What a revelation today's recipe is for Wartime Eggless Fruit Cake (Vinegar Cake). With no lingering taste of the vinegar that's added, it's light and fruity, with a soft crumbly texture. However, "Vinegar cakes" weren't just popular during the wartime era - using vinegar in cake making was countrywide practice when the hens “were off lay”. So, although those thrifty and heavily rationed housewives knew a thing or two, so did farmer’s wives and country folk who kept hens - my own paternal grandmother included. She came from Swaffham in Norfolk, and the other name for this Wartime Eggless Fruit Cake (Vinegar Cake) is Norfolk Vinegar Cake, as it was very popular in this English county. Nofolk is a very rural county, and my grandmother's family owned a smallholding, where they reared and kept rabbits, goats, chickens, geese and ducks. But, back to today's recipe for Wartime Eggless Fruit Cake (Vinegar Cake) - I found a recipe for Vinegar Cake in Marguerite Patten's book, "Feeding the Nation". I initially made that recipe, but it was very crumbly, and broke up when I turned it out of the cake tin! It tasted WONDERFUL though, and we had it with custard as a pudding. I looked through all my old and vintage cookbooks and found numerous recipes for eggless cakes, all using vinegar and bicarbonate of soda as a raising agent. Finally I discovered a Norfolk WI recipe for Norfolk Vinegar Cake, which I made, and which turned out beautifully, as you can see from the photos. It IS still a very crumbly cake, and it breaks up easily on cutting, but at least I was able to turn it out of the cake tin! And, it tastes wonderful. This is a fabulous recipe for those who may have an intolerance to eggs, or whose hens have gone "off lay" and are on strike! You cannot taste the vinegar at all, and when vinegar reacts with baking soda, it creates carbon dioxide bubbles, which act as a leavening agent, giving cakes a light and airy rise. Do try this lovely old recipe, it makes a lovely fruit cake that improves with keeping, espeically if made with butter and not margarine. Do let me know if you make it, Karen