Tag: cake

Fourth of July Baking: A German Dessert of American Symbolism and Celebrity

Published on by In The Vintage Kitchen7 Comments

In 1986, there was a recipe. In 1956, there was a woman related to the recipe. In 1886, there was a statue related to the woman who was related to the recipe. In 1870, there was a model related to the statue who was related to the woman and the recipe. In 1865, there was a sculptor who was related to the model who was related to the statue who was related to the woman who was related to the recipe.  And so begins the story of Week 18 in the International Vintage Recipe Tour 2020.  Herzlich Willkommen! Welcome to Germany!

This week there is a little cooking surprise. In today’s post, we are diverting slightly from the original Tour plan and preparing a recipe, not from the New York Times International Cook Book, which we have been following since January, but from another vintage kitchen book altogether. This guest cookbook, Celebrity Desserts, was published in 1986 for a very particular reason and hails from the great state of New York just like our treasured International Tour cookbook. It also happens to fall right in line with this week’s featured destination of Germany and  the upcoming Fourth of July holiday.

All that being said we are off on quite a fun adventure today! It is a journey that involves not only German history but also French and American history too. It involves family cooking, patriotic holidays, and international icons of hope, opportunity, and hospitality -three things my family and I like to celebrate on the 4th of July. And then there’s the actual recipe itself. One that is luxurious without being fussy, a cool treat in hot weather, and so popular around the world that almost every country on the planet has their own particular version of it.

Initially, this trip to Germany via the kitchen was going to fill Week 18’s post with sights and stories of Sauerbraten,  an heirloom beef recipe that takes three days to prepare.  Excited to explore a very traditional method of making a famous German food, I hinted at things to come at the end of the Paris post. Unfortunately, I ran into some roadblocks.

In our unpredictable time of pandemic cooking, it seems that sourcing a grass-fed beef bottom roast that cost anything less than $50.00 and that was anything under 5lbs in size turned out to be a feat of great impossibilities.  Since the recipe only called for 3lbs of beef, both the size and the price suggested that maybe this lovely, long cooking project of authentic, homemade Sauerbraten might just be a bit too much to tackle at the moment. In an effort to remain flexible these days and simply go with the flow of what is available at the grocery and the market, the heirloom Sauerbraten will be rain checked for a later date. Hopefully, we can revisit this recipe again at some point further on in the year. By that time (fingers crossed) beef may be more plentiful and a bit more economical.

In the meantime, Celebrity Desserts called from the cookbook shelf.  Saving the day and the country fare by offering a wonderfully delicious creation of German heritage, the dessert we are making today, thanks to our guest cookbook, comes along with its own very unique history. One that embraces German, Italian, French, and American ancestry as well as celebrates a special lady we all know and love.  I’m so pleased to present our featured German dessert this week, Bavarian Cheesecake.

Cheesecake is a dessert uniquely prepared in a variety of ways depending on what part of the globe you call home. It is one of the few cakes that can be served baked or unbaked. It can be frozen, refrigerated, or served at room temperature. It can be made entirely of ricotta cheese or entirely of cream cheese. It can be slathered in sauce, dolloped with fruit, drizzled with chocolate, or dotted with nuts. It can be stuffed with spices, herbs, vegetables, or just about anything under the sun. And it runs the gamut as far as taste from sweet to savory to something in between. With such an opportunity for culinary creativity,  there’s no shortage of recipes when it comes to cheesecake. In just under .6 seconds Google will deliver over 215,000,000 cheesecake-related results. Narrow it down by specific ingredient and the field gets smaller but still contains hundreds of thousands of options. But the recipe we are making today stands out from all these others. This one has a very unique lineage that sets it apart from all the other cheesecakes and all the other variations.

As the cookbook title denotes, it involves a celebrity. But not one that you might suspect. This famous figure has never had her own cooking show, nor written a book, nor sang a song. She’s not the ruler of a country or a corporation (though her values would certainly be welcomed!). She didn’t invent a cure for a disease nor end world hunger nor paint a masterpiece. She wasn’t a dancer or a designer or a technology wizard. But she has been featured in her share of movies and she has been the subject of photographers for decades.  In order to get to the heart of this mystery woman’s famous roots, let’s begin at the ending, by tracing the recipe backwards.

It all starts with this face…

Do you recognize her? Most likely, probably not. She’s a pretty obscure reference in regards to her famous connection. But maybe the following info will help spark your curiosity or at least ignite the musings of your mind. Her name is Dorothy.  This photo of Dorothy was taken in the 1980s, part of a follow-up story from the 1950s when she had first become the topic of newspaper headlines. At the time this photo was taken, Dorothy lived in Boise, Idaho but the event that made her newsworthy in the 1950s revolved around something that happened in New York City. Any guesses as to who she might be? If not, here’s another clue…

This is Charlotte. She is related to Dorothy. Can you see any resemblance?  Charlotte was born in 1801 in the Alsace region of northern France. She married into a French family with the last name of Bartholdi. Charlotte had a son named Frederic who became an artist. This is Frederic…

Frederic dreamed of designing an enormous statue. He wanted to build it in France, but display it in America. The statue was going to require a lot of money to build, so he came to the United States in the 1860s ready to talk up his idea and gather some investors. As it turns out, Frederic’s concept sounded an awful lot like another American statue that was already in the works and slated for display in Plymouth, Massachusetts. That statue would eventually be called the National Monument to the Forefathers and looked like this…

Undeterred by this similarity, Frederic went back home to France and carried on with his own statue anyway. He raised money in his own country with the help of his mother and the generosity of local French citizens including school children. Eventually, Frederic’s dream was realized and his statue came to fruition. Off on a boat, it went to America. This is what he created…

Now back to Dorothy and Charlotte. Charlotte, Frederic’s mother, was the model for the face of the Statue of Liberty. Dorothy is Charlotte’s great-great-granddaughter.

When Dorothy was photographed in New York Harbor in the 1950s in front of the Statue of Liberty, everyone remarked on their striking similarities…

Dorothy Franks photographed in 1956 with the Statue. The inset photo was taken in 1984. Images courtesy of the Daily News.

Dorothy was related to Charlotte both via direct lineage and also by marriage, as she married her second cousin who was also related to Charlotte by blood. Today’s recipe for Bavarian Cheesecake comes from Dorothy’s kitchen.

The recipe was submitted for inclusion in the Celebrity Desserts Cookbook in 1986 by Dorothy’s granddaughter Linda, who lived in Washington state (oddly enough, in the same small town where my mom grew up). The cookbook was compiled by the Albany NY Council of the Telephone Pioneers of America, a social service organization founded in 1911 that was inspired by Alexander Graham Bell’s invention of the telephone. The Pioneers produced this cookbook as a fundraiser campaign to raise money for much-needed repairs to the Statue of Liberty. The Council collected favorite recipes from a variety of kitchens all across the country including famous ones (a former First Lady, well-known figures in the performing arts, iconic hospitality venues, etc) as well as regular home cooks, Pioneer members, and telephone industry employees who had culinary crowd-pleasers to share.  Undoubtedly Linda’s recipe and the provenance from which it came must have been the icing on the cake (no pun intended!) when it came to the whole cookbook. With just five degrees of separation from Linda’s kitchen in Bothell, WA to the Statue of Liberty in New York Harbor, this cheesecake recipe instantly added a whole new dynamic element to the American food scene and to celebratory Fourth of July fare.

