Midnight Sky Cake

A positively gothic recipe

I was noodling around with recipes and came up with this one. I didn’t mean to bake a Goth cake, it’s just that the only baking cocoa in the pantry was Black Cocoa¹ and I’d been asked for a dairy-free chocolate cake. In fact, this recipe is not only dairy-free, but egg free. The base recipe, which I have tweaked rather a lot from it’s origin, came from a James Beard cookbook, so it’s entirely possible this cake has roots in the Great Depression and the food rationing during (and somewhat after, depending on the part of the world you live in) World War II. I can tell from the use of only baking soda that it is an older recipe, newer ones will use double-acting baking powder as it is a more reliable leavening agent with less touchiness about how much mixing you do, or how fast it gets in the oven.

Midnight Sky Cake

preheat oven to 350F, then grease or line a 9x13 pan with parchment paper, or 12 cupcake liners in a muffin pan

• 1 1/2 c all-purpose flour

• 4 tbsp black cocoa powder

• 1 1/2 tsp baking soda

• 1 c sugar

In a mixing bowl, sift together the dry ingredients. Pour in the wet:

• 1 c water

• 1 tbsp lemon juice

• 1 1/2 tsp coffee extract²

• 1/2 c melted and cooled lard

Quickly stir the wet into the dry just until the batter is combined, don’t worry about any lumpiness. Pour the batter into the pan. Get it in the oven as soon as you can, the leavening reaction works right away and you want to keep it in the batter!

Bake for about 20 minutes, until firm to the touch and a cake tester comes out clean. Cool, sprinkle lightly with powdered sugar. Serve with berries if you have them, or a drizzle of warm berry jam, in lieu of frosting. Or simply as it is, for a less sweet treat!

I was pleasantly surprised at how fast and easy this is to make up, and how moist it was. It is a very chocolatey, sweet cake for it’s simplicity. It was served to supper guests and got praise from all, and my friend Dorothy dubbed it Midnight Sky cake, for the color and sprinkle of white powdered sugar stars on top. It tends towards tender and crumbling, so would not be ideal for frosting and decorating, unless made into cupcakes where no lateral pressure need be applied. It’s so easy, and you could make it with whatever baking cocoa you had on hand, if you don’t want to keep the black in your pantry, that it would be a lovely fast informal dessert or treat any day of the week.

1. No food coloring involved, the cocoa processing leaves it black as night, and it’s dutch-processed which means it’s less bitter than baking cocoa powder generally is, although still more bitter than I like in my coffee. You can find it on Amazon (that’s an affiliate link, thank you).

2. Or vanilla, if you haven’t soaked some coffee beans in vodka or other clear liquor for a couple of weeks, which is all you need to make coffee extract.