A Stained Glass Cake

I was in many choirs as a kid. Church choirs, school choirs, and for a few summers, a performance choir. I liked the church choir best; those girls were the coolest. We ranged in ages and stages, from me, aged ten, all the way to Catherine, aged 17. Catherine looked like Liesl Von Trapp, with shiny brown hair hanging around her shoulders and an alto voice so rich and strong. There were some tall and small, older and younger, sweet voices and some off-key, all working with a common goal - to sing beautifully together. We needed each other, all of us.

Before church we met in the choir room and rifled through the wooden wardrobes for our silky blue gowns. Below the hem of the gowns were my thick tights and flat navy blue shoes, Beth’s sneakers, Paula’s low heels. We filed into the church at the beginning of the service with a certain pomp and ceremony, walking down the aisle like a river of young, singing bridesmaids flowing left and right after we reach the pulpit. The Christmas eve service was particularly special, with poinsettias on pedestals and the lights low in the nave. We were uniform in the choir stalls, our gowns concealing our outfits underneath. During the silent moments we sat quietly, headbands, french braids and short, feathered heads gently bowed. But in the silence were sounds, a riot. Crinkling bulletins, sniffles, coughs, twisting candy wrappers. Wooden beams flanked the vaulted ceiling high above, mimicking the keel of a ship. We are the animals in the ark below. Someone in the choir giggles; we’re getting restless. 

It’s time to sing. 

—

I attended a Christmas concert at St. Paul’s church a few nights ago, with donated funds going to outreach programs in our city. There was a brass quintet and a choir dressed in white-over-red gowns. We sang carols, listened to readings and held lit candles in the dimmed light of the church. And then, just like when I was ten, the service concluded with Hark the Herald Angels Sing. I managed through the verses, my unpracticed voice finding the octave where it wanted to settle. I gulped breaths, not the elegant, tiny sips of my childhood. But then the organ bellowed powerfully for the last verse and the choir exploded, their voices filling every corner and curve of the historic church. My voice flowed into their river, carried by their voices.

The word descant means a voice above or removed from other voices. In a choir setting a descant is the melody sung by one, some or all of the sopranos, above the melody. Some say it’s a festive opportunity for a choir to show off. I think it’s when the choir takes flight. 

I was a soloist, once. Our church choir was singing for a small group gathered in the church lounge one dark December night. The lounge was next to the church kitchen, where tea, coffee and store-bought biscuits were eaten after church on Sundays. 

I liked the view from the lounge into the kitchen, with the long, horizontal window framed by accordion shutters between the two rooms. From the view plane of a ten year old, the window revealed the mid-section of belted church dresses shuffling around, filling coffee urns and washing tea cups. 

That night the room was low-lit and smelled of cinnamon. There was a table set up beneath the kitchen window, topped with a neat row of tea cups, an urn of hot apple cider, and slices of Christmas cake. We - a selection of the children’s choir- stood in front of the small congregation in our white smocks over red choir gowns. I was nervous. Our conductor told the audience we would begin the Old English Folk song I Saw Three Ships Come Sailing In, with Lindsay and Amy as soloists. “Lindsay couldn’t sing a note on tune when she started with us,” he began, “but she’s come a long way.” I wanted to crawl under the table with a slice of Christmas cake. I didn’t like Christmas cake - who possibly could? - but it seemed like the best idea at the time. 

I nailed my solo, mainly because there isn’t a descant in I Saw Three Ships Come Sailing In. I couldn’t lift my voice above the melody, all by myself. But last week in the church, with the strength of the choir swirling around me, my voice took flight. I was at the back of the toboggan, flying down a snowy hill with a brave person at the helm. I was a passenger in a fast car, cruising around the Cabot Trail. I stood next to Liesl Von Trapp. My voice was thin, perhaps not quite in tune, but that’s the beauty of singing with an erupting choir - your voice becomes theirs. 

The next day my mom and I bought ingredients for her new favourite Christmas cake. It’s an orange slice cake, inspired by Brenda Gantt, a southern cook who guides people through her family recipes on Facebook. It’s a big, heavy cake, filled with orange slice gumdrops, dates, pecans and coconut and brushed with an orange syrup to keep it fresh “for a very long time.” Brenda makes this cake for Thanksgiving, but whispers into the camera, “If y’all have some leftover after Thanksgiving, you can use it for Christmas.” 

Brenda’s kitchen, the sound of her voice, the soothing way she walks the viewer through the recipe takes my mom back to our days living in Mississippi when I was little. I watched all 42 minutes and 38 seconds of the video as she made the cake with her daughter, chopped orange slices, laughed in her easy, southern way, took the cake out of the oven in her dressing gown before bed and brushed it with orange sugar syrup, then woke up in the dark, peeled parchment paper from the cake, and brushed it with more syrup. She is the chief soprano, the one you want to stand beside to carry you through.

Brenda Gantt’s Orange Slice Cake 

I am a convert! My mom and Brenda are right - this cake is good y’all! There are a few ingredients below that we can’t find in Canada, like chopped sugared dates and the star of the cake, orange slices. Instead we bought pitted dates, chopped them and tossed the pieces in sugar. For the orange slices, we picked out the orange gum drops from four bags of Real Juice fruit slices. (I have a few pounds of every other flavour left over, if anyone is in need…) 

For the cake:

1 cup / 225g / 8oz salted butter, at room temperature 

2 cups / 400g / 14 oz white sugar

4 eggs

½ cup / 125ml buttermilk

1 teaspoon baking soda

3 ½ cups / 500g  / 1.2 lbs flour 

2 cups / 200g / 7oz shredded coconut 

2 cups / 250g / 8oz / roughly chopped pecans 

1 lb / 2 ½ cups chopped dates, tossed in white sugar

1 lb / 2 ½ cups orange slice candy 

For the glaze:

1 cup / 200g / 7 oz white sugar

Juice of 1 orange

Butter and flour a bundt pan, then line it with parchment paper. (This is tricky, but worth it. I didn’t use parchment and had to steam the cake, tap it and caress it until it finally decided to let go.)

Preheat the oven to 250F* / 120C

Cream the butter and sugar together until very smooth. Add eggs, one at a time, mixing well each time. Stir buttermilk with baking soda, then stir into the butter mixture. 

In a very large, separate bowl, combine flour, shredded coconut, chopped pecans, chopped dates and chopped orange slices. Still well to coat everything in flour. Add the creamed mixture to the flour mixture and stir well with a wooden spoon until flour has been completely incorporated. In Brenda’s words, “it makes a stiff dough.”

Bake cake in the centre of the oven for 2 ½ - 3 hrs, until a knife comes out clean. Leave cake in the pan to cool. While cake is cooling, in a small pan on the stove, combine sugar and just enough orange juice to make a thick syrup and stir well until sugar has dissolved. Using a skewer, spear the top of the cake all over, then drizzle some of the glaze over the top of the cake making sure the glaze travels down the little holes. (Save the remaining glaze for later!) Leave the cake to cool completely in the pan - overnight is fine. Remove pan when cake is cool and heat the remaining glaze until liquid. Brush the sides and bottom of the cake with glaze - this keeps the cake from drying out. 

*I preheated the oven to 275F instead of 250F, by mistake. The cake turned out fine, but it’s a little darker than my mom’s. I love a forgiving cake.