Depression cake is a type of
cake
Cake is a flour confection made from flour, sugar, and other ingredients, and is usually baked. In their oldest forms, cakes were modifications of bread, but cakes now cover a wide range of preparations that can be simple or elaborate, ...
that was commonly made during the
Great Depression
The Great Depression (19291939) was an economic shock that impacted most countries across the world. It was a period of economic depression that became evident after a major fall in stock prices in the United States. The economic contagio ...
. The
ingredient
An ingredient is a substance that forms part of a mixture (in a general sense). For example, in cooking, recipes specify which ingredients are used to prepare a specific dish. Many commercial product (business), products contain secret ingredie ...
s include little or no
milk
Milk is a white liquid food produced by the mammary glands of mammals. It is the primary source of nutrition for young mammals (including breastfed human infants) before they are able to digestion, digest solid food. Immune factors and immune ...
,
sugar
Sugar is the generic name for sweet-tasting, soluble carbohydrates, many of which are used in food. Simple sugars, also called monosaccharides, include glucose, fructose, and galactose. Compound sugars, also called disaccharides or double ...
,
butter
Butter is a dairy product made from the fat and protein components of churned cream. It is a semi-solid emulsion at room temperature, consisting of approximately 80% butterfat. It is used at room temperature as a spread, melted as a condiment ...
, or
eggs
Humans and human ancestors have scavenged and eaten animal eggs for millions of years. Humans in Southeast Asia had domesticated chickens and harvested their eggs for food by 1,500 BCE. The most widely consumed eggs are those of fowl, especial ...
, because the ingredients were then either expensive or hard to obtain. Similar cakes are known as "War Cake", as they avoided ingredients that were scarce or were being conserved for the use of soldiers. A common depression cake is also known as "
Boiled Raisin Cake", "Milkless, Eggless, Butterless Cake", or "Poor Man's Cake". "Boiled" refers to the boiling of raisins with the sugar and spices to make a syrup base early in the recipe. However, some bakers do include butter. Boiled raisin-type cakes date back at least to the
American Civil War
The American Civil War (April 12, 1861 – May 26, 1865; also known by other names) was a civil war in the United States. It was fought between the Union ("the North") and the Confederacy ("the South"), the latter formed by states th ...
.
History
Depression cake has been referred to as "War Cake" by texts dating back to
World War I
World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...
. In a pamphlet distributed by the
United States Food Administration
The United States Food Administration (1917–1920) was an independent Federal agency that controlled the production, distribution and conservation of food in the U.S. during the nation's participation in World War I. It was established to preve ...
in 1918 entitled "War Economy in Food", War Cake is listed under "Recipes for Conservation Sweets". The United States Food Administration stressed the importance of reducing sugar consumption during the war and offered molasses, corn syrup, and raisins in its place.
When the
Great Depression
The Great Depression (19291939) was an economic shock that impacted most countries across the world. It was a period of economic depression that became evident after a major fall in stock prices in the United States. The economic contagio ...
hit America following the Stock Market Crash of 1929, families were forced to stretch their budgets and "make do" with minimal and cheap ingredients when it came to cooking. Some women were able to feed their families on $5 per week. Dessert became a luxury for most, and depression cake was a more affordable alternative to other cakes that used milk, eggs, and butter. Affordability was achieved through ingredient substitution. For example, shortening was substituted for butter, water was substituted for milk, and baking powder was substituted for eggs. Depression cake is just one of many examples of ingredient substitution during the Great Depression, as some women took full advantage of the practice by making mock foods such as mock
apple pie
An apple pie is a fruit pie in which the principal filling ingredient is apples. The earliest printed recipe is from England. Apple pie is often served with whipped cream, ice cream ("apple pie à la mode"), or cheddar cheese. It is generally ...
and mock fish.
Radio shows and women's periodicals played a large role in circulating the recipe for depression cake during the Great Depression.
Betty Crocker
Betty Crocker is a brand and fictional character used in advertising campaigns for food and recipes. The character was originally created by the Washburn-Crosby Company in 1921 following a contest in the '' Saturday Evening Post''. In 1954, ...
's Cooking Hour was one such show that provided women with budget-friendly recipes.
General Mills
General Mills, Inc., is an American multinational manufacturer and marketer of branded processed consumer foods sold through retail stores. Founded on the banks of the Mississippi River at Saint Anthony Falls in Minneapolis, the company orig ...
, owner of Betty Crocker, employed nutritionists and cooks to experiment with different ways of "ruining" a cake, such as ingredient omission.
