Comments on: “Qu’ils mangent de la brioche!,” Election Cake edition

By: the good old days » Blog Archive » Picnic Day: Election Day Cake!

the good old days » Blog Archive » Picnic Day: Election Day Cake! — Mon, 22 Jun 2009 18:44:36 +0000

[...] Day Cake. (Credit where credit’s due, I originally got the recipe and idea to make it from Historiann.) I learned quite a lot of things, including “baking powder is a wonderful invention” [...]

By: Election Day open thread : Historiann : History and sexual politics, 1492 to the present

Tue, 04 Nov 2008 19:06:06 +0000

[...] out the window to get a whiff of the fresh breezes of change, slice yourself a nice big piece of Election Cake, and fill us in on what you know. (Check out Erica’s adventures baking an Election [...]

By: Erica

Erica — Tue, 04 Nov 2008 17:26:30 +0000

I didn’t let it rise overnight. I started yesterday morning around 11, tried to ruin my mixer around 4 when I mixed it together, and stuck it in the oven around 6:30. While much of the time was spent waiting for things to rise, it was a very long project. My kitchen was a lot messier than it usually is after cooking.

I’m sure an overnight rise would work just fine. Make sure it’s the final rise, though, I wouldn’t recommend trying that final mixing when you’ve just woken up and are still a bit groggy.

At around 8pm, just after “sizzling” the molasses topping, my brother called and asked for a recipe suggestion — something to take to an election party the next day. Then he asked why I was laughing so hard. I managed to discourage him from doing this, though, because it would have taken too much time.

The cakes are huge. 9″ in diameter, obviously, but about 6″ tall at least. (Oh, and a bundt pan works just fine!) A double recipe would be an incredible amount of food… just right for a village festival on Election Day, though.

By: Historiann

Historiann — Tue, 04 Nov 2008 17:08:14 +0000

Yes, KC, that’s the long version of the story. (And you’re right, brioche is a buttery yeast bread, kind of like Hartford Election Cake plus raisins and citron!)

Everyone should go click on the good old days and see Erica’s Hartford Election Cake–I’ll update this post and include some of her photos!

By: the good old days » Blog Archive » Retro Recipe Special: Election Day Cake

Tue, 04 Nov 2008 17:00:22 +0000

[...] Another Historiann Recipe, this time for Tuesday instead of Thursday because hopefully nobody will be election-obsessed in two days time. (Seriously, Nation, I would like an election that’s over the same day it starts this time. Is that too much to ask? No more 2000/2004 drag-it-out bullshit, there’s a good country.) [...]

By: Knitting Clio

Knitting Clio — Tue, 04 Nov 2008 16:56:27 +0000

On my campus, there is a dormitory named after Catharine Beecher, but her first name is misspelled with the “e” in the middle. I have tried for the past 16 years without any success to get facilities to change it. Their excuses range from, it’s too expensive to make a new sign, to the ur post-modern “how do we know for sure that she spelled it that way.” ’cause she wrote it in her letters and books, you jerks!

Regarding Marie Antoinette — I think the real story was that someone told her about the bread riots, and her reply was a clueless, “why don’t they just eat brioche”? (which is really more of a sweet type of bread than a cake)

By: Historiann

Historiann — Tue, 04 Nov 2008 03:18:11 +0000

Erica–you are hardcore! Amazing. I got home after work and had a glass of wine–such was the extent of my ambition! I hope you’ll let us know how it all turns out.

By: Indyanna

Indyanna — Tue, 04 Nov 2008 03:03:17 +0000

November 1998 was a good election. I was stopping up in Happy Valley for a history talk, and later at my fleabag motel had the pleasure of watching American sensibility beat back on the impeachment hyenas. My first thought on seeing the name “Hartford” election cake was that it had something to do with the Federalists crashing and burning in that town in what was it, 1815? Another good sign. Maybe what Marie Antoinette meant was they should take a Brioschi, which was a mid-late 20th century fizzy remedy for indigestion, kind of like an Alka Seltzer, only different?

It will be good to follow the election thread tomorrow, hopefully to a big celebration at night’s end. What a year it’s been. Pennsylvania is ready for battle, I know that.

By: Erica

Erica — Mon, 03 Nov 2008 23:47:14 +0000

OK, I’m making this, and it’s an EXTREMELY MESSY recipe. I got batter up inside my mixer, that can’t be good…

The different proportion of sugar may also have something to do with the yeast, which eats some of the sugar as it inflates the dough.

By: Historiann

Historiann — Mon, 03 Nov 2008 19:15:05 +0000

Brian–great research! I’m not so sure that Beecher’s recipe is simpler so much as less detailed and for a much larger cake (or batch of cakes.) For example, the recipe above calls for 1/4 cup of brandy, whereas the Beecher recipe calls for a gill each of brandy and wine (or 2-4 times the previous amount, ) Beecher’s recipe also calls for 4 times the butter–2 lbs. instead of half a pound. The fruit proportions are similar too: 2-3 pounds in Beecher, and 1-1/2 cups in the 1987 recipe. The contemporary recipe looks a bit less sweet than the older recipe, you are correct, but it’s not wildly out of proportion. I’m sure the authors of the 1987 book tinkered with Beecher’s recipe and decided to update it to please contemporary palates. (I also wonder if that has to do with the powerful sweetness of the ultra-refined white sugar we have today, versus the not so refined sugar of 150 years ago? This is just a guess.)

Oh, and don’t you love Beecher’s instruction, “When you put the wood into the oven…” ? What a feat it was to produce any edible baked good in a wood stove!