Chocolate depression cake recipe: (No eggs, no butter, no milk)

The idea for this vegan cake can be traced back to the Great Depression when traditional cake ingredients were hard to come by.

Photo byMikes-Photography/Pixabay

I first tried this recipe during the early days of lockdown, back in 2020, on a day that I was stuck at home wanting to bake something, but entirely out of eggs.

Today, I can find plenty of eggs on store shelves, but they are expensive. It seemed like a good time to pull out this tasty and easy chocolate cake recipe with limited ingredients.

What is a depression cake?

Limited-ingredient chocolate cakes were dreamed up by resourceful women during the Great Depression when eggs, butter, and milk were expensive and needed to be used sparingly.

Since it uses no dairy or eggs, it's also a great recipe for people who are lactose intolerant or have egg allergies.

What replaces the missing ingredients?

• Cooking oil instead of butter. Some people prefer oil to butter in their cakes because although butter adds rich flavor, cakes made with oil are more tender and moist.
• Vinegar and baking soda are a substitute for eggs. The mixture fluffs up the cake and helps with texture. (Don't worry, you won’t taste the vinegar.)
• Water is used in place of milk for the liquid.

I pulled out my old copy of the Joy of Cooking cookbook (1997) to see if I could find a recipe for a chocolate depression cake.

There I found a “Dairy-Free Chocolate Cake (Vegan)," which had what I was looking for. A cake with no butter, eggs, or milk.

Dairy-Free Chocolate Cake Recipe (from the Joy of Cooking)

Ingredients:

• 1–1/2 cups flour
• 1 cup sugar plus 2 tablespoons sugar
• 6 tablespoons unsweetened cocoa powder
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/8 teaspoon salt
• 1 cup cold water
• 1/4 cup vegetable oil
• 1 tablespoon white vinegar
• 2 teaspoons vanilla

Directions:

1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit.
2. Grease and flour one 8 x 8-inch pan or line it with parchment paper.
3. Sift together flour, sugar, unsweetened cocoa powder, baking soda, and salt in a large bowl.
4. Combine the water, vegetable oil, white vinegar, and vanilla in a small bowl.
5. Add the wet ingredients to the dry ingredients, stirring until smooth.
6. Pour the batter into the pan and spread evenly.
7. Bake for 25 to 30 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean.
8. Let cool for 10 minutes before removing it from the pan.

The Joy of Cooking recommends either dusting the cake with powdered sugar and serving it or frosting it with a Quick Cookie Icing.

Quick Cookie Icing Recipe (from the Joy of Cooking)

Ingredients:

• 4 cups powdered sugar
• 3 to 4 tablespoons water

Directions:

1. Whisk powdered sugar and water together until smooth. Add water or more powdered sugar as needed to adjust the consistency.
2. Keep in an airtight container if not using immediately. This will keep for four days at room temperature or a month in the refrigerator.

The verdict

It was tasty and chocolatey with a great texture. However, it did remind me somewhat of a boxed cake. While I missed the rich flavor of butter, my daughter loved the ultra sweetness of this recipe.

In the end, it's pretty amazing what you can do with limited ingredients. And as it turns out, you don't need dairy and eggs to make a great cake.

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Note: A previous version of this story was originally published on Medium.

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