TBO.com - TBO is Tampa Bay Online

Syllables Of The Season

Haiku offerings / Celebrate Harvey fruitcake, / Make a tasty read

ADVERTISEMENT

By JEFF HOUCK | The Tampa Tribune

Published: December 15, 2008

Every year it gets more difficult to choose a winner from the hundreds of poems submitted to the annual Mrs. Harvey's White Fruitcake Haiku Contest. The dilemma: They just keep getting better and better.

To pick our 2008 winner, we looked for an unimpeachable judge: someone with expertise, a person invulnerable to bribery, whose character was solid.

Thank goodness we found Evelyn Sanchez.

The 79-year-old artist from Brandon sells 5-pound and 1 1/4-pound fruitcakes baked using Mrs. Harvey's recipe and gives the proceeds away. This year, she's raising money to help put a new roof on a building at Brandon Church of God. Last year, she sent her profits to an orphanage in Israel that helps children affected by terrorism.

When we stopped by her home this month so she could judge entries from our 10 finalists, we were stunned by what we found. Fruitcakes were stacked everywhere: on dining room tables, countertops, end tables, a china cabinet and even a table with a Grecian bust on it. Her hard work made it appear as if some sort of baked goods population explosion had occurred.

While we were there, Edna Walters of Palm River showed up to pick up six large fruitcakes and five small ones. The order set her back $266.50, but she gladly paid the bill. She plans to give cakes as gifts to her postal carrier and others who make her life easier.

"The meat manager at my grocery store always cuts meat special for me," Walters said. "I'll give one to him to say thank you."

After completing her sale to Walters, Sanchez was kind enough to take a break from baking to participate in our haiku foolishness.

This one from Laurie Griffith of Clearwater met with disapproval:

Sweet, candied fruit chunks
Sometimes a cube, sometimes round
Looks like vomit.

"Oh my," she said. "I think people who don't like fruitcake haven't had good fruitcake."

Walters seconded that notion: "People who don't like fruitcake haven't had Miss Evelyn's fruitcake."

It took a while for Sanchez to pick a winner because there were several amusing creations that caught her eye. In the end, she picked the recipe-like verse sent by Doris Hertz of Apollo Beach. (See below.)

"It sounded like someone who has made fruitcake before," Sanchez said.

Hertz was surprised to hear she had won. A former language arts teacher, Hertz said her inspiration was simple: "It's how you make a fruitcake. It's a lot of work, really."

Sanchez's guess was correct; Hertz, 61, has baked her share of fruitcake over the years. As a Navy wife, she's made and sent many fruitcakes from various ports of call back to friends and loved ones in her hometown of Sarasota. She can't decide why the holiday treats have such a negative image.

"I've tried to figure that out," she said. "I have nothing against fruitcake."

Second-place winner Cindy Lewis says she made Mrs. Harvey's white fruitcake last year for family members and, "They all loved it!"

Lewis said her mom always started making fruitcakes in November, taking care to season each cake with rum.

"Sometimes, the rum didn't make it on the cakes!" Lewis says. "Fruitcake has a very special meaning for all of us in the family."

FIRST PLACE:

Chop, dredge, cream, beat, sift,
Fold, stir, blend, grease, line, pour, cool;
Five pounds of fruitcake.

Doris Hertz, Apollo Beach

SECOND PLACE:

Fruitcake like football?
Some pass it others down it
and both contain nuts.

Cindy Lewis, Plant City

THIRD PLACE

Crash, broken window
Look, there's a note from Santa
"Regifting fruitcake"

Linda Gilleo, Tampa

BEST OF THE REST

This year's crop of holiday haiku was as diverse as ever, with authors finding inspiration from a variety of places and past events.

Miriam Filppula of Avon Park was quite kind when she wrote:

How could we survive,
Harvey's fruitcake recipe
Not in Tampa Trib?

We share your sentiments, Miriam. We're like fruitcake in that we're tough to get rid of.

Cecilia Boyce of Odessa spun a scenario of edible mistaken identity:

We mailed the fruitcake —
or so we thought — to Iraq.
Where's the salmon loaf?

Boyce also tugged at our heart with this forlorn poem:

The cook is long gone,
Like a dream on a summer night;
Her fruitcake remains.

June Hall of Riverview relied on experience with foreign fruitcake objects for inspiration:

Homemade fruitcake, Wow
It's not from a box and can
Biting a shell — Damn!

"I love the ones about the shells because it really happens, and sometimes it's not fruitcake until you bite a shell," Hall writes.

Mary Ellen Ahrens of Lake Alfred stated things plainly:

Lucille wore glasses
But didn't like molasses
In her white fruitcake

Jackie Garvin of Valrico came out of the fruitcake closet, sort of:

I shamelessly say
The vilified cake of fruits
Pleases my palate.

I prefer nutty fruitcake
To fix our country

This inspires a thought: Wouldn't it have been great to see the Big Three automakers snacking on white fruitcake as they begged Congress for money?

Alan Schism of Dover used his word power to blow us away with this ditty:

Amalgamation
or E pluribus unum?
Cake of fruit to me.

Thanks for clearing that up for us, Alan. We have no idea what you're talking about.

Oh, one more thing. Mr. Schism has a message for those who neglect their holiday baked goods:

Don't want your fruitcake?
Email me! Address? Sizzem
@hotmail.com

We couldn't figure out if generosity or something more devious was the inspiration for this one from Nancy M. Hester of Tucker, Ga.:

No fruitcake for me
Granny can eat the whole thing
If her teeth are in

Michael Childs of Trinity noted that one of the nation's largest candied-fruit manufacturers is found locally: the Plant City-based Paradise Inc. His haiku poem borrowed a sports metaphor:

Fruitcake memories:
Using it as a football
Touchdown one and all

Karen Lee of Tampa noted the juxtaposition of verse and holiday treats:

Fruitcake and haiku
What a strange combination.
Here's a slice of both.

When we asked Karen to send us a photo for this story, she e-mailed a snapshot of her standing in front of the Egyptian pyramids. It inspired us to write:

Perhaps pharaohs would
Still be here if pyramids
Were built with fruitcake.

Last, but by no means least, was this poem sent by Frances Lutes of Zephyrhills:

Fruitcake in a pan
Is like good sex with a man.
"Enjoy" while you can.

We're not sure why you put quotes around the word "enjoy," Frances, but in the spirit of the holidays, it's probably best if we let this one go with no comment.

Reporter Jeff Houck can be reached at (813) 259-7324.

Share this:

Loading Comments...

Email Print

ADVERTISEMENT