Loring Schuler
Loring Ashley Schuler (August 24, 1886-June 4, 1968) was an American journalist and editor of the ''Ladies' Home Journal'' from 1928 to 1935.
Schuler was born in 1886 and grew up in New Bedford, Massachusetts and graduated from Harvard University ...
's ''
Ladies' Home Journal
''Ladies' Home Journal'' was an American magazine last published by the Meredith Corporation. It was first published on February 16, 1883, and eventually became one of the leading women's magazines of the 20th century in the United States. In 18 ...
'' was a publication that also offered baking tips during the Great Depression, recommending replacing eggs with baking powder and using inexpensive grains and produce.
A recipe titled "War Cake" was published in
M.F.K. Fisher
Mary Frances Kennedy Fisher (July 3, 1908 – June 22, 1992) was an American food writer. She was a founder of the Napa Valley Wine Library. Over her lifetime she wrote 27 books, including a translation of ''The Physiology of Taste'' by Brillat- ...
's book ''
How to Cook a Wolf'' and republished in her ''
The Art of Eating''; it uses
bacon
Bacon is a type of salt-cured pork made from various cuts, typically the belly or less fatty parts of the back. It is eaten as a side dish (particularly in breakfasts), used as a central ingredient (e.g., the bacon, lettuce, and tomato sand ...
grease on the premise that
spice
A spice is a seed, fruit, root, bark, or other plant substance primarily used for flavoring or coloring food. Spices are distinguished from herbs, which are the leaves, flowers, or stems of plants used for flavoring or as a garnish. Spices a ...
s will mask its taste.
Today
Praised for its practicality and declared to be "the most worthwhile cake ever made," depression cake is still baked in modern America.
["Depression Cake Still Popular." The Telegraph-Herald. Dubuque, Iowa, May 30, 1973, 128 edition.] The recipe for it has been featured in an array of publications such as ''
The Telegraph-Herald
The ''Telegraph Herald'', locally referred to as the ''TH'', is a daily newspaper published in Dubuque, Iowa, for the population of Dubuque and surrounding areas in Iowa, Illinois, and Wisconsin. The newspaper is the result of a 1901 merger of th ...
'', ''
The Pittsburgh Press
''The Pittsburgh Press'' (formerly ''The Pittsburg Press'' and originally ''The Evening Penny Press'') was a major afternoon daily newspaper published in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, from 1884 to 1992. At one time, the ''Press'' was the second larg ...
'', and ''
The Modesto Bee
''The Modesto Bee'' is a California newspaper, founded in 1884 as the ''Daily Evening News'' and published continuously as a daily under a variety of names. Before its purchase by Charles K. McClatchy and McClatchy Newspapers in 1924, it merged ...
''.
Ingredients and recipe
Some commonly used ingredients in depression cake:
*white sugar,
*brown sugar,
*
molasses
Molasses () is a viscous substance resulting from refining sugarcane or sugar beets into sugar. Molasses varies in the amount of sugar, method of extraction and age of the plant. Sugarcane molasses is primarily used to sweeten and flavour foods ...
,
*
corn syrup
Corn syrup is a food syrup which is made from the starch of corn (called maize in many countries) and contains varying amounts of sugars: glucose, maltose and higher oligosaccharides, depending on the grade. Corn syrup is used in foods to softe ...
,
*
strong coffee, water, or
apple juice
Apple juice is a fruit juice made by the maceration and pressing of an apple. The resulting expelled juice may be further treated by enzymatic and centrifugal clarification to remove the starch and pectin, which holds fine particulate in suspe ...
,
*
shortening
Shortening is any fat that is a solid at room temperature and used to make crumbly pastry and other food products. Although butter is solid at room temperature and is frequently used in making pastry, the term ''shortening'' seldom refers to bu ...
or
lard
Lard is a semi-solid white fat product obtained by rendering the fatty tissue of a pig.[Lard]
entry in the o ...
*dark
raisin
A raisin is a dried grape. Raisins are produced in many regions of the world and may be eaten raw or used in cooking, baking, and brewing. In the United Kingdom, Ireland, New Zealand, and Australia, the word ''raisin'' is reserved for the d ...
s or diced pitted
prune
A prune is a dried plum, most commonly from the European plum (''Prunus domestica''). Not all plum species or varieties can be dried into prunes. A prune is the firm-fleshed fruit (plum) of ''Prunus domestica'' varieties that have a high solu ...
s,
*
apple
An apple is an edible fruit produced by an apple tree (''Malus domestica''). Apple fruit tree, trees are agriculture, cultivated worldwide and are the most widely grown species in the genus ''Malus''. The tree originated in Central Asia, wh ...
