Idiot Cake

As a kid, I loved fruit cocktail. Yes, there were never enough cherries, but there were plenty of mushy, unidentifiable white and beige cubes swimming in a thick syrup made of 98% sugar. What more could a cavity-ridden child ask for?

A favourite of cakers everywhere, Idiot Cake (a.k.a. Fruit Cocktail Cake) is the softest, fruitiest and squishiest cake you’ll ever eat. The cake itself is pretty special, but once you pour that hot milk, sugar and butter mixture overtop, you’re left with something that resembles a wet sponge. Only it tastes better than a wet sponge. Like, a lot.

As to why it’s called Idiot Cake, who knows? Maybe you’re an idiot if you screw up the recipe. Or you’re an idiot if you don’t like it. Or maybe you’re an idiot if you don’t make the cake (which you should, because it’s delicious).

Shredded coconut alert! Do NOT attempt to eat this cake without a toothpick handy. Otherwise, your co-workers might catch you flossing your teeth with the corner of your business card. Then you’ll really look like an idiot. Trust me on this one.

1½ cups white sugar
½ cup corn oil
2 eggs
Beat and mix well.
Sift:
2 cups flour
½ teaspoon salt
2 teaspoons soda
Add: 1 14-ounce can fruit cocktail. Mix well.
Pour above mixture into a 9x13 pan. Greased and floured. Bake at 350° for 45 minutes.
Topping:
½ cup butter
¾ cup white sugar
½ cup milk
Boil together for 1 minute. Remove from heat and add 1 teaspoon vanilla. Pour over cooled cake in pan while still hot. Sprinkle with ½ cup coconut. This also makes a delicious dessert (see note) served with ice cream, whipped cream or Dream Whip.

Note: “Also makes a delicious dessert?” What other reason would you eat this? For breakfast? Actually, now that I think about it….

PS: I’ll announce the winner of my Pink Thing contest this Friday!

Source: Women’s Ministries Cook Book, Calvary Pentecostal Church

Pink Thing

The bad news? We’re at the end of Unfortunately Named Caker Recipe Month. The good news? I’ve got something pink.

Like most cakers, I enjoy entertaining. Once the crockpot has been unplugged, the paper plates crammed into the garbage and the Taster’s Choice has been served, there’s nothing I like more than turning to my guests and asking, “Who’s got room for some Pink Thing?”

Look, there’s no reason to feel ashamed – everyone should indulge every now and then. Pink Thing is creamy, tasty as heck and hits the spot. Toss in some nuts and you’re in seventh heaven. Take it from someone who knows – Pink Thing delivers!

A few months back, I gave readers the chance to win copies of my novel, Natural Order, along with a handwritten recipe card. Fellow blogger Mimi was one of the winners and I sent her the recipe for Pink Thing. (Check out her results.) Naturally, I had to taste Pink Thing for myself – and now I’ve got another contest lined up!

Simply leave a comment that uses Pink Thing in a sentence. I’ll pick the best one and send the winner a copy of my first book, Fruit. I’ll even sign it so you get an extra 50 cents on eBay. Make sure you leave your comment by next Sunday, June 2. (And yes, you can opt in as "Anonymous.")

Good luck!

1 can cherry pie filling
1 can Eagle Brand milk
1 can pineapple tidbits
1 carton Cool Whip
1 ½ cups pecans, chopped

Mix and refrigerate overnight. Spoon into pudding dishes or parfait glasses. Serves 8.

Source: London Newcomer’s Cook Book

(Yep, this is the same gem that gave me “This is Terrible – the Soda is Overwhelming!” Cherry Pudding.)

Make Do Squares

It's week three of Unfortunately Named Caker Recipes and I can hardly stand the excitement. This week’s recipe doesn’t have the same visual associations as Bun Spread or Corn Ring, but I think these squares are about as unfortunately named as caker recipes get.

