My Chocolate Season 2022: Wacky Cake

Looking for another luscious, last minute Thanksgiving dessert? This Wacky (Chocolate) Cake couldn’t be easier or faster. If you enjoy baking, you likely have plenty of butter and confectioner’s sugar on hand. But you only need those if you also make the icing.

As stated in Southern Living’s recipe notes, “This cake was created when many common ingredients were hard to acquire, or food items were being rationed, so the recipe doesn't include any butter, eggs, or milk.” 
​
Click on the recipe link above-which includes an embedded link for the frosting-and follow along, as I share my thoughts/V.O.E.s. 

Although this recipe features sifted flour, cocoa powder, salt, and baking soda, I’ve never owned a sifter, so I filtered each of these ingredients through my sieve. I also initially ‘sifted’ them into a large bowl, before transferring the whole combination into an 8- by 8-inch ungreased pan. 

I created three wells in the mixture, but I should have made the oil well larger (I used safflower oil because that is what I had on hand). Thankfully, the oil run-off didn’t hurt the recipe, and everything blended easily after I added the water. 

Blending ingredients after adding water

FROSTING NOTES

Although recipe instructions mention pouring this mixture atop the cake, I found it too dense, even while blending the ingredients. At a certain point my whisk couldn’t adequately handle the frosting density, so I switched to a large spoon. I also incorporated two extra tablespoons of milk. And, because I wanted to temper the frosting sweetness a bit, I had already reduced the amount of powdered sugar by ¼ cup.

Southern Living recommends topping this finished cake with pecans, but I again worked with what I already had and substituted walnuts. About that nut-free section of cake. With two toddler grandsons, nuts just won't cut it  :)

The results? Moist, dense, decadent, and tough to stop eating. But we did, to make sure there was some left for tomorrow. Happy Thanksgiving, everyone!