Depression Era Chocolate Cake Recipe (2024)

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Depression Era Chocolate Cake Recipe (1)

I always have a hard time picking favorites, but there’s no doubt in my mind that chocolate cake with chocolate frosting is my absolute favorite, favorite dessert. And this Depression era chocolate cake recipe is one that I’ve made over and over again because I love the rich dark chocolate taste.

This recipe is one that I adapted from a recipe I found in an old Reminisce magazine several years ago submitted by a lady named Beulah Sak. I don’t know anything about the history behind the original recipe or about how old it is, so I can’t say for certain how historically accurate this recipe is as far as being a Depression era recipe, but it is a simple, old-fashioned style recipe just the same. I made some changes and additions to the original recipe to suit my taste and to make it fit better into my real food lifestyle.

This Depression era chocolate cake does not call for any butter, milk, or eggs, allowing for those who did not have access to these ingredients or could not afford them to still have a cake for special occasions. This cake also would have been perfect for the winter season when access to butter, milk, and eggs would have been more limited if chickens weren’t laying much and cows weren’t being milked.

In place of these ingredients, this cake uses water, oil, and a mix of baking soda and vinegar as the rising agent. During the Depression period, the fats used could possibly have been something old-fashioned like lard, but newer vegetables oils were becoming increasingly popular in this era, so it’s probably more likely that the oil might have been something soybean oil or cottonseed oil.

For my version of this cake, I choose to use coconut oil in place of the vegetable oil because I’m not a big fan of vegetable oils like canola or soybean oil. And even though they may not be the most authentic to the Depression period, I’ve also added some ginger and some coffee to the cake because I like the way that they enhance the chocolate flavor. And I’ve included my favorite recipe for a rich chocolate frosting because no cake is complete without a good frosting in my opinion!

Depression Era Chocolate Cake Recipe:

This cake is a rich, fudgy kind of cake. It’s not one of those fluffy cakes with no substance that falls apart as soon as you put your fork in it. This cake is for the serious dark chocolate lovers out there!

(Update: For those of you who like recipe cards for saving and printing recipes, I’ve added one to this post if you scroll down to the bottom. And if you’re re-visiting this page, I just made a couple more changes to the recipe. I decreased the amount of sugar by just a quarter cup the most recent time I made this cake, and I couldn’t even taste a difference at all. I also added an extra half teaspoon of salt because I felt that that would enhance the flavor even more.)

Ingredients:

3 cups flour (I like using unbleached all-purpose but you could also try cake flour or spelt or a combination of flours. See notes below for info about einkorn flour.)
1 3/4 cups organiccane sugar
1 1/2 tsp sea salt (you can find my favorite salthere)
7 Tbs cocoa powder
2 tsp aluminum-freebaking soda
1/2 tspground ginger
3/4 cup coconut oil, melted and cooled
2 tsppure vanilla extract
2 cups black coffee (or you can use 2 tsp instant coffee dissolved in 2 cups of warm water.)
2 Tbs apple cider vinegar

Notes About Ingredients

* I wouldn’t recommend using 100% einkorn flour for this cake because when I tried it as a layer cake it was so soft that it wasn’t stable enough to stack the layers, and the whole cake sank and started falling apart. If you wanted to try using einkorn flour I would recommend either making the cake in a sheet pan rather than in two layers or using a blend of einkorn and all-purpose flour.

* If it’s summer and your coconut oil is already melty, you can skip the step of melting it. It’s also a good idea to use room temperature or warm water because if you use cold water it might make the coconut oil clump. This won’t be a problem if you are using hot coffee, but if you are using cold coffee then it’s a good idea to warm it up a bit before adding it in with the coconut oil.

* The powdered ginger and coffee are optional if you don’t have those ingredients or prefer not to use them. I like to add them just because they give the chocolate a little more “depth of flavor” as professional bakers like to say. You can’t really taste either the ginger or coffee very well because the predominant flavor is chocolate, but they enhance the chocolate flavor. So the main flavor is chocolate rather than mocha, but the coffee just seems to make the chocolate taste better. And if you’ve ever tried making your own homemade vinegar, you could use that in place of the store bought apple cider vinegar too.

