The fruitcake has always offended me. Those strange, chewy, brightly colored bits inside that dry brick of so-called cake. I like fruit. I like cake. People shouldn't do such things to things I like.

That said, fruit desserts are frequently a disappointment in my thinking. In the sacred hierarchy of the course eaten last, I'm a custard/panna cotta/flan fan first, a chocolate fan second and somewhere down the line, close to last, I am a fruit dessert fan. I feel fairly certain I could go the rest of my life without eating another piece of apple pie and be quite content.

But I've been messing around with that orange cake recipe I found in Saveur, which I thought might make a good cake base for pineapple upside down cake. I had a mango that I thought I'd try as a cake topping instead of pineapple, but the mango I poked at for days went from hard and unripe to rotten in the space of what must have been one golden hour, so I missed my shot. Instead I segmented an orange and added some currants and golden raisins to a bit of melted butter and brown sugar in the bottom of the pan. I should have used more oranges, but I was timid because I feared they might burn or stick or something. But they worked out really nicely. And I think I've got a nice fruit dessert recipe that I'll keep.

Orange cake, with currants, golden raisins and orange segments.

I also tried to make kimchi again. I didn't have an Asian pear, so I added a couple sliced red bell peppers for a bit of sweetness and crunch. Otherwise, I followed this recipe to a T.

I tasted it today and the cabbage hadn't softened quite enough to meet my liking, so I added a bit more rice wine vinegar. I suspect that the "quick" style recipe means there's not going to be as much fermentation as I'd like. We'll see.