Coca-Cola cake is one of those vintage American recipes that you don’t see often. I’ve never made it until I came across the recipe on the food blog, Southern Kitchen. Coke, butter, oil, buttermilk, cocoa, eggs flour and lots of sugar-what could be bad? Upon first bite I proclaimed this one of the best cakes ever, a fine example of a classic sheet cake.
Coca-Cola cake originated not in Atlantic, the home of Coke, but in Charleston, West Virginia, according to the food writer Kate Williams, editor of Southern Kitchen, and whose recipe I followed. It’s been around since the 1950s and occasionally found in regional cookbooks, newspaper and magazine articles.
The cake is so sweet it really needs nothing else, though you might be tempted to serve a scoop of vanilla ice cream on top.
An extremely moist cake it’s topped with a very sweet chocolate icing that’s truly addictive if not responsible for instant waist-gain. Toasted pecans are sprinkled on top of the frosting on the finished cake but the original recipe was to stir it into the frosting. I think I like that method better than the one instructed to use.
Original Coke should be used (no diet, zero, caffeine free concoctions) for the cake and the frosting. The chocolate component is cocoa. I used Hershey’s Special Dark cocoa, which is a blend of natural and Dutch process cocoa powders. It has a very deep flavor a develops a dark crumb.
Though the recipe instructs to use a standard 9 by 13-inch baking pan, I used my favorite new baking vessel, an 11.8- by 12-inch Nordic Ware cake pan. I discovered this pan size when it was called for in a New York Times Cooking recipe, Lemon Drizzle Cake. (More on that at another time). The pan size is uncommon here and I searched for it online and at local shops to no avail It’s a standard size used by British bakers, instead of our 9-by-13-inch pan; the Times version of the Drizzle cake recipe uses a 9 by 12 pan. I searched everywhere for it, including calling Leroux, who has a good baking section. They said that they only carried 9 by 13. ( When a recipe, especially cakes, calls for an exact size pan, it’s best to use it.) I also tried Bed, Bath and Beyond, Target, Walmart, Kohl’s, Macy’s-and all had the standard nine by thirteen pan. I also discovered that Whole Foods carries a line of Nordic Ware including this great cake pan.
But I went into Leroux to search for myself and discovered this little stash of baking pans on a bottom shelf . There it was: an 8.8- by-12-inch cake pan made by Nordic Ware. I felt like I had just unearthed the Dead Sea Scrolls.
I like the smaller pan compared with the 9 by 13 inch version, which seems so big. The pan makes a nice size cake rather than a gigantic one (the extra inch all around makes a difference) and the slightly smaller dimensions do not affect the recipe calling for the larger pan.
The cake takes minutes to prepare, without undue fuss in assembling.
Coca-cola Cake
Ingredients
- 2 cups granulated sugar
- 2 cups all-purpose flour
- 1 cup Coca-Cola
- 8 tablespoons (1 stick) unsalted butter, plus more for greasing
- 1/2 cup vegetable oil
- 1/4 cup unsweetened cocoa
- 2 large eggs, lightly beaten
- 1 teaspoon vanilla
- 1/2 cup buttermilk
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- 1 (16-ounce) box powdered sugar
- 1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter
- 1/2 cup Coca-Cola
- 3 tablespoons unsweetened cocoa
- 1 teaspoon vanilla
- 1 cup chopped pecans, toasted
Instructions
- To make the cake. Heat the oven to 350 degrees. Thoroughly butter a 9-by-13-inch cake pan (or Nordic Ware 11.8 by 12-inch pan).
- In a large bowl, whisk together the sugar and flour.
- In medium saucepan, combine the Coca-Cola, butter, oil and cocoa and bring to a boil over medium heat. Remove from the heat and pour over the dry ingredients. Mix well. Stir in the eggs and vanilla.
- In a small bowl, combine the buttermilk and baking soda. Immediately stir into the batter mixture. Mix well and pour into the prepared pan. Bake until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean, 35 to 45 minutes.
- Frosting. About 10 minutes before the cake is finished, make the frosting: Sift the powdered sugar into a second large bowl.
- In a small saucepan, combine the butter, Coca-Cola and cocoa. Place over medium heat and cook until the butter melts. Remove from the heat and pour over the powdered sugar. Add the vanilla and whisk until smooth.
- When the cake is finished, poke holes with a skewer all over the surface. Pour the frosting over the hot cake, allowing it to seep into the holes. Top with the toasted pecans Or stir into the frosting before pouring over the cake.
- Let the frosted cake cool completely in the pan, cut into squares and serve.
