When I was growing up, there was a certain delicacy that one could only obtain at the cafeteria at whatever school you happen to be attending at the time. This delicacy, was known as "wacky cake". Wacky cake day was always a good time. Back then, wacky cake was the most delicious food product ever invented, at least that's how my fond memories of it are stored. Out of the blue one day I decided that I should reproduce this stupendous feat of culinary mastery. After all, I am the cook in my house. I am always cooking something. I cook some sort of food almost every single day. I am quite good at it, so I decided that I could decode the hidden secrets of this marvelous gem.

I sent an email to my friend, who was able to obtain what could very well turn out to be the exact recipe that the school used for the delicious treat. Could it be this easy? No way, wacky cake is special, and indigenous to only my region of my county of my state. No way someone would easily part with such an item, it would surely be locked away at Fort Knox, under tight government control.

After obtaining the recipe I discovered that it did not contain what type or size of pan would be required for said cake. Oh my, what shall I do? Being an avid chef, I certainly realized that these two key pieces of data could prevent my dream of once again being reunited with my long lost chocolatey friend. I decided to forge ahead, and do whatever it takes to make wacky cake, even if it meant making 1000 crappy substandard wacky cakes along the way.

To minimize the amount of brown chunks I produced before hitting the jackpot, I decided to hit up a few pages I frequent that would have some standard cake recipes, so that I could compare how much raw material went into other cakes in relation to what size pan they used. On a whim, I poked in "wacky cake", and whatta ya know.... there were already wacky cake recipes floating around. After a cursory perusal of them I soon realized that they were basically the same recipe, with a few minor changes here and there for pan size and whatnot. A quick hit of Wikipedia even produced a short writeup on the damn thing.

Apparently, the current accepted theory as to its origin is that it was invented during the rationing days of World War II, when milk and eggs, the most common of all cake ingredients, were extremely scarce. To make up for this, the cake is made to rise through the use of baking powder and vinegar, of all things! Yes my friends, that stupid volcano you made when you were little, could have very well been made into wacky cake instead.

The recipe I obtained did mention the use of a tiny amount of milk, but I am 100% certain that it is not needed, and water could be substituted in its stead. I did include the milk in mine, because I wanted to be as true as I could to the recipe I was given. Maybe this tiny portion of milk made the wacky cake in my school something special.

The recipe is VERY simple. You throw everything that goes into the cake into a bowl, and stir it a few times. Nothing more, nothing less. Here is what that looks like.

This is:
3 cups flour
1 1/2 cups sugar
1/2 cup cocoa
1 tsp. soda
2 cups water
1 cup oil
4 tsp. vinegar
1 tsp. vanilla



and here it is in the pan...



Now I should mention that I was low on cocoa, so I cut everything to exactly 75% of the total amounts, but I was making this in the smaller of my two Pyrex baking dishes, so it should be fine.

The recipe was vague on how long to cook the cake, it simply says " Bake at 375 degrees until just done (springs to light touch.)" Just done? Are you kidding me? I looked back at the online infos I found and they baked their at 350 for 30 minutes, but they were using metal cake pans, so I would have to go longer. Well, I ended up having to go a lot longer. After about 35 minutes I pulled the beast out of the oven and prodded around with a fork. Yuck! in the middle it was still just a lump of fecal colored goo, so I popped it back in and left it, and left it, and left it, and left it. I ended up having to cook the sucker for about an hour and fifteen minutes!



I may have overcooked it just a tiny bit because it was a little bit dry around the edges, but that was the only way to get it done in the middle. I think next time, a lower temperature may be the key. Anyway, so the recipe then says to "punch holes in the cake with a meat fork". MEAT FORK? WTF? Oh well, I lost my meat fork back in the 80s, so I opted to use a normal fork. I poked several holes in the cake, as can be seen here.



Ok, so they aren't exactly holes, they are huge gashes. Who really gives a damn, I am about to eat wacky cake up in here. Only one thing left to do... recreate the magical frosting. the frosting on wacky cake is bizarre to say the least. It is hard, yet soft at the same time. If you were to hold it in your hand for a little while, it would melt. Also, it has a very strange texture when you eat it, almost like a cross between sand and chocolate. I guess it is sort of like melty chocolate sand! Here are a few frosting preparation pictures.





This is:
2 cups sugar
1/2 cup cocoa
1/2 cup milk
1 stick Oleo

This is where the milk comes into play. Next time, I will just try water. The instructions here are again VERY simple. Chuck all this shit in a pan and boil for 3 minutes, then cool for 5 minutes. Then dump it on your cake. Tada!



When the frosting goes on, it is really shines, you can even see the reflection of my Zojirushi in the background!

Ladies and gentlemen, I give you... The Wacky Cake.


The cake is delicious. Is it as good as it was back in my childhood? I have no clue! It is a real shitter, but since I have not had wacky cake for a minimum of 15 years, I cannot recall if it is supposed to taste like my cake tastes or not. The cake is really good, and it seems... "institutional", for lack of a better term. I do not think it is outside the realm of something that might be served in a cafeteria. The only true way to tell would be if the schools where I grew up still feature wacky cake, then either obtain a true specimen and compare, or have a school-aged child try mine and and provide feedback. Chances are, neither is going to happen, so I will just assume that this is a 100% authentic recreation of my prized delight.