The lineage of this recipe doesn’t stop with the ladies though, nor the French nationality. It’s called Bavarian Cheesecake because it hails from Bavaria, the state located inside Germany that is known for its fairy tale castles, picturesque scenery, and a handful of typically traditional German foods including beer and sausages.

Charlotte’s family were German protestants in Alsace and Dorothy’s grandfather was born in Italy. So the Bartholdis themselves were a multicultural bunch, just like the immigrants who would come to meet Lady Liberty in New York.  Eventually, Dorothy’s grandfather left Italy and immigrated to America in the late 1890s. When he floated in on the steel grey waves of water in New York Harbor, he passed under the coppery gaze of his grandmother Charlotte. What a surreal experience that must have been. In a Daily News interview published in the 1980s, Charlotte said the family was very proud of their connection to Lady Liberty and that her dad, when she was a little girl would tell stories about Charlotte and Frederic’s connection to the statue.

Dedication day !o The Statue of Liberty as photographed on October 28, 1886. Image courtesy of nps.org

Alongside Dorothy’s Italian grandfather, came boatloads of German immigrants. Of the 12 million people that came through Ellis Island from the 1890s – the 1950s, 1/12 of them were German. Because of that large influx from The Land of Poets and Thinkers (that is Germany’s nickname!), one in every four Americans today is connected via German ancestry.

I always think it is fascinating to learn about other people’s immigration stories. It’s so interesting to hear about the situations that brought them to America and to hear about what they encountered when they arrived, and where their dreams and aspirations took them. In Dorothy’s case, her Bartholdi ancestors immigrated to the U.S.  to work in the gold mines in Colorado and to set up shop as stone masons and funerary art designers. In a nutshell, that’s the story of how the Bartholdi family came to America. And how they made a new life for themselves, and made a family, and then made Dorothy and then Linda. And of course all that time they made the cheesecake.

If I could take poetic license with this recipe, I’d like to rename it  Bartholdi’s Bavarian Cheesecake, so that it never lost the lineage of the ladies and their connection to Liberty. Like the nervous anticipation of first-time immigrants to America, this was my first time ever making cheesecake. I must admit I was a little nervous. I had always thought that cheesecake was a very difficult thing to make  – something that took a long time and a lot of effort. Maybe some cheesecake versions are that way, but I’m happy to say that this recipe couldn’t have been easier. It did take a little bit of time – between the chilling of the crust and the two different oven bakes plus the cooling and the overnight rest in the fridge, but certainly, it wasn’t a three-day affair like the Sauerbraten would have been, and it wasn’t expensive to make.

Chalk it all up to the fact that it feeds a crowd, looks lovely on a plate, and lasts in the fridge for days and days and days, I think this Bavarian Cheesecake might just be the new favorite of the International Vintage Recipe Tour so far.  And that is really saying something. Australia’s Queen Mother’s Cake from Week 2 of the Tour is still receiving accolades by blog readers and eaters all these months later. So I’m especially excited to hear what you think of this latest addition to our culinary book of adventures. When we get to the end of the year and the end of the Tour, it will be fun to vote on the most favorite food made along the way. But for now, we have Bavaria and baking to get to…

Bartholdi’s Bavarian Cheesecake

Makes one 8″ inch cake or 12 Servings

For the crust:

2 cups finely crushed vanilla wafer crumbs

2 tablespoons sugar

1 tsp cinnamon

1 1/2 teaspoon nutmeg

1/3 cup butter

For the filling:

1 1/2 lbs cream cheese (or three 8oz. packages), softened

1 cup sugar

3 eggs

1 tablespoon lemon juice

1 teaspoon grated lemon rind

1/2 teaspoon vanilla

For the top layer:

2 cups sour cream

3 tablespoons sugar

1 teaspoon vanilla

For the crust: Combine first five ingredients (wafers, sugar, cinnamon, nutmeg, butter) in a bowl. With a pastry blender, cut butter until thoroughly blended until it resembles course crumbs.

Press mixture firmly and evenly against bottom and sides of a lightly greased 8-inch spring form pan. (Note: I used an 8 1/2 inch pan and that worked totally fine too.)

Refrigerate 30 minutes.

For the filling: Preheat the oven to 375 degrees. Cream cheese and sugar together in a large bowl until light and fluffy.

Add eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition.

Thoroughly blend in the lemon juice, lemon rind, and 1/2 teaspoon vanilla. Pour into chilled crumb crust.

Bake for 45 minutes. Remove from oven and let cool at room temperature for 30 minutes. (Note: The cake will brown a little on the edges, as seen in the photos below, and may even crack a little bit on top. All that is totally fine.)

For the top layer: Preheat the oven to 500 degrees. Blend together the sour cream, sugar and vanilla. Carefully spread sour cream mixture over cooled cheese filling.

Bake in oven for 10 minutes. Cool.

Then refrigerate overnight before serving.

Once you’ve refrigerated the cheesecake overnight, the top layer will become firm. This makes it a lovely platform for decorating in all sorts of ways. Since this is a patriotic dessert, you might consider adding blueberries, strawberries, or raspberries to the top. Or perhaps some lemon rind twists or fresh herbs. I decorated mine very simply with a sprig of mint and a flower (a petal each for Dorothy, for Charlotte and for Lady Liberty!).  I wanted to see how it tasted unadorned, without any other ingredients changing the flavor composition.

As it turns out, it tasted like a dream! I wasn’t sure if this was going to be a really dense cheesecake or if it was going to be more light and airy, but when I cut the first slice, the answer revealed itself…

The sour cream top layer had a taste and consistency exactly like the filling of cheese danish pastries. Sweet with a subtle creamy tang. The cream cheese layer had a consistency like very thick whip cream – pillowy but substantial without being hefty.

The crust held everything together so beautifully that each slice cut perfectly smooth and never fell apart when transferred to the individual serving plates.

What a joy this dessert turned out to be. Subtle and smooth, with hints of vanilla and lemon, it is a really lovely and really delicious dessert for summer. Especially if served cold straight from the fridge. An elegant alternative if you are tired of traditional Fourth of July flag cake, berry pies or fruit parfaits this dessert can be doled out in large slices or small and travels well. It also doesn’t mind hanging out in the fridge for hours while you party the day away.

Unlike a couple previous recipes from the Tour, there is absolutely nothing I would do to alter this recipe. I wouldn’t add anything, decorate it any differently or change the flavor components in any way. It is a true classic in all the best ways and absolutely perfect as is. Just like Lady Liberty herself:)

Cheers to Linda and Dorothy and Charlotte for providing a recipe with a really long family pedigree. And to Frederic for dreaming up a Statue that welcomed the world.

“Give me your tired, your poor, Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, The wretched refuse of your teeming shore, Send these the homeless, tempest-tost to me. I lift my lamp beside the golden door.” – A portion of the poem, The New Colossus, by Emma Lazarus published in 1903 on a plaque at the base of the Statue of Liberty.

The lovely lady Liberty. Image credit: Juan Mayobre

The Statue of Liberty has been a sign of hope, potential and opportunity ever since her dedication on October 28, 1886. Except for the bald eagle, and the American flag she’s the most iconic symbol of our country that stands for everything we aspired to achieve as a nation. She’s artistic (thanks to Frederic), poetic (thanks to Emma Lazarus), strong (thanks to her copper cladding) and welcoming (thanks to Ellis Island). This has been one of the toughest years in American history to date, but I hope at the end of the day we can remember and focus on the qualities that Lady Liberty stands for. That we can shelter and accept and care for, with equal regard, all that come ashore.

