Anna Sultana’s Milkless, Eggless, Butterless Cakes (Chocolate or Raisin) and Two-Egg Sponge Cake

Well, we’ve just gotten through about a month of living in quarantine.

To be honest, for many seniors in Manitoba staying home during early Spring is  just a regular part of our usual way of living.

During this time we have icy sidewalks, what with our usual freeze and thaw weather pattern.

But the shortages at the grocery store is becoming a bit unnerving.

Sometimes it calls for a bit of ingenuity in the kitchen before we can make dinner, or desserts.

Flour is a staple, but it can cause a problem if you run out.

Check the back of your cabinets.

If you have cake & pastry flour and the recipe calls for all-purpose flour, just add two tablespoons to each cup of cake and pastry flour.

If you have all-purpose flour and the recipe calls for cake & pastry flour, just remove two tablespoons from each cup of all-purpose flour.

I’m hoping that you've also got a bag of raisins just sitting on the shelves.

Depression Cake, also called Boiled Raisin Cake or War Cake, is a recipe that doesn’t call for milk, eggs or butter.

Neither does Ma’s Easy Raisin/Sultana Cake.

Got raisins? Got cake.

Hints:

About the Chocolate Cake, when we're over the virus crisis:

Instead of the water you can use 1 Cup lukewarm sour milk or buttermilk.

Instead of the oil, you can use 1/2 Cup margarine, melted.

If you’ve got a tin of frosting, or feel like making some, it would be appreciated.

Chocolate Mocha Frosting

Dissolve

1 Tablespoon instant coffee

in

1/2 Cup hot water

Set aside.

In a medium mixer bowl cream

3/4 Cup Crisco

1 Tablespoon vanilla

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/2 Cup unsweetened cocoa

Making 3 dry and 2 liquid additions, add

4 1/2 Cups sifted icing sugar

Alternately with the prepared coffee.

Beat well until smooth.

You could split the cake to make it more like a layer cake.

                        Chocolate Cake

Grease an 8 inch square pan

Preheat oven to 350º F

Sift into a medium bowl

1 1/2 Cup flour

1 Cup sugar

3 Tablespoons cocoa

1 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon baking powder

1 teaspoon baking soda

Add

3 ounces oil 

1 teaspoon vanilla

1 teaspoon cider vinegar

1 Cup water

Mix well.

Pour the batter into the prepared pan.

Bake 40 minutes.

Insert a toothpick to test the cake to be sure it's done.

Place the cake in the pan on a rack.

Allow it to cool for 10 minutes before turning it out onto a platter.

                        Two-Egg Sponge Cake

Grease and flour an 8 inch square pan

Preheat oven to 325º F

Note: This cake batter is thin.

Place in medium bowl

1 Cup flour

1 teaspoon baking powder

1/4 teaspoon salt

Blend together and set aside.

Heat but do not boil

1/2 Cup milk

In a mixing bowl beat thoroughly at medium speed

2 large eggs

Slowly add

3/4 cup sugar

Continue beating for another five minutes.

Gradually add

3 Tablespoons oil

1 teaspoon vanilla

1 Tablespoon lemon juice

Make 3 dry (the flour) and 2 liquid (the milk) additions to the egg mixture.

Mix lightly, only enough to blend well.

Pour the batter into the prepared pan.

Bake 30 minutes.

Insert a toothpick to test the cake to be sure it's done.

Place the cake in the pan on a rack.

Allow it to cool for 10 minutes before turning it out onto a platter.

Anna Sultana’s Mocha Cake and Mocha Fudge Frosting

I’m watching Julie & Julia on television.

It just started.

Julie has had a rough day at work.

She’s home and is making a chocolate cream pie.

That chocolate pie lead to her blogging, sort of.

Ah…  chocolate…

Chocolate has had its place in my writing career, too, sort of.

When Sophie and I wanted to start our radio show in 2007 we had to come up with a name.

It was supposed to be short, catchy, something to tell the listeners who we were.

We went home and wrote lists of what we thought were perfectly good titles.

Robin Eriksson, the Program Director at CKUW, wasn’t impressed by our ideas.

She suggested we name our show Better Than Chocolate.

Since we were totally out of ideas - and we knew she had final say on the show’s name - we agreed to accept her suggestion.

Now we’re talking two senior citizens.

I was 57 and Sophie was 75 years old.

Neither of us had heard of, let alone seen, the movie Better Than Chocolate.

It was a 1999 Canadian romantic comedy movie shot in Vancouver and directed by Anne Wheeler. 

Just so you know, it is one of Canada's highest grossing films of all time, really, according to the Cannes Film Festival Website.

Yeah, well, there were Canadian beavers in it, all right, but just not the type of beavers two old ladies would go to the movies to see.

Wonder how many of our listeners were equally surprised when they tuned in to us.

In 2009 that radio show became my blog Winnipeg is Better Than Chocolate.

Which I started after seeing the movie Julie & Julia.

The circle of life... Julia... Julie... me.

Oh, well…  Back to chocolate…

Chocolate’s health benefits have been in the news lately.

Last year the Huffington Post had an article about that, too:

10 Ways Giving In To That Chocolate Craving Can Benefit Your Health

So, yes, there's proof, chocolate is good for you.

But a square of chocolate doesn’t quite seem like enough for a dinner dessert.

Especially if it’s been a Sunday dinner type of dinner.

