Chocolate cake

The Wacky Life

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Normally, Gentle Reader, I try to mix up the recipes I give you.

While I could live (for a short time) on a diet consisting solely of birthday cake and potato salad, most humans aren’t quite as highly evolved as myself.  So, if I give you a roast beef one week, I wouldn’t give you roast pork the following week.

The same runs true for dessert.  Usually, I’d never give them to you two weeks in a row, never mind three.

But, I think we can all agree that these times are anything but normal.

So, for the third week in a row, I’ve got dessert for you.  Sometimes you just need either chocolate or massive quantities of alcohol.  And, since they both have lots of calories, I had to make a decision.  And, while every once in a while I enjoy a spiritous beverage or two, I am firmly team chocolate.

Oh my…

This week it’s chocolate cake—my mom’s wacky cake.

Continuing the cooking from the larder of the last two weeks, this cake can probably be made with ingredients on hand.  It was a treat developed during the Great Depression when money was tight and continued through WWII when ingredients were literally rationed.

There are no eggs, no butter, and it’s mixed, baked, and served in the same pan.

Traditionally, the cake doesn’t call for frosting—sometimes a sprinkling of powdered sugar.  But, there isn’t a cake on the planet that can’t be made better by a healthy addition of frosting. 

My mom would have this cake waiting for us when we got home from school, as a surprise.

I guess you could have it waiting for your family when they come in from the other room.  Or you could use it as a bribe/reward.

Do you happen to need the garage cleaned out?  Or the car washed, or weeds pulled?

Just saying…

Take care and stay safe.

Thanks for your time.

Contact debbie at d@bullcity.mom.

Wacky Cake

1 ½ cups flour

1 cup sugar

3 tablespoons unsweetened cocoa (I like Hershey’s special dark, but use whatever you have on hand)

1 teaspoon baking soda

1 teaspoon salt

1 tablespoon vinegar (any type)

¼ cup + 2 tablespoons vegetable oil

1 teaspoon vanilla

1 cup cold water-You can replace some or all of the water with cold coffee, espresso, cola or root beer.

Preheat oven to 350°.  Grease and flour 8 or 9 inch round cake pan.  Put dry ingredients in cake pan.  make a well-like indentation in center.  Pour in liquids, and mix with a  fork just until the batter comes together.  Bake for 30-35 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean, but slightly moist.  Leave in pan.

Let cake cool completely and then make frosting.  Serves 8.

Best Fudge Icing

This frosting is really versatile and can be used for any number of things.  It’s really good on something dense, like brownies or blondies. 

6 tablespoons butter

4 tablespoons cocoa

3 cups powdered sugar

6 tablespoons milk

2 teaspoons vanilla

In saucepan, melt butter.  Stir in cocoa until it’s dissolved.  Mix in powdered sugar.  It will get as stiff as concrete here–that’s okay.

Pour in milk, and whisk until completely smooth and glossy.  Stir in vanilla.

Pour over completely cooled cake, and allow to set before serving.

Before it sets, you can sprinkle the top with something to make it a little special.

Topping Ideas:

Chocolate chips

Toasted nuts

Coconut

Sprinkles or Jimmies

Toffee chips

Large flakes of finishing salt

Broken pretzels

Potato chip shards

M & M’s

Cereal, like Fruity Pebbles or Cocoa Puffs

Mini-marshmallows

Crushed cookies

Light sprinkling of cayenne or smoked paprika

Powdered freeze-dried fruit

Chocolate is the answer. The question? Irrelevant.

/ momsequitur / Leave a comment

There are two absolutes concerning this confection.

Everyone that tastes it asks for the recipe.

And, every time someone makes it for the first time, they panic; old-timers and newbies alike.

You probably know of Ina Garten.  She’s the former owner of a famous specialty food store.  When she sold it, she kept the store’s name, “Barefoot Contessa” as her own moniker.

Not that Barefoot Contessa…

This Barefoot Contessa.

In her books and TV shows, she shares lots of classic recipes.

If you close your eyes and think of chocolate cake, this is that cake.  Her version is rich, moist, and delicious; and the frosting tastes like sweet chocolate butter.

Beatty’s Chocolate Cake

Recipe courtesy Ina Gartenchoc cakeButter, for greasing pans

1 3/4 cups all-purpose flour, plus more for pans

2 cups sugar

3/4 cups cocoa powder

2 teaspoons baking soda

1 teaspoon baking powder

1 teaspoon kosher salt

1 cup buttermilk

½ cup vegetable oil

2 extra-large eggs, at room temperature

1 teaspoon vanilla

1 cup freshly brewed hot coffee

Chocolate Buttercream, recipe follows

Preheat oven to 350. Butter 2 (8-inch) round cake pans. Line pans with parchment paper, then butter and flour them.

Sift flour, sugar, cocoa, baking soda, baking powder, and salt into bowl of electric mixer fitted with a paddle attachment and mix on low speed until combined. In another bowl, combine buttermilk, oil, eggs, and vanilla. With mixer on low speed, slowly add wet ingredients to dry. With mixer still on low, add coffee and stir just to combine, scraping bottom of bowl.  Pour batter into prepared pans and bake for 35 to 40 minutes, until cake tester comes out clean. Cool in pans for 30 minutes, then turn them out onto cooling rack and cool completely.So here’s where the panic comes.  The batter will be thin.  I mean thin like the consistency of heavy cream thin.  When you make the batter, you’ll think you’ve screwed it up.  You haven’t—it’s fine, I promise.