Join me next time as our culinary adventures take us to Greece via the kitchen for Week 19 of the International Vintage Recipe Tour 2020!

UPDATE FROM OUR READERS!

If you find yourself without a springform pan for the cheesecake, rest assured, there are a couple of other pieces of dishware you can use as well, as noted by two of our readers…

Marianne in Seattle used a deep-dish pie pan, and served the cheesecake right from the pan. A beauty in all directions!

“It was really good. We all liked it!”  Marianne also substituted lemon wafer cookies from Trader Joe’s in place of the vanilla wafers. “The lemon cookies make a nice crust,” she said.

Marilyn in Arizona used a 9″ inch tart pan and it turned out beautifully. She shared the following… “Going to create a fun game (questions and answers) to play with the blog post. Better than sitting around discussing the virus… you saved the day Katherine!” How nice!

If you discover any helpful hints after making this recipe or would like to share a photo of your decorated dessert, please comment below. A big thank you to Marianne and Marilyn for their helpful tips!

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A Very English Dessert: Trifally Speaking

Published on by In The Vintage Kitchen2 Comments

Hello Hello! Happy Mother’s Day weekend to all the moms out there. Welcome to week 15 of the International Vintage Recipe Tour 2020. This week finds us in England via the kitchen, making a dessert that dates all the way back to the 1750’s.

It was a time when women dressed like this…

An embroidered muslin dress dating from 1730-1769 from the Victoria and Albert Museum collection

and men dressed like this…

Men’s fashionable suit made in England circa 1765. Courtesy of the Victoria & Albert museum collection.

and housing looked like this…

An engraving of Marble Hill, circa 1749 courtesy of english-heritage.org

and dessert looked like this…

In the kitchens of castles and cottages and country houses across the rolling hills and bucolic landscapes of England, big bowls filled with fruit and cream and custard and cake decorated tables and delighted diners.

The fun of this week’s vintage recipe starts with the adjectives that most often describe it… tipsy, whimsical, drunken, inconsequential, foolish, scrapy, flurried. It was first made in the 1500’s, but really became part of the popular dessert vernacular in the 1700’s, and was one of the few sweet treats of its day that appealed to practically every type of eater, from the thrifty homemaker to the flamboyant palace chef. Legend states that its origin may have originally sprouted in Spain or Italy, but once the British embraced it, it became a wholly English dessert. And it came complete with cute nicknames – The Tipsy Parson, The Tipsy Hedgehog, The Tipsy Squire. All an homage to the alcohol cleverly disguised inside the cake and custard that held the whole assemblage together.

Today in the Kitchen, I’m pleased to announce that we are making English Trifle, a piled up assortment of boozy cake, jam, fruit, custard and cream. Like any 500 year old recipe, lots of variations have emerged since it was first created, but the fundamental hallmarks of the recipe (cream, cake, alcohol, fruit, custard, jelly) haven’t changed in five centuries. That makes it one of the most authentic desserts in the history of baking.

The first cookbook to print a recipe for trifle with jelly was Hannah Glasse’s The Art of Cookery Made Plain and Easy, which was published in 1751.

Eight years ago, my friend Diana gave me a trifle dish. I loved it immediately for its big shape, but up until now never actually made the food that it’s named for. Instead, over the past almost-decade, I’ve used my trifle dish for all sorts of non-related kitchen jobs – a flower vase, a holder for various miscellanies (wine corks, napkins, kitchen tools, flatware), a container to corral foodstuffs (bread, cookies, nuts), a fruit bowl, an ice bucket, a table centerpiece for candles and crafts, an organizer for pantry odds and ends, and most recently a punch bowl. It’s overall handiness is ironic considering that this dish was made for one very specific type of dessert.

The trifle dish turned punch bowl was featured in Week 4 of the International Vintage Recipe Tour 2020 when we visited Barbados via the kitchen. Read more about that here.

Anyway, its exciting to think that this much loved glass container is not only making it’s trifle debut here on the Recipe Tour but also serving up the oldest historical food we have made on the blog yet. That means it is older than  Election Cake (1700’s) and older than Sally Lunn Cake (1600’s)

That’s Election Cake on the left and Sally Lunn Cake on the right!

The recipe we are following for this English Trifle is from the 1970’s New York Times International Cookbook, but it is pretty faithful to the 16th-18th century versions. The only adjustment I had to make with this specific recipe was exchanging the current jelly for raspberry preserves, since I couldn’t find current jelly at the grocery store.  Some vintage recipes for trifle feature other fruits like cherries, apricots, strawberries or peaches so really you could use any type of jam that you prefer best and still keep the historical integrity of true English Trifle completely intact.

A two part process, this was no quick whip up in the kitchen, but it’s not complicated to make.  Since it contains two recipes in one, I wound up breaking up the steps into two parts over two days – one day for the homemade sponge cake and the other day for the homemade custard and assembly. Over the years, especially in the mid-to late 20th century, many short-cut variations have been substituted for these two steps – including store bought pound cake, prepackaged ladyfingers, instant pudding mixes, prepackaged cake mixes and ready made whip cream. But I recommend making the whole dessert from scratch even though it takes a good chunk of time to prepare.

The process of making this over the course of two days worked well, because the longer the sponge cake rests in the fridge, the easier it is to slice for presentation in the trifle dish. It is also ideal to refrigerate the entire finished (and decorated) trifle overnight to allow the cake time to soak up the Madeira,  and to allow the rum to blend into the custard.

There’s a fun step in the sponge cake making process which involves a clean kitchen towel and the act of rolling the cake up inside it. If you are familiar with jelly roll cakes, this won’t be a new or unusual task for you, but if you’ve never rolled up a hot cake just out of the oven in a kitchen cloth before, it will feel a little strange and unnatural. Almost like something you’ve been trained not to do as a kid – like writing in a book or coloring on a wall. But persevere anyway. It all works out wonderfully in the end.

Sponge Jelly Roll

3 tablespoons butter, melted

4 eggs

1/4 teaspoon salt

3/4 cup plus 2 tablespoons granulated sugar

3/4 cup sifted all-purpose flour

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

2 tablespoons confectioner’s sugar

3/4 cup tart current jelly ( I used 50% less sugar organic raspberry preserves)

2 tablespoons Madeira

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Brush an 8×12 jelly roll pan (or a standard cake pan) with half the melted butter. Line the pan with a large sheet of parchment paper, letting a little of the paper hang over the sides. Then brush the parchment paper with the remaining butter.

Break the eggs into a medium size bowl. Add the salt and three quarters cup sugar.

Beat with an electric mixer until stiff or until the batter forms a thick ribbon and fall back onto itself when the beaters are lifted from the bowl. Carefully fold in the flour and vanilla. Pour this mixture into the prepared pan. Spread smooth with a ribber spatula. Bake in the oven for 15 minutes.

While the cake is baking, lay your clean kitchen towel flat on the counter. In a small bowl, sift together the remaining two tablespoons sugar with the confectioners’ sugar. Sprinkle the sugar mixture on the clean towel. Watch this step over on Instagram in the Week 15 video here.

After you pull the cake from the oven, grab all four corners of the parchment paper and immediately remove the cake from the pan. Carefully flip the cake onto the sugared towel and peel away the parchment paper.  Adjust the cake so that it lines up with the edge of the towel and then quickly roll it up. Watch a video of this step here.

