist in the first place? Is this a britishism that I'm unaware of?
posted by Grither at 8:06 AM on March 20, 2018

How would banana cake be construed as racist in the first place? Is this a britishism that I'm unaware of?

Actually more of a mainland European way to insult Africans. Glad to hear it's not the case here.
posted by ocschwar at 8:07 AM on March 20, 2018 [2 favorites]

This looks like a pretty good lemon elderflower cake recipe.
posted by jedicus at 8:12 AM on March 20, 2018 [3 favorites]

How would banana cake be construed as racist in the first place? Is this a britishism that I'm unaware of?

It was pretty common, back in the day, to throw bananas onto the pitch when the first black football players were signed
posted by fearfulsymmetry at 8:13 AM on March 20, 2018 [2 favorites]

I love elderflower anything and I approve of this choice!
posted by Sophie1 at 8:15 AM on March 20, 2018 [3 favorites]

What makes a cake American-style vs. British or any other style?
posted by Autumnheart at 8:15 AM on March 20, 2018 [3 favorites]

Not to abuse the edit window, but after just googling it myself, apparently an American style cake is one that isn’t sponge and uses buttercream and/or some other light fluffy icing vs. fondant. Or, as we call it here in America, “cake”. *laugh*
posted by Autumnheart at 8:18 AM on March 20, 2018 [4 favorites]

I assumed Royal Fondling was some sort of cake decoration, like an unholy mixture of fondant and Royal Icing.
posted by Rock Steady at 8:21 AM on March 20, 2018 [3 favorites]

@Autumnheart - American vs. European. More here from the British perspective. There are differences; Americans tend to think of cake as layers with filling and frosting. This is not the case in other places, and the textures and ingredients are often very different, along with the techniques.
posted by OneSmartMonkey at 8:29 AM on March 20, 2018 [2 favorites]

Wait, fruitcake? Like the heavy pound cake with weird bits of fruit in it?
Yes and it's dry af. And then they cover it with fondant about half an inch thick. It just doesn't taste very good and the fondant leaves potential for really questionable wedding cake design choices*.

Which is why for our UK wedding I went with a tower of strawberry tarts and a strawberry shortcake for the cake cutting ceremony.

*like that one wedding cake I saw where they made likenesses of the bride and groom with one of them sprawled drunk on a bed. I don't even...
posted by like_neon at 8:32 AM on March 20, 2018 [3 favorites]

Well, American cake doesn’t have to be in layers (sheet cake is a thing) but I see the differences. Further googling also found some recipe sites that include things like cheesecake, pound cake, brownies, etc.

I feel like we’ve finally arrived as a culture now that we’re known for doing something well that people actually want.
posted by Autumnheart at 8:43 AM on March 20, 2018 [1 favorite]

There are differences; Americans tend to think of cake as layers with filling and frosting. This is not the case in other places, and the textures and ingredients are often very different, along with the techniques.

.....? I would call such a thing ("layers with filling and frosting") as a layer cake specifically, rather than saying anything not in layers is not a cake. And the "American Vs. European" links simply delve down into different varieties of cake.

I grant that there are those who can get really weird about the Linnean classification of desserts, but this is sounding to me like someone saying "Americans think dachshunds are the only kinds of dogs there are" and I'm all, "but....no, we know there are other breeds."
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 8:45 AM on March 20, 2018 [6 favorites]

Of course, the British tradition of Royal Wedding Fruitcakes may have been a recognition of the history of members of the Royal Family being "nutty as a fruitcake", but I never liked that cliche because the worst fruitcakes I've encountered were not nut-dominant. Of course it could also be a reference to the probably-mostly-American tradition of not eating holiday fruitcakes but rather re-gifting them year-after-year, in a too-appropriate comparison to British Royalty.
posted by oneswellfoop at 8:50 AM on March 20, 2018 [1 favorite]

Yeah, I'm definitely more confused than ever about US vs UK (vs European?) cake styles.

Whatever, I hope they enjoy their cake.
posted by Chrysostom at 9:11 AM on March 20, 2018 [1 favorite]

I’d commented before googling further (because it became clear after a few more searches that it wasn’t just layer cakes), but the main differences seem to be the use of flour and fats (butter, oil) in the proportions typically found in an American cake vs. any other kind of cake. I’m tickled by the idea that there actually is such a thing as “American-style cake” as a culinary positive.
posted by Autumnheart at 9:17 AM on March 20, 2018 [1 favorite]

If they were going for American food design, they could've used Janice Poon...
posted by rmd1023 at 9:35 AM on March 20, 2018 [3 favorites]

I am an American. Four years ago I married a guy who is a naturalized American, but came here from England as an adult. People notice the accent, but one of the other English things about him is that he has a taste for English desserts.