Nothing says “low expectations” more than Make Do Squares. I’m not saying that cakers take a lot of pride in our cooking, but most of us at least put some effort into faking it. Call these squares “Cereal Celebration Crunchies.” Call them “Chocolate Cheerio Squares.” Just don't call them what they are – which is pretty much a brown cube of I-simply-don't-give-a-crap.

If you do make Make Do Squares, avoid bringing them to funerals, bridal showers or anniversary parties. You’ll send a mixed message which will leave people thinking you’re a) mean b) lazy c) suicidal or d) all three. Instead, save them for yourself for those times when you’re tired of making do with your job, your weight or your oppressive, suffocating relationship with Mother.

1/3 pound butter or margarine (see note)
12 ounce package chocolate or butterscotch chips
1 cup peanut butter
8 ounce package walnuts
1 bag miniature marshmallows or 3 to 4 cups of your favourite cereal (ie Captain Crunch, Cheerios)

Melt the butter, chips and peanut butter over medium heat. Add vanilla and remaining ingredients. Press into buttered 8 x 12 pan. Cool. Cut into squares.

Note: I screwed up the recipe and accidentally used 2/3 pounds of butter. They turned out a little, er, slick. But that's okay. I made did with them.

Source: Simply Delicious! A Collection of our Favourite Recipes, The United Way of Leeds and Grenville

Corn Ring

Well, here we are – week two of Unfortunately Named Caker Recipe Month. This week’s gem features an ingredient that cakers often refer to as “liquid gold.” That's right, I’m talking creamed corn.

Although most cakers don’t like vegetables, we make an exception for creamed corn. Mainly because it has sugar. It’s also less work to chew since the niblets are all soft and mushy. And, being imaginative people, cakers are also fascinated by the shapes creamed corn makes as it spreads across our dinner plates. ("Look, mother! A goat!")

Although it’s unfortunately named (and ugly as a one-eyed toad), Corn Ring is a dish I’d proudly serve to company at Sunday dinner. If I had Sunday dinners. Or company. It’s basically a moist, oat-laden meatloaf wrapped around a steaming hot lake of creamed corn goodness. And who wouldn’t dive right into that?

Now that I stop to think about it, the corn doesn’t make the “ring.” The ground beef does. The corn makes the hole in the centre. So really, this should be called Corn…uh, never mind. I just realized this dish was about to fall into a new category: Really Unfortunately Named Caker Recipes.

1 ½ pounds ground beef
1 cup uncooked Quaker oats
2 eggs, beaten
1 cup milk
¼ cup chopped onion
2 ½ teaspoons salt
¼ teaspoon pepper
1 teaspoon prepared mustard
1 14 ounce can creamed corn
Combine all ingredients except corn thoroughly. Pack firmly in 1 quart casserole dish. Make a hole in centre and put in corn. Bake at 375° approximately 1 hour. Serves 6.

Source: The Cooking Secrets of First United Church Women, Port Credit, Mississauga

Bun Spread

It’s Caker Cooking’s two-year anniversary!

It seems like only 730 days ago I posted my first recipe for Mock Apple Pie. Since then, there have been a few tears, a few laughs and more than a few pounds. (It’s gotten so bad, I’m wearing Spanx in the shower these days.)

To celebrate my milestone, I’m christening May as Unfortunately Named Caker Recipe Month. Every week I’ll feature a caker recipe that – while delicious – has a name only a mother could love. Provided that mother is blind, deaf and delusional. I’ve posted some unfortunately named recipes before (remember Dump Cake and White Stuff?) but the recipes I’m featuring this month have a special place in my heart.

On that note, I can’t think of a better way to celebrate my anniversary than by spreading my buns.

Er. That didn’t sound good. Let me try again. 

Who doesn’t love a tasty bun spread?

Uh, take three.

When was the last time a bun spread made your eyes roll back in your head?

See what I mean? Regardless of how you say it, stringing the words “bun” and “spread” so close together is pretty much guaranteed to garner some awkward coughs, gossip at the next Euchre night or, if you're lucky, a phone number. My advice? Leave out the “bun” and just say “spread.” As in, “Hot damn, Dolores – now that's what I call a spread!”