Let the cake rest for 15 minutes wrapped in the towel. Then unroll the towel and spread the cake with a thin, even layer of jelly.

Then roll the cake up once more, except this time don’t roll it up into the cloth.

Transfer the roll carefully to a sheet of waxed paper or parchment paper,  and wrap it and place it in the fridge to chill. (Note: You can leave it in the fridge up to 24 hours. The longer it sits in the fridge the easier it will be to cut and arrange in the dish).

After the cake has chilled, remove it from the fridge and place it on a cutting board. Cut the entire jelly roll into 1/2″ inch thick slices.

Next line the bottom of the trifle dish with as many slices as will fit to cover the bottom and then line the sides of the dish. You should have a few slices left over after you’ve lined the dish. Set those remaining slices aside for use after the custard is ready.

Sprinkle the cake slices with the two tablespoons of Madeira and then cover and refrigerate the dish while you make Part Two of the recipe.

English Trifle

Serves 10-12

Sponge Jelly Roll slices

4 eggs, seperated

1/4 cup granulated sugar

1/2 tablespoon unflavored gelatin

1 1/4 cups light cream

2 cups heavy cream

2 tablespoons light rum

1 tablespoon confectioners’ sugar

1 teaspoon vanilla

Place the egg yolks in a medium bowl and add the sugar.

Beat thoroughly with an electric mixer and add the gelatin. Set aside.

Bring the light cream to a boil in a small saucepan, stirring constantly so that the cream does not scorch. Slowly add it to the egg mixture, stirring constantly with a whisk as you incorporate the milk.

Transfer the egg/milk mixture to a large saucepan. Cook and stir the mixture over low heat until it coats the back of a wooden spoon (about 10 minutes).

Immediately remove the saucepan from the heat and set the pan in a bowl filled with ice cubes to cool. Stir until cooled. {Note: I cooked my custard for about 15 minutes on the stove, which I think turned out to be about 5 minutes too long! Once the custard sits in the ice cubes it thickens even more, so ultimately when you remove the custard from the heat it should be about the consistency of somewhat runny cheese sauce and not quite as thick as loose pudding, which was more like my consistency.}

In a separate mixing bowl add the egg whites and beat until they form soft peaks.

Fold the whites into the cooled custard. {Note as you can see from the photo below my custard became pretty thick once it cooled. If this happens to you, don’t worry, once you fold in the egg whites and the cream you can use a rubber spatula to smooth the custard out. The rum also helps the custard break down a little bit.}

Beat half the heavy cream until stiff…

And then fold the heavy cream into the custard/egg white mixture…

Then fold in the rum…

Spoon all the custard into the trifle dish, covering the bottom slices and spreading the custard evenly with a spatula.

Cover the top of the custard with the reserved slices of jelly roll.

Beat the remaining cream and sweeten it with confectioners’ sugar and vanilla extract. Using a pastry tube or spoon, garnish the top of the trifle with cream. Now comes the fun part… decorating the top! The recipe’s directions stopped after the whipped cream, so we are now, at this stage,  left up to our own interpretations and creativity from this point forward. Some bakers like to decorate the tops of their trifles with crushed nuts, slivered almonds, shaved chocolate or fruit. I decided to top mine with strawberries, blackberries, raspberries and mint.

And because this recipe hails from England, the land of beautiful gardens, I put a few fresh flowers on top too.

We are enjoying strawberry season this month in the South, so the berries seemed like an ideal companion, and my sweet mint in the garden is growing by leaps and bounds, making me want to add mint to everything in order to keep it under control. But you might have your own fun spin on a trifle topper so I encourage you to get creative.

To serve the trifle, you just need to dive right into it with a big spoon and scoop out a slice of cake from the side and place it on a dessert plate. Then add an extra dollop of custard and whip cream from the interior and add some additional bits of topping for an extra bit of flair.

A truly delicious baking endeavor that tastes of summer and satisfaction, this whole dessert is substantial but not heavy. The custard is pillowy, the whip cream delicate, the berries tangy.  It is no wonder that this recipe has been floating around the dessert world for five hundred years. It’s a timeless classic for sure. No matter how we have evolved as humans from century to century, I don’t think we’ll ever tire of any combination involving fruit and cream, flour and custard, butter and jam. It’s in our history, after all.

P.S. The trifle will keep in the fridge for a few days but not the freezer, as this recipe is meant for sharing not storing. If you are still quarantining like we are in my neck of the woods, and your amount of eaters is small, don’t let the size and scale of this recipe sway you. Perhaps you could surprise your friends or neighbors with a little gift of British baking.

Cheers to England for propelling this dessert through centuries. And cheers to all the moms out there who have made this recipe in the past and will continue to make this recipe in the future!

Join us next week as we island hop over to Fiji for a tropical dinner and a special weather episode that adds audible ambiance to our cooking adventure. See you next time for Week 16 of the Recipe Tour!

A Celebration for Australia: Queen Mother’s Cake & The Royal Lady Who Inspired It

Published on by In The Vintage Kitchen22 Comments

Hello and welcome to Week Two of the International Vintage Recipe Tour 2020! This week’s cooking adventure takes us 7,200 miles away from the lamb-stuffed food of Armenia to the beautiful land of Australia, the only stop on our Recipe Tour this year, that is both a country and a continent.

As you all know, Australia has been in the news quite a bit these days due to the devastating wildfires burning throughout the country. In an effort to help the recovery process and because this is our featured destination of the week, 50% of all Vintage Kitchen shop sales made between January 15th-January 22nd will be donated to the Kangaroo Island Wildlife Park. There people are working tirelessly to save the koalas, kangaroos and other wildlife harmed by the fires that burnt a large portion of their natural habitat. This donation will help feed, shelter and supply the island’s animals with much-needed medical care and attention. I selected Kangaroo Island Wildlife Park because they specifically addressed through social media, the need for food supplies for the animals, all of whom are national icons and unique treasures of the country.  If you wish to donate to Kangaroo Island Wildlife Park directly, please visit their donation page here.

A koala undergoing care at Kangaroo Island Wildlife Park

Because we are visiting countries alphabetically via the kitchen on this Recipe Tour, (a decision made last summer when the whole international idea first came about), it just so happened that we landed on Australia during an environmental crisis.  At times like this, when an area of the world is going through a major upset, it seems trivial and unnecessarily indulgent to draw attention to something like dessert.

But one thing I learned after experiencing 9/11 while living in New York City, is the significance of small pleasures. Familiar experiences like watching a favorite tv show or listening to music or eating a favorite food during a time of disaster can bring a much-needed sense of comfort and temporary joy. Even if it’s just a mild distraction in a day full of struggle. Our featured recipe this week is a homemade cake. Usually cake is most defined as a celebratory food – one that draws people together, raises spirits and commemorates life, new beginnings or accomplishments. It is one of the most optimistic and joyful foods we eat. One of the few that can automatically bring people together and instantly raise spirits. So it is with that in mind, that I focus this post. For the days and weeks and months ahead for Australia, I wish endless amounts of cake and all the symbolism that such a sweet treat stands for… love, support, community, optimism and comfort.

In this week’s post, we’ll be making an Australian favorite – Queen Mother’s Cake, a flourless chocolate cake that reflects a cosmopolitan cross-cultural heritage. We’ll also learn more about the vivacious English woman behind the recipe’s name, including her special connection to the Land Down Under.