So for our wedding we had to have both kinds of wedding cake. The fruitcake, well, American wedding guests found it baffling. Especially kids - they were keen to try it, but a lot of pieces with just one bite out of them, went out in the trash.

But there's another important thing about fruitcake. It keeps, so it can be mailed. And it's one of the etiquette things, to mail pieces of fruitcake to family members over there who could not attend.
posted by elizilla at 9:37 AM on March 20, 2018 [13 favorites]

Fruitcake is a traditional wedding cake because it's one of the few cakes strong enough to hold up multiple tiers by itself without getting crushed. And English people just like (maybe liked) fruitcake. It's not so bad.
posted by GuyZero at 9:41 AM on March 20, 2018 [2 favorites]

TBF, the English generally mean a baked cake frosted with butter cream or royal icing rather than cardboard supports covered in fondant.
posted by bonehead at 10:04 AM on March 20, 2018 [5 favorites]

My parents, new Canadians getting married in Edmonton in the 80s, got a fruitcake wedding cake from Woodwards thinking "fruit + cake" = something like an HK-style fresh fruit and cream cake (雜果蛋糕)... The subsequent dismay during the wedding reception is the stuff of family legend.
posted by btfreek at 10:24 AM on March 20, 2018 [21 favorites]

Wedding or no wedding, that fresh fruit and cream cake looks pretty tasty, btfreek. No wonder your parents were disappointed or upset.
posted by Bella Donna at 12:51 PM on March 20, 2018 [4 favorites]

Fruitcake is traditional in Trinidad, too. I learned that the hard way, going to weddings as a child, hanging on, emotionally, just for the cake. I kept forgetting what to expect until the very moment of being served that somehow already stale cube of fondant and what felt indistinguishable from intentional hostility. Despite being married to an Englishman, I never knew we got it from England until this thread, but after slavery I can't say I'm surprised.
posted by two or three cars parked under the stars at 1:47 PM on March 20, 2018 [3 favorites]

I don't get the fruitcake hate.

I mean, I'll order chocolate cake over fruitcake a restaurant, but a decent fruitcake is pretty tasty.
posted by GuyZero at 1:55 PM on March 20, 2018 [7 favorites]

Wow, though, that link to the comedy Queen twitter has some racist ass replies.
posted by FritoKAL at 2:07 PM on March 20, 2018

Spectacular fruitcake is pretty good by normal cake standards, but bad fruitcake is so much worse than other bad cake - dry, mushy, harshly alcoholic, covered in plasticky fondant and full of bizarre, undercooked preserves. And a lot of wedding fruitcake is really bad. I feel like the idea of making wedding cakes actually nice to eat rather than fancy-looking and apocalypse-ready is pretty recent, and doesn't especially seem to have caught on among bakers of traditional wedding fondant fruitcakes.
posted by two or three cars parked under the stars at 2:32 PM on March 20, 2018 [2 favorites]

I just want to say that my father-in-law makes a fantastic fruitcake, but due to American prejudices, he has to call it "icebox cake." This will not stand, people! Let the cakes be as out and fruity and as rum soaked as they want! #leavenocakeinthecloset
posted by 1f2frfbf at 2:43 PM on March 20, 2018 [3 favorites]

due to American prejudices, he has to call it "icebox cake."

but icebox cake is a totally different cake genotype! this could lead to high mischief nearly on the order of that which befell poor btfreek's parents!

i mean, i'd eat either, but if i bit into one expecting the other i'd be severely discomfited
posted by halation at 2:49 PM on March 20, 2018 [6 favorites]

When I got married a few years ago, our bakery offered a wedding-cake-only banana flavor. I kind of just assumed banana was some sort of Wedding Thing, either from a tradition I was unfamiliar with, or some new trend I was unaware of yet. We ordered it, and it was delicious. Elderflower also sounds wonderful, but so does fruitcake. I guess my vote, if anyone's taking count, is for all the cakes.
posted by Tentacle of Trust at 7:23 PM on March 20, 2018

you traditionally serve fruitcake at weddings

Guests used to be given souvenir slices in little specially-made waxed paper sleeves. Proper wedding cake lasts a very long time indeed; I wouldn't be surprised if those slices are still edible today.

