Photo: Doaa Elkady • Food Styling: Jason Schreiber • Prop Styling: Paige Hicks. Photo: Doaa Elkady • Food Styling: Jason Schreiber • Prop Styling: Paige Hicks
For Franco Palestinian chef and Bethlehem: A Celebration of Palestinian Food author Fadi Kattan, Christmas isn’t Christmas without his grandmother’s fruitcake. “This cake symbolizes Christmas for all of us in the family, as Teta Julia would share the love and fill up all our refrigerators with loaves of it,” he writes. “After her passing, it was a while before I had the courage to revive the ritual. Now, not a Christmas passes by without my baking her famous cake.”
The cake is based on an old Betty Crocker recipe that Teta Julia adapted to showcase locally sourced Palestinian ingredients, including dibs, a thick, earthy grape molasses; and a whopping five different kinds of dried fruits: dates, raisins, apricots, cherries, and figs. Also studded with buttery walnuts and heavily spiced, each dense, darkly sweet loaf is worth its weight in gold. While Kattan recommends storing the cake in the fridge for a week before serving or gifting, it can also be enjoyed the same day it’s baked—even he admits to devouring the first loaf as soon as it’s cool enough to handle.
Adapted with permission from Bethlehem: A Celebration of Palestinian Food by Fadi Kattan. Published by Hardie Grant Publishing, May 2024.
Featured in “Remembering Teta Julia and Her Recipe for Christmas Cake.”
Yield: Two 9-inch loaves Cook Time: 2