Do you recognize her? Long before Kate Middleton and Meghan Markle captured headlines, this famous royal woman dazzled the world with her vivacious spirit and warm personality. If you guessed that she was a lady, a duchess or a queen you’d be right on all three fronts. She is Lady Elizabeth Bowes Lyon, also known as the Duchess of York, Queen Elizabeth and the Queen Mother. If you were intimately involved with the royals during her lifetime, you’d know her by one more moniker too – her family nickname “Cake” which was earned because of her sheer delight and interest in anything resembling a cake-like dessert. This was Elizabeth on her wedding day, the start of her journey towards eventually becoming Queen Mother…

Elizabeth on wedding day in April 1923.

and this was her elaborate wedding cake…

Photo courtesy of royal.uk

On the Netflix show, The Crown, you’ll see Elizabeth portrayed by Victoria Hamilton on screen, a supporting character to Claire Foy’s Queen Elizabeth II …

Victoria Hamilton as Queen Elizabeth L in the Netflix show, The Crown

but in real life, for much of her life, Elizabeth the Queen Mother, was the star of her own spectacular show. A glittering jewel in the Royal Family, she was beloved for her warm demeanor, her cheerful personality and her ability to relate to people, most especially working-class women.

A world traveler throughout her life, she loved trying new things and surprising people with her authenticity, integrity, capability and willingness to be involved. If she went camping, she would set up her own tent. If she went fishing, she would catch her own dinner. If she wanted a new dress, she’d work out the initial designs herself. Witty, stylish, observational and fun to be around, Elizabeth was one of the most popular members of the Royal family from the time she stepped into the limelight as the bride of King George VI to the time of her death at the age of 101.

She visited Australia several times throughout her life, but her first impression of it in the 1920’s sealed her fondness for it for the rest of her life. In a letter home to her mother, in 1927 she wrote…

“It is most lovely country… The climate is marvellous – very hot sun and cool breezes, and we have both enjoyed ourselves up here in Queensland. The people are so nice & friendly, & the distances are so vast that it keeps them simple.”

Queen Elizabeth _ Canberra, Queensland Australia 1927. Photo courtesy of the National Archives of Australia

As the previous constitutional monarch of Australia (up until 1952), it’s easy to understand how Queen Mother’s Cake could be linked to Aussie history. But the origin story of this confectionary creation doesn’t start or stop there. Legend states that the cake was introduced to the Queen via a Polish pianist named Jan Smeterlin (1892-1967)…

who had first tasted the cake in Austria. Jan, in addition to being a talented piano player, was also a talented cook. It is unclear whether he brought the Austrian recipe home with him or if he created it from memory in his own kitchen, but either way , the story goes that he made the cake for the Queen one day while she was visiting him in the early 1950’s.  So in love with it did she fall that Queen Elizabeth requested a copy of the recipe from Jan and started baking it herself at the palace. Taking on new significance and a new name – Queen Mother’s Cake – it became the favorite cake that Elizabeth liked to offer to guests and it was the only cake that she insisted on making herself each time an occasion called for it.

With its glossy chocolate frosting, simple ingredients and fluffy, moist consistency, it is easy to see why this cake became a favorite, not only with the Queen and Jan Smeterlin, but also with all of England and Australia too.

So delicious, so easy to make and so fast to assemble, Queen Mother’s Cake tastes like a fudge frosted brownie but without the heft and density normally associated with a traditional flour-filled brownie. A dash of powdered instant coffee in the frosting gives a slight tangy contrast to the sweet cake and a dollop of freshly whipped cream perfectly unites all the flavors.

I’m always a fan of a cake that allows you a little creativity in the decorating department. Apparently many Australian bakers from earlier generations learned their pastry and confectionery skills from English artisans during the Victorian era which focused heavily on beautifully presented cakes and exquisite designs.  This stylized influence and interest in gorgeously crafted cakes has remained within the country over the past century, making Australians some of the most highly skilled cake decorators in the world.

The Queen Mother’s Cake is sort of a blank canvas of creativity though when it comes to the presentation department. Like the woman it was named after it is very amenable and open to all sorts of different design interpretations and embellishments.  This recipe just calls for a simple, smoothly frosted cake with no particular adornment though. In wanting to stay authentic to the recipe, I left my cake unadorned as well, but I couldn’t help adding some whip cream and a sprinkle of sliced almonds on each slice. There is something to be said about a good simple cake that requires minimal effort, but next time, it might be fun to experiment with a little extra design on top too.

Queen Mother’s Cake

(serves 12)

For the cake:

Fine bread crumbs

6 oz. fine quality sweet chocolate ( I used German baking chocolate that contained 48% cocoa)

3/4 cup sweet butter

3/4 cup granulated sugar

6 eggs, seperated

6 oz. finely grated almonds

Pinch of salt

Icing

For the icing:

1/2 cup heavy cream

1 rounded teaspoon decaffeinated instant coffee (I used Starbucks Via)

8 oz. fine-quality sweet chocolate, broken into pieces ( I used German baking chocolate that contained 48% cocoa)

Preheat oven to 375 degrees.

Butter a 9″ inch spring-form pan. Line the butter with waxed paper (parchment paper) and butter the paper. Dust the sides and bottom with fine bread crumbs. Set aside.

Melt the chocolate in the top of a double-boiler. Remove the heat and cool.

Cream the butter and sugar very well. Add the egg yolks one at a time, and beat until smooth. Stir in the cooled chocolate and almonds.

Beat the egg whites with the salt until stiff but not dry. Adding one-third of the egg-whites at a time, fold carefully into the chocolate mixture.

Pour into the prepared pan…

and bake twenty minutes. Reduce the oven temperature to 350 degrees and bake 45 minutes longer . Remove from the oven, place on a wet towel, and cool.

When cool, remove the cake from the pan. If the top is uneven, level it with a thin sharp knife. Place the cake on waxed paper (or parchment)…

Next make the icing. Heat the cream in a heavy saucepan until it just barely begins to boil. Add the instant coffee and stir to dissolve…

then add the chocolate. After a minute or two, remove the saucepan from the heat and stir constantly until the chocolate is completely melted.

Let cool a few minutes until just barely tepid. Poor icing over the top of cake.  Using a spatula, completely cover the top and sides.

Let stand at room temperature until the icing sets, then transfer to a cake platter. Gather up all your friends and your family, your co-workers, your neighbors, your party-goers, your joy-seekers. Then, get to celebrating. Raise a fork to Australia and to all that they have managed to achieve in the face of adversity. Raise a fork to optimism and to courage, to comfort and support. To cake. And to carrying on towards a brighter day.

Join us next Wednesday, Week Three of the International Vintage Recipe Tour 2020, as we head out on our next epicurean adventure… Austria, where we will be making a saucy recipe and discussing all things food and travel with a modern-day local. Stay tuned!

Blackberry Baking with the Legendary Sally or Solange or Whatever She Once Was Called

Published on by In The Vintage Kitchen13 Comments

In the historic baking world, there’s a legend that springs from a yeast bread.  Depending on the sources and the provenance of specific recipes, facts about this legend vary widely and wildly. In some tales, she’s a 17th-century girl, in others an 18th-century woman.  She was French. She was English. She was colonial American. She was an ordinary teenager, she was a famous baker, she was a lowly domestic servant. She had a name that was either Sally or Solange or Madame or Marie. She was a real human being but she then again she was a fake and then yet again someone else’s flight of fancy. For three centuries, this baking icon has tumbled through time on the flimsiest of resumes. This is the story of Sally Lunn and a cake (or it might have been a bread) that made her famous.

