Crazy Cake! How to Make Rich Chocolate Cake with No Eggs or Butter

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I recently received an exquisite book titled Wartime Farm: Rediscovering the Skills and Spirit of World War II. It shipped all the way from England! The authors—Peter Ginn, Ruth Goodman and Alex Langlands—also star in the BBC series Wartime Farm. The book and series are about their experiences reenacting the way a farm would have been run during the War.

Rationing & Improvisation

The chapter “Wartime Food” noted that rationing was not about supplying food but about placing limits on the amount of certain foods a person could purchase. It is hard to imagine how much this must have affected everyday homemaking in a time when most meals were prepared at home.

The Ministry of Food diligently shared recipes and ideas for ways to prepare meals without key ingredients. Lots of improvisation needed to happen to keep everyone alive and healthy enough to work.

Ancestry of a Chocolate Cake

I was unaware of all this when invited to dinner at a friend’s house years ago. Dessert that evening was the most fudgy, decadent chocolate cake I had ever tasted. After getting the recipe, I threw away my other chocolate cake recipes. It is one of those that has been handed from person to person for so long, nobody knows where it came from. With no eggs or butter, it would have been a good option during the War.

The recipe has more sugar than would have been possible during the War. Because sugar is considered a wet ingredient in baking, some or all of it could be replaced by maple or golden syrup. The recipe also calls for a good bit of oil. Half or all of that could be replaced by applesauce. Apples were available during World War 2 so applesauce could have been made at home.

The icing may not have been an option. It does contain one-and-a-half weeks’ worth of butter ration so would most likely have been reserved for a special occasion—except when icing was forbidden. Yes, that did happen and even wedding cakes were “iced” with elaborately decorated cardboard covers. 

This cake recipe could easily have been developed during the War and morphed over the years to include more sugar and fat. At any rate, the cake would be delicious even with less sugar and with applesauce for oil. If you want to try it without icing, a la 1940s, top it with a dusting of confectioner’s sugar or mock marzipan.

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Crazy Cake

Yield 8-10

Author Harriett Sebastian

Enjoy this easy, one-bowl recipe for Crazy Cake—crazy because it bakes up tender and rich without any eggs or butter. Score one more victory for the Home Front!

Ingredients

Cake

• 3 cups all-purpose flour (plus extra to flour the baking pan)
• 2 cups sugar
• 2 teaspoons baking soda
• 1/3 cup cocoa
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 2 tablespoons espresso granules
• ¾ cup salad oil (half or all can be replaced by applesauce)
• 2 teaspoons vinegar
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 2 cups water

Icing

• 6 tablespoons cocoa
• 6 tablespoons butter, softened
• 4 tablespoons hot water
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 3 cups confectioner’s sugar

Instructions

1. Preheat oven to 350°F. Grease and flour a 9”x13” pan.
2. Blend dry ingredients (including sugar, if using) in a large bowl. Add wet ingredients to dry and blend with a fork until thoroughly mixed. Do not overmix, beat or blend with a mixer. Pour batter into prepared pan and bake 35-40 minutes or until a toothpick inserted into the center of the cake comes out clean. Do not overbake. Allow cake to cool before icing.
3. For the icing, mix the first four ingredients together.
4. Add confectioner’s sugar and beat until smooth.
5. Spread on cooled cake.

My soul, wait silently for God alone, for my expectation is from Him. Psalm 62:5