Cream Cheese Fruitcake

This recipe is from the Diamonds for Dessert blog. The author says "It is a family recipe handed down to me by my mom." I have yet to try it but it looks so delicious!

• Ready In: 1 hr 10 mins
• Yields: 1 loaf

Ingredients

• 8  ounces cream cheese
• 4  eggs, room temperature
• 2  cups flour
• 2  teaspoons baking powder
• 1  cup butter, room temperature
• 1  teaspoon vanilla extract
• 3⁄4-1  cup sugar
• 1  teaspoon salt
• 3  cups  mixed nuts and dried fruit
• 1⁄2 cup flour, to coat dried fruit

Directions

1. To make the fruit & nut mix, chop up an assortment of dried fruits and nuts of your choice. Typically, my mom uses raisins, pineapple, papaya, green & red glacé cherries, and pecans. Smaller dried fruits like raisins don't need to be cut, but dice up the other fruits and the nuts. Now measure out 3 cups worth of the mixture and mix it up with the remaining 1/2 cup of flour (this is done so that the fruits and nuts won't all sink to the bottom of your cake when baking).
2. Preheat the oven to 325°F
3. Cream the butter and sugar together. Mix in the cream cheese.
4. Add the eggs in one at a time, mixing after each addition. Add the vanilla extract.
5. In another bowl, mix the dry ingredients: 2 cups flour, the baking powder, and the salt.
6. Fold the dry ingredients into the wet ingredients; the batter will be quite thick.
7. When barely any streaks remain, mix in the flour-covered fruit & nut mix. Only on few strokes of your spatula are needed; do not overmix.
8. Spray a loaf pan (9x5 in) with nonstick spray and line the bottom of the pan with a rectangle of parchment paper.
9. Scrape your batter into the loaf pan, smoothing the top.
10. Place in the oven and let bake for 60-70 minutes, or until a tester comes out clean.
11. If near the end of baking, the inside of the cake is still wet but the top is browning too quickly, cover the top with a sheet of foil.
12. Let your cake cool in the pan for 10 minutes, then remove to a wire rack to finish cooking.