TV Cook Nigella Lawson Begs People to Skip Christmas Cake and Go for an ‘Appealing’ Alternative Instead

The holidays are upon us and this calls for trays teeming with delicious sweet cakes topped with colorful nuts and dried fruits. Millions of Americans are blissfully immersed in mixing batters for Christmas cakes, baking butter cookies and gingerbread biscuits, decorating their homes with glittery ornaments, and mounting wreaths. In many of these houses, there’s a shelf in the kitchen where a plastic-wrapped fruitcake is sitting somberly. While other cakes are destined for the dinner plates and make people happy, the much-loathed fruitcake often gets tossed in the bin or becomes a scapegoat in those odd fruitcake-toss events. Johnny Carson famously said, "There is only one fruitcake in the entire world and people keep passing it around."

For all the reasons why people hate these fruitcakes, television cook Nigella Lawson suggested her fans forego the traditional cake and opt for a new, more palatable recipe, The Sunday Times reported. Just before 2023’s Christmas, Lawson revealed that she would not be serving Christmas cake this festive season “because I’m surrounded by those who abominate dried fruit in all its seasonal manifestations, in favor of an altogether more fan-friendly desert.” Instead, she said she would go for a crowd-pleaser chocolate cake for her family and friends. 

“Much as I love a slice of dense, damp Christmas cake, especially when eaten with a slice of strong, sharp cheese, I am surrounded by those who abominate dried fruit in all its seasonal manifestations,” said the celebrity chef. The host of Nigella's Kitchen confessed that there’s no benefit in celebrating the festival with a dessert that no one likes to eat. “If no one in your family likes dried fruit, there’s no point having a Christmas cake gathering dust or just being eaten on sufferance. If chocolate cake appeals more, go for it.” She said.

It is unclear why Americans hate fruitcake but a 2022 survey by the Delicious Dessert Company found that under-35s considered fruit cake the “most boring” type of cake, with a third of people in that age group considering it in need of a makeover, per The Guardian. But it was her children’s distaste of this cake that inspired Lawson to change the tradition. “It was made clear to me long ago that, in the interest of harmony in the home, I needed to introduce a new tradition that made us all happy, and this [chocolate] cake is it,” she said. “Tradition is a glorious thing at this time of year, but I’m all for embracing new Christmas rituals of our own,” the celebrity added.

While she displayed an opposition to the traditional Christmas cake, Lawson said she wouldn’t skip the cake altogether. She would whip up a pudding or a trifle. In an interview with BBC Good Food, she also shared her love for fudgy and sumptuously dark Christmas cake filled with dates and treacly with marmalade. Other festive desserts she likes to serve her loved ones include candied chestnuts, sparkling white wine, peppermint bark chocolates, and jeweled pomegranate puddings. Lawson has also displayed her fondness for edible decorations, the most recent being an edible Christmas tree!