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Devil's Food Cake
1/2 CUP SHORTENING I CUP SUGAR 3 EGGS, SLIGHTLY BEATEN I TEASPOON SODA I TEASPOON BAKING POWDER 13/4 CUPS PASTRY OR I CAKE FLOUR I TEASPOON CINNAMON 1/2 CUP MILK 1/2 CUP COCOA HOT WATER Cream shortening, add sugar and cream together, add eggs and beat. Sift soda, baking powder, flour and cinnamon together, and add to egg mixture alternately with milk. Mix cocoa with enough hot water to make a smooth paste, and add. Bake in greased tube pan 35 minutes at 375°. Ice with the following: 2 CUPS CONFECTIONER'S SUGAR 2 TABLESPOONS COCOA 2 TABLESPOONS SOF- TENED BUTTER WARM COFFEE OR CREAM 1/2 TEASPOON VANILLA Mix sugar and cocoa, work into softened butter, add sufficient warm coffee or cream to spread, add vanilla, and spread over cake.
Although this would turn out like a fallen-angle cake if attempted outside of a kitchen it's included because of its picnic popularity.
A plain creamed-butter chocolate cake that bakes in a tube pan and is finished with an uncooked cocoa glaze. The proportions are sound; a few of the printed quantities need reading with care.
- The flour lineThe ingredient list reads as 1¾ cups pastry or cake flour; the two are close, though cake flour is the softer of the pair. If you have only all-purpose, reducing the measure slightly is the common makeshift, but it lessens the flour rather than actually lowering the protein content.
- ShorteningIn a book of this vintage this means vegetable shortening or lard, though butter works and gives better flavour. Whichever you use, it must be soft enough to cream to a pale, aerated mass before the sugar goes in — that aeration contributes to the cake's lift alongside the soda and baking powder.
- Cocoa and hot waterUse natural (non-alkalised) cocoa rather than Dutch-process. The teaspoon of soda is there to react with the acidity of natural cocoa; Dutch cocoa is already neutralised, so the soda has less to work on and the crumb will be less lifted and flatter in flavour, though the baking powder still does its part. About ¼ cup of hot water makes a smooth paste from ½ cup cocoa.
- No salt listedThe recipe omits it, as some of the period do. A scant ½ teaspoon of salt sifted with the dry ingredients is worth adding if you use unsalted fat.
- Oven and pan375°F is correct as printed and on the brisk side for a tube cake. A 9-inch tube pan is a reasonable size; the recipe calls only for greasing. Check at 30 minutes with a skewer, as 35 minutes at that heat can take it just past done.
- The icing consistencyAdd the warm coffee or cream a teaspoon at a time. Two cups of confectioner's sugar takes very little liquid before it slumps, and coffee gives a noticeably deeper chocolate flavour than cream does. Ice only when the cake is fully cool.
- YieldOne tube cake, twelve to sixteen slices. It keeps well covered for two or three days, which is the point of its inclusion in a book about eating away from the house.