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A hot summer day

Today has been such a scorcher that all we did is go to church, lie around and sip Coke Lemon Lights. At least it is a bit cooler now (half past six in the evening)and the brain cells can function, albeit feebly. I have managed to create some sort of order in my list of fruitcakes: boiled, white, traditional, unusual are the categories I used. I have made a shopping list for 4 of the recipes I have selected to try and am surprised by the small amount of booze I am so far expected to buy - 4 tablespoons rum or more. This obviously doesnt include the alcohol that will feed the cakes from now till Christmas. I mentioned going to church - coming Saturday we are having an Around Da World Dinner in the church hall and I have offered to help with the cooking. The theme is quite ambitious - we are going to cook South African, Indian, Nigerian and Hawaiian, so I am really curious how it is going to turn out. I know very little about Hawaiian or Nigerian food. We are getting together to start cooking on Friday - I will report about Around Da World next weekend. My shopping list looks like this: 250 g seedless raisins 1 cup seeded raisins ½ cup (65 grams) currants ½ cup (75 grams) sultanas 1 kilo mixed fruit (fruitcake mix - rasins, sultanas, currants and mixed candied peel)) 1 cup chopped figs or dates 1 cup (175 grams) candied and chopped mixed peel 1 lb red candied cherries, chopped 1½ cups whole candied cherries 1 lb candied pineapple, chopped 1 cup chopped candied pineapple 1 cup thinly sliced citron 6 cups pecans, chopped 125 gram crushed peanuts 3 cups coarsely chopped nuts 5 teaspoons ground cinnamon 2½ teaspoon ground cloves 11,25 ml powdered ginger 1 teaspoon nutmeg 4 teaspoons allspice 2 teaspoons apple pie spice mix 3 teaspoons vanilla extract 2 teaspoons almond extract 1 dessertspoon Parisian essence 1 dessertspoon glycerine 1 teaspoon baking soda 1 teaspoon baking powder 1 tablespoon dark plum jam rind & juice 1 orange 1 cup pineapple, apple or orange juice 1 grated Granny Smith apple 4 tablespoons rum or more 500 g butter 1 cup Wesson oil 2,5 kilo cake flour 12 large eggs 2½ teaspoons salt 2 cups granulated sugar 3½ cups brown sugar I have no idea what Wesson oil is, so I will assume that it is ordinary sunflower-type salad oil. Some of the recipes call for self-raising flour, whch I am not very fond of because it often tastes too strongly of baking powder. I will just add 1 teaspoon of baking powder per cup of flour for those recipes. I am surprised by one cake that includes crushed peanuts - I cant imagine what it is going to taste like. Candied citron is almost impossible to get hold of, but maybe I am lucky. What the candied pineapple will cost I shudder to think. Parisian essence is, I think, similar to the caramel syrup my mother used to flavour and colour her cake, so that is what I will be using. I will presently go surfing to find out what a traditional American apple pie spice consists of. I feel a bit gloomy that nobody seems to have visited my blog yet.