Amish Chocolate Flat Cake

About a decade ago, I was asked to bring a birthday cake to my dear (and now sadly departed) friend Suzanne Wasserman's 50th birthday party at the Bridge Cafe. So I baked a nine-inch red velvet layer cake. Imagine my dismay when I arrived at the party and realized that this single cake would need to feed about 40 guests.  (I had another frosted cake at home -- I was selling them at the time and always made two -- but couldn't convince my teenage son to bring it to the restaurant.) Throughout the dinner I fretted about the scarcity of dessert but by some absolute miracle the staff managed to carve out enough slices of decent size.

Not that I should have substituted this large flat cake (for Suzanne and her husband David loved red velvet), but I would have had a much more relaxed dinner.

This vintage recipe is from an Amish collection I purchased years ago. It's baked in an 11 x 17 inch jelly roll pan and, when baked and frosted, it's just 1/2 inch tall, hence its name. Both the cake and its frosting couldn't be easier to make and will certainly feed a large crowd.

Upon hearing the name "flat cake," the DH said I should pair it with #FlatLillian, an initiative at Henry Street Settlement, to spread the word and work of it's founder Lillian Wald by photographing her against all sorts of backdrops. Suzanne, a filmmaker and historian, studied the Lower East Side and was one of Lillian's biggest fans.


#Flat Lillian with the frosted chocolate flat cake.

This is a very, very simple cake to make done on the stovetop and in a bowl. No heavy machinery needed.  Melt the butter, water, and cocoa in a saucepan.

Pour the mixture into a bowl and add in the dry ingredients. Stir or whisk to combine.



Add in the eggs, buttermilk, vanilla and baking soda, whisking them together them first.



Pour the cake into a greased jelly roll pan. I sprayed the pan with Pam, then laid a sheet of parchment over to ensure an easy release.



The unfrosted cake.



While the cake is in the oven, begin the frosting. Boil butter, cocoa and buttermilk, then add in confectioner's sugar, nuts, vanilla and salt.



Frost the cake while it's still warm. You'll need an offset spatula or butter knife to spread the frosting over the cake.



Henry Street's Executive Director David Garza, a real #FlatLillian champion, eating the cake (even though he's not supposed to, so don't tell anyone).

Production notes: I followed the recipe exactly, except I substituted butter for the Crisco.  The Amish, rather thrifty folk, probably wanted to save some money.  I wasn't sure if the cake should be warm, or just the frosting, so I made sure both were warm when I frosted it.  You'd be fine with a cool cake and warm frosting. If you don't have buttermilk, you can make your own by mixing some white vinegar in regular milk and having it stand for a few minutes.  The amount of salt in the frosting should be a pinch -- it won't taste salty, but will add a depth of flavor.  Chop the nuts on the finer side.

Family Chocolate Cake Recipe

This Family Chocolate Cake recipe is not my family's -- it belongs to the Wenzel family whose son Ryan worked for me a few years ago. It was passed down from Ryan's paternal grandmother and the go-to cake for all family birthdays. After he shared the recipe, I baked one for his farewell party. Although it was delicious, and a big hit, I never got around to blogging about it. Until now.

We celebrated my niece Jessica's birthday last weekend because it happened to fall on Honeyball Day, our family tradition where we make strufoli, an Italian confection from my husband's childhood. I'm not a fan, but it's a fun day. However, I am a big fan of this old-fashioned chocolate cake with white frosting, also called "gravy" frosting. You'll see why below.

Start by melting the butter and chocolate in water.

When it's smooth, remove from the heat and let it cool to room temperature.  Because chocolate is the star, it's better to use good quality (i.e., not a supermarket brand) chocolate. I used Scharffen Berger, one of my favorites. 

Next, start the batter.  It really couldn't be easier.

Add the chocolate mixture to the batter and incorporate.

After adding the dry ingredients and sour cream, pour the batter into greased and floured pans.

Remove from the oven, cool on a rack for about ten minutes, then turn the cakes out from the pan to completely cool. Ryan once skipped this important step, and frosted a warm cake, with rather unfortunate consequences.

While the cake is cooling, begin the frosting. It uses flour (!)) which is why it is often referred to as gravy icing. It's a very old recipe and one that should be returned to the American frosting repertoire. I screwed this up the first time by overcooking the flour and water mixture. You want it to be thickened, but not so much that it congeals, as below. Lesson learned.

Cream the butter and sugar, then add the cooled "gravy" mixture and continue beating until light and fluffy.

Frost the cake. As you can see at the top, this didn't make quite enough frosting to completely cover two nine-inch layers, so I made a naked cake, all the rage these days. However, if you plan to do so, even off the cakes completely (cut the domes flat) so the side frosting doesn't gather in the gap.

Wenzel Family Chocolate Cake and White Icing

Production notes: I followed this recipe exactly, except I substituted butter for the margarine.  I baked it in two nine-inch round pans -- but didn't have enough frosting. If you want to fully frost a two-layer cake, increase the frosting amounts by 50 percent. I baked the cakes for 25 minutes. Check for doneness at 20 minutes by inserting a toothpick into the centers. (Also, Ryan just let me know that the original recipe calls for semisweet chocolate, though the unsweetened works fine.)

The birthday girl, Jessica, below. Not only was she elected to the Alpha Omega honor society in medical school, and matched to her first choice for residency, she is about to become chief resident in pediatrics (a specialty that will be very welcome in our family in a few months!), and plans to follow with a fellowship in pediatric intensive care.

Easy Chocolate Cake

This is truly the easiest chocolate cake ever, and surprisingly delicious. It's fun and different to make -- you've heard of a one-bowl cake -- well, this is a one-saucepan cake.  Yes, it's all mixed on the stove top.

In an essay entitled "The Low-Tech Person's Batterie de Cuisine" in Home Cooking by the late great Laurie Colwin, she writes that fancy (or a lot of) equipment isn't needed to turn out wonderful home-cooked meals. (Who needs a food processor when you have a knife?) This cake recipe, probably from the 1940s, is proof of that.  It requires just a saucepan, a fork (to beat the egg), a spoon to stir the batter, a measuring cup and a baking tin.

Start by cooking the milk, chocolate and butter.  Add  the sugar and cool.  Then add the egg and dry ingredients.  Stir and pour into an 8- or 9-inch cake pan.  (Or you could divide the batter to make a layer cake.)

When it is done baking, let it cool.  You can slice off the "dome" as I did.  A nice way to get a flat top (and taste-test the cake -- we gave it an A).

I was rushing when I made this cake because I was bringing it to a friend's house just an hour after I began the preparation.  I whipped up some vanilla frosting quickly and, because the cake was still warm when I had to frost it, left the sides unfrosted so that the heat would have an escape route. I added some sprinkles so no one would notice.

I followed the recipe exactly, baking it in an 8-inch pan.  (Not sure what a utility pan is.)  I used unsalted butter and Scharffen Berger unsweetened chocolate.  Because I didn't have any whole milk on hand, a combination of skim milk and half and half was a nice substitute.