Old Fashioned Chocolate Mayonnaise Cake

Making do...with Bombshell results!


Although I won't swear to it, I think this is a Depression Era recipe, and it makes perfect sense if you think about it. When oil, butter and eggs were terribly expensive, home cooks could make use of the ingredients from mayonnaise is made (oil and eggs), and still produce decandent chocolate cakes for their families. The cool thing is that these cakes actually were delicious - and it's hard to find one that is more moist than this. Ask someone who went through the Depression about a mayonnaise cake, and chances are you'll see that dreamy look, along with "my grandmother used to make a cake that was SO good...". That's exactly what this is.



I made just a couple of changes to the very traditional mayonnaise cake, to brighten up and intensify both the chocolate flavor and the faint 'tang' in the background that sets it off so beautifully. The cake also goes together in a snap, and is perfectly paired with a simple chocolate frosting. The result is moist, delicious, not too sweet and perfectly chocolate. They knew what they were doing in the Depression - making do with what they had, and still producing food that was worthy enough of a deep "mmm hmmm!". That's Bombshell in any era!

Ingredients


You'll Need:



· 2 cups flour



· 1/2 cup cocoa



· 1 1/2 teaspoons baking soda



· 1/4 teaspoon salt



· 1 cup sugar



· 3/4 cup mayonnaise



· 1/2 cup cold coffee



· ½ cup sour cream



· 2 teaspoons vanilla



Frost with vanilla buttercream, cream cheese frosting or chocolate frosting. The favorite frosting in our house is the simple chocolate frosting - not too sweet and a perfect compliment to the moist cake!

Directions


1. Butter and flour two nine inch cake pans. Preheat oven to 325F.

2.In a medium mixing bowl, sift together flour, cocoa, baking soda and salt.

3.In the bowl of an electric mixer, cream together the sugar and mayonnaise.

4.Add the coffee, sour cream and vanilla, mixing well.

5.Add the flour/cocoa mixture to the sugar/mayonnaise mixture, and stir until compeltely blended.

6.Divide the cake batter evenly between the two prepared cake pans, smoothing the tops of the batter with a knife or offset spatula.

7.Bake at 325F for twenty minutes, turning and rotating pans halfway through cooking time. Allow the cakes to cool in their pans for 10 minutes, then turn them out onto wire cooling racks. Allow to cool completley before frosting with Chocolate Frosting.