This weekend, after coming home from the market with a batch of blackberries that were so deliciously ripe they smelled like wine, I discovered a vintage recipe that is as difficult to describe as the lady it was named after. Called Fresh Blackberry Sally Lunn, it came from Meta Given’s 1957 Encyclopedia of Modern Cooking.  Surprisingly, out of a stack of forty different vintage cookbooks spanning the early 1900s to the early 1980s, Meta’s book was one of just a few that contained any recipes for fresh blackberries at all. Homemade jam and blackberry pie unified the books that did include the fruit, but Meta’s was the only cookbook that combined blackberries with a cake in the name of Sally Lunn. I love any recipe that is unique and stands out. The name Sally Lunn sounded curious and since I’d never heard of her before I had a feeling this might be fun to share with you too.

Like the age-old conundrum of who came first – the chicken or the egg – there are two different variations of a baked good that purportedly made Sally Lunn famous. One was a yeasted savory bread that looks like a cross between a bundt cake and a hamburger bun…

The yeasted bread version from the Williamsburg Cookbook, 1981 edition
Another version – not quite as bun-like on the bottom. Photo also from the Williamsburg Cookbook, 1981 edition.

and the other is a sweetened tea cake that looks like something between a blueberry pancake and a cobbler…

You wouldn’t be wrong to call either variation a Sally Lunn, even though they are two completely different types of food. Because of that, her name has popped up in recipe titles in a myriad of ways. There’s the Sally Lunn Bun, Virginia Sally Lunn, Sally Lunn Bread, Sally Lunn Cake, Sweet Sally Lunn, and just plain old Sally Lunn among others.  Likewise, in indexes, you’ll find her popping up under L for Lunn, S for Sally, or more specifically under category sections that include Cakes, Breads, Desserts, Baked Goods, Tea Cakes, Yeast Breads, Coffee Cakes, Coffee Breads, etc. So how could one possibly mythical person be identified with two types of very different yet specific baked goods over the course of hundreds of years?

As it turns out no one knows. And thus far it has been impossible to authentically identify any true source that leads to Sally and the bread and cake that share her name. Lots of ideas about her float around.  She was a teenage maidservant named Sally Lunn who delivered a newly invented bread to her master of the house, who in turn delightfully named it for her. She was a talented French baker named Solange, who escaped to a bakery in England where she began to make a popular brioche-style confection that looked like the rising of the sun. She was a working-class woman in 18th century England crying out her name in the streets as a sales tool for the bread that became her trademark. There’s even a historic eating house in England that speculates they might have been the site of Sally’s original bakery in the late 1600s.

Sally Lunn’s Historic Eating House in Bath, England

I like to believe the theory that Sally Lunn was an actual baker living in 1700s England. The story details how she invented a sweet yeast bread that became very popular at first locally, then regionally, then across the sea. With this theory, it makes sense then that references to Sally Lunn would have shown up in early American cookbooks, a favored recipe brought over by the English as they colonized America. Possibly, at some point in history, when yeast either became too expensive, or there was a shortage, a non-yeast cake version was invented by some other creative and clever baker in the 1800s who used all the same ingredients of Sally Lunn bread minus the yeast. Thereby keeping the name Sally Lunn in the recipe title. By the time, the 1950s rolled around perhaps Meta made her own creative choice by marrying blackberries into the non-yeast version of Sally Lunn cake. Whether this is an accurate assumption or not, no one will ever know for certain unless some of Sally’s baking notes happen to show up. But with all this mysteriousness that surrounds Sally and her two contributions to the baking industry, I think she’d be happy knowing that at least her name stayed attached even though the origin story didn’t. It is, after all, the ultimate branding success story, 1700’s style!

Meta Given’s two-volume Modern Encyclopedia of Cooking from the 1950s

Meta Given was a legend in the culinary world in her own right. A nutritionist at heart, she set out to write some of the most comprehensive cookbooks of the 1950s that included recipes for people across the entire economic spectrum. Her books featured everything from thrifty staples like squirrel stew to elegant French dishes with layered sauces and nuanced flavors. Her mission was to make cooking fun, enjoyable, and accessible for everyone while also making it nutritious and creative.  I’m so pleased to present her lovely sweet treat of a dessert that highlights the juicy, sun-ripened flavors of blackberries nearing summer’s end. What I love about this cake in particular is that it is pretty healthy – using small amounts of sugar, butter, and flour. The blackberries really keep the cake moist and add a familiar sweet-tart flavor similar to cobbler but with a velvety more dense consistency like a blueberry pancake.  If you wanted to add an extra dash of sweetness you could drizzle the whole cake with honey or follow Meta’s suggestion of adding a lemon sugar glaze once the cake is out of the oven, but I loved it just as it was… simple and summery.

Meta Given’s Fresh Blackberry Sally Lunn Cake

1-pint box of freshly picked blackberries (enough for 2 1/2 cups)

1 tablespoon sugar

1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour

2 teaspoons baking powder

1/4 teaspoon salt

3 tablespoons salted butter, softened

2/3rd cup sugar ( I used raw cane sugar)

1 large egg

1 1/2 tablespoons lemon juice

1/2 cup sour cream*

1/2 cup whole milk*

(*Note – The milk measurement was left out of the original recipe, but was included in a revised edition in 1959. I used the sour cream/milk combination but you can also substitute those two ingredients for 1 cup of buttermilk).

Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Butter well an 8 1/2″ inch springform cake pan.

Drop berries into a bowl of cold water to rinse and remove any stems or leaf debris. Swish berries gently and then by hand remove them to a colander to drain. Once the berries have drained in the colander transfer them to a medium size bowl and gently toss them with 1 tablespoon of sugar. Set aside.

In a separate bowl, sift the flour, baking soda, and salt together. Set aside.

In another bowl, whip the butter, sugar, and egg together until creamy. Stir in lemon juice using a wooden spoon and then add the flour, sour cream, and milk, blending until smooth.

Gently fold in the blackberries until just well distributed. Turn batter into prepared pan.

Bake until golden brown (about 40-55 minutes) or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. Once ready to remove from oven, let cake cool slightly in pan on a cooling rack before serving either lukewarm or at room temperature.

In addition to enjoying the end-of-season fruit harvest this month, Fresh Blackberry Sally Lunn cake also freezes well. So if you choose that storage method you’ll still be able to taste the warm days of summer even on the coldest winter nights. And because it does have a pancake-esque quality to it, it wouldn’t be terrible to serve it for breakfast or even alongside a summer salad for brunch or lunch. This Fall, I’ll share the other version of Sally Lunn as we dive into bread-baking season to see how these two, and if these two compare in any way other than by name.

In the meantime, cheers to Sally and to Meta for baking delicious food that withstands not only multiple decades but multiple centuries too!  If you are interested in learning more about Meta and her cookbooks, find a few in the shop here. The Williamsburg Cookbook will also be heading to the shop shortly as well, in case you want to catch up on your colonial fare before heading into the holiday season. Find that one coming to the cookbook section shortly. And finally, this cake was styled using the lovely vintage 1960s Italian cut glass cake stand which you can find in the shop here.

Sugar Spun Success: It’s the 1920’s, It’s Wilton and It’s the Winter Snowflake Cake!