,
*unsifted
all-purpose flour
Flour is a powder made by grinding raw grains, roots, beans, nuts, or seeds. Flours are used to make many different foods. Cereal flour, particularly wheat flour, is the main ingredient of bread, which is a staple food for many cultures. ...
,
*
rye flour,
*salt
*
baking soda
Sodium bicarbonate (IUPAC name: sodium hydrogencarbonate), commonly known as baking soda or bicarbonate of soda, is a chemical compound with the formula NaHCO3. It is a salt composed of a sodium cation ( Na+) and a bicarbonate anion ( HCO3−) ...
,
*
baking powder
Baking powder is a dry chemical leavening agent, a mixture of a carbonate or bicarbonate and a weak acid. The base and acid are prevented from reacting prematurely by the inclusion of a buffer such as cornstarch. Baking powder is used to increase ...
,
*
cinnamon
Cinnamon is a spice obtained from the inner bark of several tree species from the genus ''Cinnamomum''. Cinnamon is used mainly as an aromatic condiment and flavouring additive in a wide variety of cuisines, sweet and savoury dishes, breakfa ...
,
*
allspice
Allspice, also known as Jamaica pepper, myrtle pepper, pimenta, or pimento, is the dried unripe berry (botany), berry of ''Pimenta dioica'', a Canopy (forest), midcanopy tree native to the Greater Antilles, southern Mexico, and Central America, ...
,
*
clove
Cloves are the aromatic flower buds of a tree in the family Myrtaceae, ''Syzygium aromaticum'' (). They are native to the Maluku Islands (or Moluccas) in Indonesia, and are commonly used as a spice, flavoring or fragrance in consumer products, ...
,
*
nutmeg
Nutmeg is the seed or ground spice of several species of the genus ''Myristica''. ''Myristica fragrans'' (fragrant nutmeg or true nutmeg) is a dark-leaved evergreen tree cultivated for two spices derived from its fruit: nutmeg, from its seed, an ...
,
*chopped
walnuts
A walnut is the edible seed of a drupe of any tree of the genus ''Juglans'' (family Juglandaceae), particularly the Persian or English walnut, ''Juglans regia''.
Although culinarily considered a "nut" and used as such, it is not a true bot ...
,
almonds
The almond (''Prunus amygdalus'', Synonym (taxonomy)#Botany, syn. ''Prunus dulcis'') is a species of tree native to Iran and surrounding countries, including the Levant. The almond is also the name of the edible and widely cultivated seed of th ...
, or
pecans
The pecan (''Carya illinoinensis'') is a species of hickory native to the southern United States and northern Mexico in the region of the Mississippi River. The tree is cultivated for its seed in the southern United States, primarily in Georgia, ...
.
Pears were sometimes substituted for apples.
An example for a depression cake recipe is as follows:
*Preheat oven to 350°F. Grease a 13 by 9 in baking pan. In a large saucepan, combine 1 cup white sugar, 2 cups firmly packed brown sugar, 2 cups water, 1 cup shortening, 4 cups seedless raisins, 1 tsp cinnamon, 1 tsp nutmeg, 1/2 tsp cloves, and 2 tsp salt. Boil together for 3 minutes, then cool.
*Sift together 4 cups flour, 2 1/2 tsp baking powder, 2 tsp baking soda. Add to saucepan, along with 2 cups chopped nuts (optional.) Mix well and pour into baking pan. Bake for 45 minutes.
*Remove from oven. Let cool for 10 minutes, then turn onto a cake plate. When thoroughly cool, sprinkle with a little powdered sugar or mix lemon juice and grated lemon rind into powdered sugar for frosting.
[Canfield, Jack, Mark Victor Hansen, and Diana Von Welanetz Wentworth. Chicken Soup for the Soul Cookbook: 101 Stories with Recipes from the Heart. HCI, 1995.]
This is one example of a depression cake recipe. Other variations may include corn syrup, molasses, brown sugar, and various fruits. In some instances, bakers would leave the cake unfrosted or sprinkle the top with powdered sugar in lieu of icing. The interchangeability of ingredients makes the recipe for depression cake extremely versatile.
See also
*
Bulldog gravy another Great Depression era food
*
Wacky cake
Wacky cake, also called crazy cake, Joe cake, wowie cake, and WW II cake, is a spongy, cocoa-based cake. It is unique in that unlike many pastries and desserts, no eggs, butter or milk are used to make the cake batter.
Wacky cake may have been ...
, a cake that became popular during World War II rationing
References
{{reflist, 2
Cakes
Historical foods