Cake Walk

Baking recipes usually frown on softer apples, specifying instead that you use Granny Smith. But this fragrantly spiced, fabulously flavored and pleasingly textured cake makes beautiful use of varieties such as Roma, Cortland or MacIntosh which have tender flesh. This is also good with apples that you’ve had in a bowl on the counter for a while– that last bit of the bushel you picked!

The apples partially “melt” right into the cake as it bakes. Putting it over the top? The caramel flavor of the maple-brown-sugar frosting goes supremely well with the apples and spice in the cake. Stacked, the layers make a towering apple amazement—homey indulgence of the best sort. Note: For best release, I line the cake-pans with well-greased parchment—sides AND bottoms.

From the time it opened in its first unit in 1898 until the last Ebinger’s Bakery turned out its lights in 1972, the Brooklyn bakery chain was known for this dark chocolate cake.  This recipe is answer to multiple requests for it and comes to us compliments of Chicago-based chef and baker, Gale Gand.  As Gale puts it, “Ebingers was renowned for the purity of its ingredients, the sparkling cleanliness of its stores, and the deep chocolatey-ness of this cake.”  Long after the last Ebinger’s finally closed Gand says devotees kept Blackout Cakes in their freezers. “I mean, for years!” she laughs.

Recreating the cake, Gand didn’t have access to one of these freezer fossils. Instead, she relied on the taste-memories of Ebinger’s fans who grew up in Brooklyn. Gand included this group as her taste-panel.  Says Gand, “They were a tough crowd, but they told us we finally got it right. The custard filling is finally the perfect deep, velvety, very, very, dark brown.” Continue Reading…

From the time it opened in 1905, until it closed in 1962, Little Jack’s restaurant was a force in the Chicago restaurant dining scene. At its peak in the ’50s, the sprawling three-dining room restaurant reportedly served between 600,000 and 1 million meals annually. Named for John H. “Little Jack” Levin (1887-1971), Continue Reading…

Cheesecakes come in dozens of flavors and textures. Contrasting with the dense, baked cheesecakes many know, this vintage 1959 no-bake version is so light and airy, it about levitates above the plate. If you have cheesecake lovers in your crowd, definitely try this one. You can make it two days in advance–keep it well-covered in a domed cake-keeper in the fridge until service.

Continue Reading…

This beautiful cake is our family-birthday must. After I researched this story about it and developed the recipe, with input from the Dressel family, the Chicago Tribune ran a little feature on my work, and–I’m pleased to say, liked it as much as we do : ) 

Here’s the original story…

There’s no clue that the breezy, grass-covered, empty lot at 66^th and Ashland was once the master plant of Chicago’s most famous bakery, or, that the red brick storefront at 33^rd and Wallace was its first location.  Although gone without a trace, Dressel’s Bakery was for 60-plus years the maker of Chicago’s beloved Chocolate Fudge Whipped Cream Cake. Continue Reading…

I am a strawberry girl. I eat strawberries out of hand, make pies & jams with them, macerate them, even grill and pepper them. So imagine my delight at finding myself  kneedeep in Pete Ambrose’s organic strawberry patch on Wadmalaw Island, South Carolina. Continue Reading…