Published on by In The Vintage Kitchen10 Comments

Although it was invented technically in 1927, television didn’t make a widespread appearance in homes until the 1950’s. And cooking shows didn’t reach their heyday until the 1990’s. That means there was no Food Channel, no Great British Baking Show, no Martha Stewart. If you wanted expert instruction in the 1920’s on how to bake a festive looking cake for the holidays you basically had four options as far as guidance… your mom, your grandmother, your favorite cookbook or your favorite radio show…

Agnes White Tizard, the voice of Betty Crocker on Betty Crocker’s Cooking School of the Air taught listeners how to cook for 20 years. Read more about her here.

Very reliable sources for sure, those options would have definitely produced a delicious, time-tested cake that everyone enjoyed, and had been enjoying for years and years. But none of those options would have been able to show you how to make something new and innovative. For that you would have had to go to Chicago – to the Wilton School of Cake Decorating, where you’d get expert hands-on-training on how to make the most pretty and modern cake of the holiday season.

Dewey McKinley Wilton

Started in 1929 by confectionery artist Dewey McKinley Wilton,  the Wilton School first taught classes to area pastry chefs in the hotel industry. Dewey had a special relationship with these guys in particular. As a traveling pulled sugar expert, Dewey would show up in hotel kitchens around the Midwest when the pastry chefs needed an extra bit of magnificence to wow their hotel guests.

An example of pulled sugar ribbons atop a modern day cake. This is the type of work Dewey did for area hotels in the 1920’s. Photo via pinterest.

Most of these pastry chefs were wonders themselves in the cake baking department, having been trained in Europe, and were very proficient with a frosting knife and lofty buttery layers. But they weren’t quite as familiar with Dewey’s flair for pulling sugar into hardened shapes and intricate designs.

A 1920’s pastry chef with confectionery creation. Photo courtesy of snackncake.com

Quite curious, they wanted to know about techniques, about processes, about possibilities. And most importantly, all these pastry chefs wanted to know how exactly a pot of boiling melted sugar could eventually turn into a big, brilliant ribbon or a bird or a crunchy piece of abstract art. Dewey was more than happy to share what he knew, but after so many pastry chefs in so many hotels kept asking so many of the same questions over and over again, his entrepreneurial spirit kicked in.

Instead of telling each chef, one by one, how pulled sugar was done, he realized he needed to be teaching one class geared towards many minds.  So that’s what he did. He started the Wilton School of Cake Decorating in the dining room of his house in 1929 and charged $25 a class for an expert lesson on how to pull sugar and make hard candies. The class filled up in a jiffy. Nothing excites a pastry chef more than a newfangled way to decorate a sweet treat, and in all that sugary merry making of the new School there was plenty of learning going on.  While Dewey was teaching his students, he was also learning about their classical European ways to bake, frost and assemble cakes in eye-catching ways.

An image from the early years of the Wilton School of Cake Decorating.

Soon word spread beyond the pastry chef community. The school was fun and informative and produced the most spectacular and delicious cakes the Midwest had ever experienced. People started arriving for instruction from other towns beyond Chicago, and then other states beyond Illinois. Home cooks, caterers, food economists and restaurant owners were clamoring to learn Dewey’s special way with cakes – a method he wound up calling the Wilton Way – which combined the best parts of European baking with simple easy-to-replicate American designs.

Now getting ready to celebrate its 100th birthday in a few short years, The Wilton School of Cake Decorating and Confectionery Art still remains a bustling educational center for all baking aficionados.  Determined to create interesting and engaging art through butter and suagr, Dewey and his following generations grew the business into not only a school, but also a food product and accessories line that can be found in most grocery stores around the country today as well as on their website. They even offer online classes for those who can’t make the trip to Illinois to join the fun in person.

That’s a pretty remarkable career for any business, let alone one in the baking industry where it can be difficult to remain innovative and approachable at the same time. Thanks to Dewey’s Wilton Way  and his easily accessible method, he helped dispel the myth that cake decorating was an intimidating, complicated art meant for only a certain type of person.  Thousands of accomplished students have graduated from the Wilton program since its inception, many continuing on with successful careers in the baking industry.

Here in the Vintage Kitchen, I was introduced to the Wilton Way through this book…

a 1991 reprint of their 1979 cake decorating book. It is full of attractive cakes, some vibrant with retro charm, others timeless and elegant…

Laid out like coursework, it teaches readers progressively in master class style. Meaning that if you start at the very beginning, and work your way through each chapter, by the end of the book you’ll have amassed so much skill you’ll be able to confidently tackle the baking and decorating of a multi-tiered wedding cake festooned with  a bevy of frothy details.

This past week, I endeavored to make their Winter Snowflake Cake – a pale green pastel beauty that consisted of two layers and frosted snowflakes…

This was my first foray into cake decorating with an intentional design, multiple frostings and more than one piping project, so it was a fun adventure, but it definitely didn’t go quite as planned. The Wilton’s are fast to reassure in their book, saying that the best way to make a perfect cake is to practice, practice, practice. I fast forwarded through the beginning chapters and went straight to this cake. That being said, here’s my finished version…

You’ll notice it is missing some elements from the original cake – most noticeably the side snowflakes. I’ll explain how they went awry further down in the post. I’m also sharing the recipes, as I go along too, in case you want to take yourself to school and experiment with making your own vintage snowflake cake this winter as well.

One funny thing about this cake decorating book in particular is that it’s all about cake decorating and only cake decorating, which means that you have to gather a recipe in order to bake the actual layer cake part from another source. I used Martha Stewart’s Butter Cake recipe which turned out great because it baked flat and even on all sides – characteristics you definitely want when making a multiple layer cake.

Martha Stewart’s Butter Cake 1 

(makes two 9.5″ inch round cakes)

8 ounces unsalted butter

3 cups cake flour, plus more for dusting

1 tablespoon baking powder

1/2 teaspoon salt

2 cups sugar

4 large eggs

1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

1 cup whole milk

Preheat oven to 350. Butter cake pans and dust with flour, tapping out excess flour.

Whisk together flour, baking powder and salt in a medium bowl. Set aside.

In a large bowl, using an electric mixer, mix butter and sugar until pale (about 2-3 minutes). Add eggs, one at a time, mixing well after each addition. Add vanilla and mix again.  Add flour mixture in three batches alternating between each batch with two batches of milk. Stir until evenly combined.

Distribute batter evenly between cake pans (this is about 3 1/4 cups of batter per pan).

Bake for 20-25 minutes or until cake tester inserted in center comes out clean.

Let cakes cool in pan on wire rack for 20 minutes. Invert cake layers and remove cake from pan. Let cool on wire rack completely then wrap each cake in wax paper and then plastic wrap and store in the fridge until you are ready to frost.

—

There are two types of frosting used for this cake. A pale green buttercream and a bright white royal icing. Both icing recipes are from the Wilton School and are easy to use. They both include a curious ingredient called meringue powder (made by Wilton!) which can be found in the baking section of your grocery or online.

I didn’t even know there was such a thing as meringue powder before this project,  but basically it is an egg-white substitute used in place of whipping up fresh eggs. Normally, I’m not a fan of substitute convenience products but since this was the first time I was making this cake I wanted to use the products they recommended. Next time, I’ll try to make my own meringue using fresh eggs. Now it’s onto the frosting…

Snow-white Buttercream

(makes 8 cups)

2/3 cup water

4 tablespoons meringue powder

11 1/2 cups sifted confectioner’s sugar

1 1/4 cups butter

3/4 teaspoon salt

1/2 teaspoon vanilla

2-3 drops green food coloring

In a large mixing bowl, combine water and meringue powder and whip at high speed until peaks form. Add 4 cups sugar, one cup at a time, beating at low speed after each addition. Alternately, add butter and remainder of sugar. Add salt and vanilla and beat at low speed until smooth. Add food coloring one drop at a time, (a little goes a long way!) mixing thoroughly between drops until a desired shade is achieved. The color will deepen as the icing ages, so keep that in mind when adding drops.