Now doesn’t that sound better?

See you next week for another unfortunately named caker recipe!

1 can tomato paste

1 can shrimp

½ cup cooked bacon or ham

½ teaspoon Italian spice

1 can mushrooms

½ cup grated cheese

¼ cup brown sugar

¼ cup green pepper

¼ cup onion

Mix all ingredients together. Spread on bun halves. Bake at 350° for 20 minutes This mixture can be frozen.

Editor's note: Fresh buns make all the difference in the world.

Source: Cook Book of the Mount Royal United Church, Saskatoon

Black Forest Squares

Ever since whatshisname with the wig and wooden false teeth chopped down his cherry tree, cakers have had a love affair with cherries, especially when they come in a can of gloopy, varnishy pie filling. Just consider some of the recipes I've already featured: Dump Cake, Coca Cola Salad and Easy Peasy Cherry Pie.

Cakers’ love of cherries explains why Black Forest cake is probably one of our favourites, especially when it comes from the grocery store under a plastic dome with an orange “Reduced for Quick Sale” sticker slapped on the side. Mmm. Can’t you just taste those disintegrating mountains of whipped cream and chocolately shavings now? Someone get me $4.99 and a fork!

Unlike the cake, these Black Forest Squares (although they're more cakeish than squareish) put the cherry pie filling into the batter. The result? Pretty much the dampest cake you’ll ever come across. And who doesn’t like damp? Unless, of course, it’s gym socks, your cellar or the back of your thighs on a July day while sitting on the vinyl-covered seat of a Chevette, wondering if Mother is ever going to come out of the bingo hall.

1 chocolate cake mix
2 eggs
1 teaspoon almond extract
1 can cherry pie filling
1 container chocolate icing

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. In bowl, mix first 4 ingredients together until well blended. Pour mixture into greased 10x15 inch pan (see note) and bake for 25 to 30 minutes. Remove, let cool and ice with chocolate icing.

Note: 10x15? Who has a 10x15 pan? I used a 9x13 instead.

Source: Royal Recipes For the Love of Tiny Hearts, Children’s Hospital Foundation, Eastern Ontario and Western Quebec


HEY! May marks the TWO-YEAR anniversary of Caker Cooking! I’ve got a month-long special in the works that you won’t want to miss, so check back next week for all cakery good times.

Pineapple Casserole

As a simple Canadian caker coming from a country with only 10 11 12 provinces, I often find keeping track of all those U.S. states confusing. I mean, Alabama, New York, Wisconsin, Miami. There's just so many of them.

I have some American Caker Cooking readers, so I like to give both of them a shout out every now and then by featuring a recipe from their land. This week’s recipe comes from a place called Lake Hasavu in Arizona. For those Canadians who don’t know where Arizona is, it’s that rocky place where the Brady Bunch went on vacation.

Just to add to my American confusion, this Pineapple Casserole is made with canned pineapple chunks, Ritz crackers and cheese. That's pretty much it. I mean, where’s the ground beef? The cream-of-something soup? Where’s the salt, for crying out loud?!?

Enough whining. Pineapple Casserole is tasty enough in that weird fruit-and-cheese kind of way. For all I know, it could be a popular dish in Arizona. But next time, I think I'll opt for pork chaps and appleshach.

4 cans Dole pineapple, well drained or 2 larger cans of other brand
1 ½ cups grated cheese
2/3 cup crushed Ritz crackers
5 tablespoons flour
1 stick margarine, melted

This makes a large batch – 9x9” Pyrex casserole pan (square). Serves 12-16. (May use smaller pan and make ½ batch for family size.

Place pineapple evenly over bottom of pan. Mix flour with grated cheese and sprinkle over pineapple. Sprinkle crushed Ritz crackers (or substitute salt-free crackers). Pour melted margarine over, bake 30 min. at 350 degrees. Good served hot with a meat course or later served either hot or cold as a snack or dessert.

Source: Havasu Regional Hospital Auxiliary, Lake Hasavu City, Arizona