Also, royal icing (basically egg white and icing sugar IIRC) is amazing. Not to eat, obviously, but just the way common foodstuffs can be turned into something so structurally stable. It's literally rock hard. I mean, I have no idea how you go about cutting a traditional wedding cake covered with royal icing. Maybe you could etch it with a Dremel? Anyway, I understand that that's the way people made those tower cakes without resorting to support from cardboard. Royal icing, the culinary equivalent of concrete.
posted by Joe in Australia at 8:40 PM on March 20, 2018 [3 favorites]

Yes! I saw an episode of the Great British Bake Off in which they interviewed a guy who displayed his extant souvenir slice of Queen Victoria and Prince Albert's (fruitcake) wedding cake, wrapped in a bit of paper and kept in a small tin. It was from this cake that the British "fruit cake as wedding cake" tradition arose:

The confectioner in the Royal Establishment at Buckingham Palace created the Royal Wedding Cake for the marriage of Queen Victoria and Prince Albert in 1840. It was described as “consisting of the most exquisite compounds of all the rich things with which the most expensive cakes can be composed, mingled and mixed together into delightful harmony by the most elaborate science of the confectioner.” The royal cake weighed nearly 300 pounds and was three yards in circumference. The masterpiece was about fourteen inches in depth or thickness. The wedding cake was showcased upon an elegant “superstructure” and cost more than £100.

posted by taz at 9:25 PM on March 20, 2018 [4 favorites]

Wait, that means...that episode of Seinfeld was a lie!!!
posted by praemunire at 10:29 PM on March 20, 2018

Wait, fruitcake? Like the heavy pound cake with weird bits of fruit in it?
Yes and it's dry af. And then they cover it with fondant about half an inch thick. It just doesn't taste very good and the fondant leaves potential for really questionable wedding cake design choices*.

No, that's BAD fruitcake. Good fruitcake is much moister than American-style cake. I don't like.most cakes because they are dry; I love fruitcake. ( if the fruit has been soaking in alcohol for several years, that not a problem)

And the important bit isn't the icing - which should be royal icing or very thin fondant - but the delicious, delicious almond paste (aka marzipan).

Fruitcake is the only proper cake for a wedding. Otherwise, how can you save a piece for your first anniversary? (we had a whole layer, yum!)
posted by jb at 5:31 AM on March 21, 2018 [5 favorites]

If you're starting your fruitcake batter with a pound cake recipe, then you're doing it wrong.
posted by jb at 5:32 AM on March 21, 2018 [4 favorites]

I once had a 15 year old piece of fruit cake. It did not keep well. (I believe the words of "it's like death in my mouth!" may have been uttered). They turn to dust.

As for cutting them: at my wedding, we learned the hard way that the royal icing needs to be pre-cut. You can get through, but not with a fancy knife while looking elegant for the camera.
posted by jb at 5:37 AM on March 21, 2018

We are from the same small, tight-knit cluster of West Marin towns in California that Ms. Ptak is from; in fact, her father used to teach drama at the same school where I worked. Believe me, this is hugely exciting for all of us. Yay Claire! I bet that cake is going to be over-the-top yummy!
posted by Lynsey at 1:02 PM on March 21, 2018

Katy Carr has fruit cake for her wedding cake, though, so Americans must have known about it at some point. She uses Aunt Izzy's recipe and sends pieces to all the poor people in Burnet.
posted by paduasoy at 3:21 PM on March 21, 2018 [1 favorite]

Katy Carr has fruit cake for her wedding cake, though, so Americans must have known about it at some point.

I read a lot of "old" books as a kid (and old encyclopedias, and old etiquette manuals), and I had no idea who Katy Carr or Aunt Izzy were, or where Burnet was. (Apparently they're from an 1872 book.) I don't think that would affect whether most Americans these days are familiar with the idea of fruitcake as a wedding cake.

One of the regrets of my life is that I never got the fruitcake recipe used by a dear friend of the family, who has since shuffled off this mortal coil. Forget the jokes about "one eternal fruitcake that gets endlessly traded around"; the friends who were lucky enough to get one of Dorothy's fruitcakes prized them. I'd cut 1/8" slices to make it last longer and only offered it to my closest friends. (If somebody demurred due to fruitcake prejudice, I didn't try to talk them into it. More for me.)
posted by Lexica at 3:43 PM on March 21, 2018 [1 favorite]

Yes, classic British fruitcake is nothing like the American idea of a regular-ish cake containing scattered pieces of fruit. The British form is basically a baked loaf of partially-reconstituted dried fruit held together by a spiced batter and covered with marzipan, which in turn is covered by icing (often fondant, but historically royal icing).

Dried fruit remain edible for an awfully long time because of all the fructose and acid in them. I don't know how long it takes them to dry out when they're in the form of a loaf and covered by a shell of icing. Decades, I expect, maybe longer. I presume that fruit cakes were originally a way of storing summer's bounty through long winters and the hungry spring, but they were certainly sent across the world, even in an era when the journey took months.
posted by Joe in Australia at 5:58 PM on March 21, 2018 [2 favorites]