Chocolate Frostingchoc frosting6 ounces semisweet chocolate

½ pound butter, softened

1 extra-large egg yolk, at room temperature

1 teaspoon vanilla

1 ¼ cups sifted confectioners’ sugar

1 tablespoon instant coffee powder

Chop chocolate and place it in heat-proof bowl set over pan of simmering water. Stir until just melted and set aside until cooled to room temperature.

In the bowl of electric mixer fitted with paddle attachment, beat butter on medium-high speed until light yellow and fluffy, about 3 minutes. Add egg yolk and vanilla and continue beating for 3 minutes. Turn mixer to low, gradually add confectioners’ sugar, then beat at medium, scraping down bowl as necessary, until smooth and creamy. Dissolve coffee powder in 2 teaspoons of hottest tap water. On low speed, add chocolate and coffee to butter mixture and mix until blended. Don’t whip!

To frost: place one cake layer, flat side up, on flat plate or cake pedestal. With knife or offset spatula, spread top with frosting. Place second layer on top, rounded side up, and spread frosting evenly on top and sides.A word of caution about the frosting: although I am always on the “more is better” bus, this philosophy will not work here.  The amount of chocolate in the recipe is perfect.  If you add more, as the frosting sets, it will get hard and crack, ruining the beauty of your work.  Don’t do it.

In the end, you could also call this a “get” cake.

If you make it, you’ll get the praise, get the raise, or get engaged.Better “get” going.

Thanks for your time.

My mom, the awful cook

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*Last week the Henderson Dispatch had some serious production issues and my column did not run in the paper.  Since they are running it this week, there will be no new Henderson piece.

Please enjoy this classic column from 2011:

This is the Tree Frog cabin in Linville, NC.  One of my favorite spots on earth.

A dream vacation for me would be weeks in a quiet mountain cabin, or an isolated beach cottage. I’d do tons of cooking with local produce and ingredients.

For my mother, that would be a punishment. She belongs in a bed and breakfast near shopping, and in the center of mild happenings, dining out every meal.

Sooo much more my mom’s speed.

With the same deliberate, reverse pride I have in my lack of algebraic aptitude, Mom will declare her lack of skill and interest in the culinary. “I’m not a good cook, and only do it to eat!”

This is no passive-aggressive bid for flattery. She honestly thinks she can’t cook.

She’s wrong.

You could fill an elementary school auditorium with the people who have eaten her spaghetti sauce once, and forever after jockeyed for repeat invitations to her table with the naked shamelessness of a reality star at 14 3/4 minutes.

Her macaroni and cheese is terrific. Best eaten cold, late at night, and in semi-private. My faithful companion: my eight-year-old self, in a flannel nightgown and bare feet, armed with a Superman fork in one hand, a salt shaker in the other, and a defiant grin. It is comfort food of mythic proportions.

Ask The Kid about Gramma’s chicken-fried steak. Last visit Gramma was implored to not only make it, but to give a chicken fried class.

She’ll occasionally cop to minor skill in baking and deserts. She’s a trained cake decorator (in the 1970s-no-fondant-lots-of-star-tip style). Despite buying the crust, her pies do just what pies should, taste yummy and make you feel loved (a la mode or not).

Each year at a holiday soiree, she feeds everyone lunch, and we ice hundreds of sugar cookies. Not only do we feast, we aren’t allowed to leave without dozens of her deceptively simple but crazy delicious Christmas cookies.

She’s a self-taught wizard of producing sweet treats with very little on-hand, while dodging three loud, hungry kids and all their friends.

NO.RECIPE.

She can make eclairs without fear or recipe. Who does that?

Here are two of my mother’s classics:

The first, wacky cake, is from her mother. I think it was originally a recipe to cope with shortages during the depression and rationing during WWII.
I don’t think there was frosting on the original (Heresy!). But Mom covers hers in a thick warm layer of milk chocolate, fudgy goodness.

Wacky Cake

wacky cake
1 1/2 cups flour
1 cup sugar
3 tablespoons cocoa powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 tablespoon vinegar
3/8 cup?! (I know, weird; sorry.) vegetable oil
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 cup cold water

Preheat oven to 350. In a lightly greased 9 inch cake pan put in dry ingredients. Make a small well in the center of the dry and pour in wet ingredients. Mix together and bake for 30-35 minutes or until toothpick comes out moist with just a couple of crumbs clinging to it. Cool, then cover with warm fudge topping.

Fudgy Milk Chocolate Icing

fudge icing
Melt three tablespoons of butter in saucepan. Whisk in 2 tablespoons cocoa powder. When dissolved, add 1 1/2 cups powdered sugar, 3 tablespoons whole milk, and 1 teaspoon vanilla. It will look like you’ve made a mistake, but keep whisking and it will turn to a glossy yummy glaze. Also good on marble brownies.

The other is a recipe picked up at a horse show potluck in Puerto Rico, and named for a trendy playdoh-type toy we all had then.

Slime

slimePrepare large box lime Jello according to package directions. When cooled, but not set, pour into blender along with one 15 oz can of pears, drained, and one 8 oz block of cream cheese, softened. Blend until completely smooth. Pour into mixing bowl and fold in one packet of Dream Whip (Whipped topping mix found in the baking aisle. Can substitute thawed, 8 oz tub of Cool Whip) made according to directions. Let set for at least four hours before eating.

Don’t ask me why, but we all had to have this stuff.

Thanks for your time, my father’s sweet tooth, and Mom’s bake sale fantasies.