Directions for Making the Cake

Preheat oven to 375 degrees and grease and flour two 9 inch round cake pans or one 13 x 9 inch pan.
In a large mixing bowl, combine flour, sugar, salt, cocoa powder, baking soda, and ginger, stirring to mix well.
Add melted and cooled coconut oil, vanilla, and warm coffee. (If using instant coffee, dissolve the coffee into the warm water first, making sure it’s fully dissolved.) Stir well to combine.
Add apple cider vinegar, stirring well to make sure there are no big lumps in the batter. Small lumps are ok. The batter will foam up a bit as the baking soda reacts with the acid in the vinegar and the coffee.
Pour batter into cake pans and bake at 375 degrees for about 25 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. (If you use a 13 x 9 pan rather than two cake pans, the cake might take a bit longer to bake through.)

Rich Chocolate Icing

What’s a good cake without a good icing, right? Well, this icing is rich and decadent and so delicious that I may or may not have eaten several spoonfuls of it while I was frosting my cake!

If you want your cake to be completely dairy-free you can use coconut oil for the frosting. Otherwise, you can use either butter or ghee.

Ingredients:

3 1/2 cups organic powdered cane sugar*
1 1/4 cup cocoa powder
1/4 cup butter, ghee, or coconut oil (I decided to use ghee for my frosting this time, and it gave it a nice, slightly caramel flavor.)
1 tsp pure vanilla extract
1/2 cup water (or coffee, like a reader suggested in the comments, if you want a mocha flavor in the icing.)
pinch sea salt(unless using salted butter)

* If you don’t want to use refined sugar, you could make your own homemade powdered sugar using a whole cane sugar. For times when I don’t want to go through the extra work of making my own, though, I just buy regular confectioner’s sugar. (Balance is key, and a little bit of white, refined sugar once in a while isn’t the end of the world. ) I make sure I getcanesugar, though, because if the bag just says “sugar” there’s a good chance that it’s made from genetically modified sugar beets rather than cane sugar. Buying organic is your best bet of finding non-GMO sugar.

Directions:

Combine powdered sugar and cocoa powder in a large mixing bowl. If you want a really smooth icing you can sift the powdered sugar and cocoa powder first.
Add vanilla extract and butter, ghee, or coconut oil.
Gradually add water, stirring well to combine until icing reaches the right consistency for spreading. (I just stirred mine by hand because I was too lazy to dig out my mixer and I didn’t want to have to wash the beaters afterward, but using a mixer is the best way to get a smooth icing without any little clumps of cocoa powder.)

Prep Time: 25 minutes

Cook Time: 25 minutes

Total Time: 50 minutes

This depression era chocolate cake recipe is made without eggs, milk, or butter, so it's a simple and delicious egg-free and dairy-free dessert (with a dairy-free option for the frosting.) This cake is rich and fudgy with a decadent dark chocolate flavor. This recipe was adapted from a recipe submission to Reminisce magazine made by Beulah Sak.

Ingredients

3 cups flour (See notes below for more information about flour types.)
1 3/4 cups cane sugar
1 1/2 tsp sea salt
7 Tbs cocoa powder
2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp ground ginger
3/4 cup coconut oil, melted
2 tsp pure vanilla extract
2 cups black coffee (or 2 tsp of instant coffee dissolved in 2 cups of warm water.) If you prefer not to use coffee you can use warm water.
2 Tbs apple cider vinegar

Instructions

Preheat oven to 375 degrees and grease and flour two 9 inch round cake pans or one 13x9 inch pan.
In a large mixing bowl, combine flour, sugar, salt, cocoa powder, baking soda, and ginger, stirring to blend well.
Add melted coconut oil, vanilla, and warm coffee or water. (If using instant coffee, dissolve the coffee into the warm water first, making sure it's fully dissolved.) Stir well to combine.
Add apple cider vinegar, stirring well to make sure there are no large lumps of flour in the batter (a few small lumps are normal.) The batter will foam up a little bit as the baking soda reacts with the acid in the vinegar and the coffee.
Divide the batter evenly between the two cake pans and bake at 375 degrees for about 25 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. (If you use a 13x9 inch pan rather than two round pans, the cake might take a bit longer to bake through.)

Notes

I wouldn’t recommend using 100% einkorn flour for this cake because when I tried it as a layer cake it was so soft that it wasn’t stable enough to stack the layers, and the whole cake sank and started falling apart. If you wanted to try using einkorn flour I would recommend either making the cake in a sheet pan rather than in two layers or using a blend of einkorn and all-purpose flour.

If it’s summer and your coconut oil is already melty, you can skip the step of melting it. It’s also a good idea to use room temperature or warm water because if you use cold water it might make the coconut oil clump.

The powdered ginger and coffee are optional. I like to add them just because they give the chocolate a little more “depth of flavor” as professional bakers like to say. You can’t taste either the ginger or coffee distinctly because the main flavor is still chocolate, but they enhance the chocolate flavor.