Special note: This  recipe makes enough frosting for one two layer cake  including top, sides and  filling between layers, plus a little extra. Leftover frosting can be stored in an air-tight container in the fridge for several weeks.

Next, I set to work frosting the top of the first layer and then the top and sides of the next layer…

When it was all sufficiently frosted, I cleaned the frosting knife and then gently scraped it as evenly as possibly around the sides of the cake to create a smooth texture.That same treatment was repeated on top of the cake too so that it maintained a flat and level surface. At this stage, I learned a fun little trick. A little drop of water helps to smooth icing out – so round I went once more on the sides with a wet frosting knife. Then the cake was set aside so that the icing could harden (or “crust” as Wilton described it). Next on the schedule was making the icing for the snowflakes…

Meringue Royal Icing

(makes 3 1/2 cups)

3 level tablespoons meringue powder

1 lb. confectioner’s sugar

3 1/2 oz. warm water

1/2 teaspoon cream of tartar

Combine all ingredients in a medium sized mixing bowl. At first, mix slowly with an electric mixer then increase the speed to medium and mix for 7-10 minutes.

Things is where things got a little bit tricky. While the snowflake icing is super easy to make,  the method used to make the snowflakes is really difficult. It involved piping icing onto wax paper…

letting each snowflake dry for an hour…

re-piping each one again (aka over-piping), letting it dry for another hour…

and then carefully removing each snowflake from the wax paper and adhering them to the cake one by one. In theory, this sounds simple enough, but each snowflake was very tricky to remove without them doing this…

After many attempts and many hours, I abandoned this method of snowflake making altogether. Evidently I need more practice in this department! Instead, I just carried on and piped the large snowflake directly on top of the cake, freehand style, and left the sides bare.

Finally, this winter snowflake cake was trimmed on top and bottom with little snowballs. Wilton recommended using two-different sized pastry tubes #3 and #6 for this task, but I just used just one ziploc bag and it worked great.

And that was how this vintage snowflake cake came to be. It definitely isn’t a perfect cake compared to Wilton standards, but it was a whole lot of fun to make and has me thinking about future designs once I practice, practice, practice as Wilton often recommends.

Have you guys ever decorated cakes like this before? If you have any tips or techniques or adventure stories of your own confectionery creations, please share them in the comments section below. It will be fun to help propel the educational portion of this post, so that we can all learn together. And most definitely, if you embark on this winter snowflake baking project, please let us know how it all tuned out in your kitchen.

In the meantime, learn more about the wonderful world of Wilton and their inspiring vintage cake decorating book  here.  Several other shop items also made an appearance in this post’s photos as well… find the 1960’s era glass cake stand here, the 1920’s silver plate water pitcher here, and the vintage embroidered tea towel here.

Hope your weekend is as sweet as buttercream and as lofty as a layer cake! Cheers!

 

The Cake That Fed An Entire Town: {Part One} On Election Day in 1700’s America

Published on by In The Vintage Kitchen8 Comments

Once upon a time in history long, long ago there was a cake that fed the whole entire town on Election Day. Called simply, Election Cake, it was an active participant in the voting scene of early America. But while the recipe’s origins are as old as the United States itself, the exact history is a little bit varied depending on which source in which state is telling the tale.

The first American cookbook was written by Amelia Simmons and published in 1796. Her second edition of this cookbook, published two years later in 1798, features the first published recipe for Election Cake.

Essentially though, everyone pretty much agrees that it boils down to the early days of New England (some say Connecticut, some say Massachusetts) when Election Day was celebrated in the Spring and considered one of the biggest party days of the year. Enjoyed with the same amount of zeal as our modern St. Patrick’s Day festivities, Election Day in 1700’s America was a boozy holiday full of ale and camaraderie and community support. Only people weren’t celebrating one particular heritage like we do the Irish on St. Patrick’s Day. They were celebrating everyone’s heritage, as Americans, on Election Day. The fervor was for freedom. And the cake was needed to sop up everyone’s spirits (the ale especially).  It also provided a little motivation to actively vote for the political candidates of the day, because even in 1700’s America, people (and politicians!) were aware of the powerfully compelling nature of cake and its ability’s to attract favor.

Being such a big festivity in the lives of Colonial America, with people traveling from miles around to attend special gatherings,  it made sense to local residents, at the time, to bake one enormous cake to serve all who showed up. So out of thirty quarts of flour and fourteen pounds of sugar and ten pounds of butter, Election Cake was born from the loving hands and hearts of local women who couldn’t vote themselves but could at the very least feed the men who were voting for them. Some historians say that this proves that women were important members of the political spectrum even back then when they had no vocal authority.  I don’t know about that, they may have just looked at the voting day in a practical feed-the-masses way,  but it is fun to think that while they were baking, they were also discussing political topics among themselves. Even if they were just hushed whispers while they were mixing batter and melting butter, I like to think they were formulating their own ideas about what should and could happen in the future shaping of America.

An election cake recipe from 1889 by Ellen Wadsworth Johnson. Photo courtesy of connecticuthistory.org

The interesting thing about Election Cake though is that it is not really cake. Since its inception it has really been more of a fruit and spice studded bread than a traditional cake. And in true American spirit it has been revised and enhanced and reworked over the centuries into numerous different versions like breakfast buns, frosted bundt cakes and drunken fruit cakes. The core of the recipe remains the same though – flour, butter and sugar – but over the years different variations have been included and excluded that involve milk, eggs, raisins, currents, citrus fruits, whiskey, rum, brandy, wine, confectioner’s sugar, etc. Baking equipment differs too. Originally, back in the day when one giant cake was made, it was too big to fit into any bakeware so it just baked free-form on the oven floor. Next came bread loaf pans, a smart decision that produced numerous easy-to-handle loaves that could be made by numerous hands. Then there was the bundt cake method, the cast iron skillet method, the baking dish method, etc.

The 1965 edition of the Fannie Farmer Cookbook originally published in 1898.

For this post, I’m making the Fannie Farmer version from her 1965 Fannie Farmer Cookbook, which was first published in 1898. True to form, this recipe has changed a bit over the Fannie Farmer years too. The 1960’s version involves raisins, whiskey and loaf pans. Her original recipe from 1898 called for figs, sour milk and bread dough starter.

The bulk of this project lies in waiting for the dough rise (six hours!).

A nine hour baking project from start to finish, this is a kitchen adventure that will unfold over two days and two blog posts. Tonight, we discussed the history behind the recipe, and tomorrow we’ll discuss the actual recipe and how it all turned out. Will it indeed be more like a raisin bread rather than a fruit cake, as it is listed in Fannie’s cookbook? Will our modern palettes fall in love with this old fashioned recipe enough to resurrect it and recommend it in the Vintage Kitchen?  Will it become a repeat labor of love on future days of election or will it be a one hit-not-so-wonderful? Only time will tell in this case. Tune in tomorrow for the 2018 Election Day results, vintage kitchen style…