There’s a saying that goes: Fast. Cheap. Good. Pick any two. The meaning is clear. You can have cheap and fast, but it won’t be good. Cheap and good, but it won’t be fast. Fast and good, but it won’t be cheap. But all three? Impossible. Until now, that is.
They say that oil and water don’t mix. But what about chocolate and vinegar? An unexpected boon of the economic crisis was the rediscovery of depression cooking. Have you seen the YouTube videos of Clara, a nonagenarian Great Depression survivor who instructs on how to cook using ingredients like day-old bread or dandelion leaves, and how to substitute for richer, more expensive items.
Aside from Clara’s lessons being both informative and quite honestly humorous, we’ve even discovered what we think is the best ever Depression recipe, a wonderfully moist and dark chocolate cake that’s both parve and eggless. The twist is the addition of vinegar, which saves the baker the cost of eggs. Apparently the vinegar interacts with the baking soda to create the rising effect, but that’s getting a bit too scientific for us. All we know is, this recipe is definitely going in the collection!
Chocolate Vinegar Cake
Adapted from, among others, King Arthur Flour
Ingredients
- 1.5 C flour
- 3/4 C sugar
- 1/2 t salt
- 1 t baking soda
- 1/4 C unsweeted cocoa powder
- 1.5 t vanilla extract
- 1/3 C canola or grapeseed oil
- 1 T white or apple cider vinegar
- 1 C cold water
Instructions
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Preheat oven to 350°F for 15 minutes. Oil a loaf or square cake pan.
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Stir together all the dry ingredients and create a well in the center. Add the wet ingredients, one by one, to the well. Mix.
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Bake for 25-30 minutes (a bit longer if you're using the loaf pan), and then cool on a wire rack for 1 hour. Serve frosted or with warm poached fruit, such as cranberries.