That does seem to call for Julie’s chocolate cream pie.

Or Ma’s Mocha Cake with Mocha Fudge Frosting.

Hints:

If you are using all purpose flour in this recipe remove two tablespoons from each cup of all purpose flour.

If you are using cake & pastry flour in a recipe that calls for all purpose flour add two tablespoons to each cup of cake and pastry flour.

The frosting instructions are for the sheet cake.

If you are making two layers:

Cut 2-inch-wide strips of wax paper.

Place the cake upside down on a serving plate.

Arrange the wax paper under the cake to protect the plate.

Spread the frosting over the cake with a spatula.

Smooth the frosting over the top and sides.

Place the second layer on top and cover with frosting.

Let the cake set at least an hour before serving.

                        Mocha Cake

Place the rack in the centre of the oven.

grease a 13 x 9 x 2 inch baking pan or 2 8 inch round pans

      

Preheat oven to 350º           

Sift together into a large mixer bowl

2 Cups cake & pastry flour

2 Cups sugar

3/4 Cup cocoa

2 teaspoons baking powder

1 teaspoon baking soda

1 teaspoon salt

Add

2 large eggs

1/2 Cup oil

1 Cup strong black coffee

1 Cup buttermilk

Beat at medium speed for 2 minutes.

The batter will be thin.

Pour the batter into the prepared pan or pans.

Smooth the surface with a spatula.

Bake until the cake is done, 35-45 minutes (30-35 minutes for round pans).

A toothpick should come out clean.

Let the cake cool in the pan on a wire rack for 5 minutes.

Invert the cake onto the rack and let it cool completely.

                        Mocha Fudge Frosting

Chop

8 ounces bittersweet chocolate

Place in a medium saucepan

1/2 Cup heavy cream

1/4 Cup butter

2 Tablespoons light corn syrup

1 teaspoon instant coffee powder

Heat until simmering.

Remove the pan from the heat and add

chopped bittersweet chocolate

Stir until smooth.

Chill, stirring occasionally, until the frosting is thick enough to spread.

Cut 2-inch-wide strips of wax paper.

Place the cake upside down on a serving platter or board.

Arrange the wax paper under the cake to protect the platter.

Spread the frosting over the cake with a spatula.

Smooth the frosting over the top and sides.

Let the cake set at least an hour before serving.

Loretta Lynn’s Chocolate Mocha Cake (Her 1980s Crisco Ad)

A few years ago I got a few e mails asking if I had the recipe for the Co-Op Refrigerator Cheesecake that appeared on the Co-Op milk cartons during the 1960s.

No surprise that the company had a great recipe that used their product.

Duh… would they have a crappy recipe?

Just got another e mail asking about Loretta Lynn’s cake.

Back in the 1980s Loretta Lynn had been featured in a Crisco ad.

The Coal Miner's Daughter was quoted saying:

Crisco’s the recipe for cakes this light, frosting this creamy…

I’ve told folks that I wouldn’t bake without my Crisco.  ‘Cause Crisco’s what I trust to make my cakes rise up this high and light, my frosting to turn out this creamy… But don’t you go using anything but Crisco if you want it to taste like mine.

Crisco’ll do you proud everytime.

Well, alrighty then.

Who’s going to argue with Loretty?

Luckily I still have a few old magazines.

And, in quite a few, there was the smiling face of The First Lady of Country Music and her recipe.

Hint:

The recipe in the ad is called Chocolate Mocha Cake.

To be honest, it’s a white cake with a Chocolate Mocha Frosting.

But Chocolate Mocha Cake is what Loretta called it.

So, so will I.

This recipe calls for cake flour.

Don’t have cake flour?  No problem.  

I included a recipe for Homemade Cake Flour Substitute in the Anna Sultana’s Crumb Cake post a few days ago.

Coincidence or what?

Maybe this was a salute to Loretta’s simpler life…

The recipe said:

Beat at medium speed for 2 minutes, or beat vigorously by hand for 300 strokes.

Doesn’t that just sound like it was written by The Coal Miner's Daughter?

I just wrote about the mixer.

I mean, this is the twenty-first century.

                        Loretta Lynn’s Chocolate Mocha Cake

Preheat oven to 350º

Grease and flour 2  9 inch round pans

In a large mixer bowl place

2 1/2 Cups sifted cake flour 

1 2/3 Cups sugar

3 1/2 teaspoons baking powder

1 teaspoon salt

Stir in 

3/4 Cup milk

2/3 Cup Crisco

Beat at medium speed for 2 minutes.

Add

3 large eggs

1/2 Cup milk

1 teaspoon vanilla

Beat at medium speed for 2 minutes.

Pour batter into prepared pans.

Bake 35 to 40 minutes or until cake tests done.

Cool 15 minutes; remove cakes from pans.

Let cool completely.

Fill and frost with Chocolate Mocha Frosting.

Chocolate Mocha Frosting

Dissolve

1 Tablespoon instant coffee

in

1/2 Cup hot water

Set aside.

In a medium mixer bowl cream

3/4 Cup Crisco

1 Tablespoon vanilla

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/2 Cup unsweetened cocoa

Add 

4 1/2 Cups sifted icing sugar

Alternately with the prepared coffee.

Make 3 dry and 2 liquid additions.

Beat well until smooth.

Spread over the cake layers and sides.

Another sentimental favourite is Eaton’s original Red Velvet Cake.

Memories….