Bess Truman's Chocolate Cake Recipe
Donnell Simon
nutrition data for bess truman's ozark pudding200 calories, 8 grams fat, 32 grams carbohydrates, 3 grams protein per serving.Show full nutritional data (including Weight Watcher's Points , cholesterol, sodium, vitamins, and diabetic exchanges)
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reviews & comments for bess truman's ozark pudding Guest Foodie March 22, 2017 Does it matter what kind of apples?
Three recipes from other American first ladies still serve as legacies during this current election season. One, Mary Lincoln's White Almond Cake, is a simple pound cake with finely chopped almonds that originated in Lexington, Kentucky, where Mary (née Todd) was raised before she married Abraham Lincoln. The story goes that Mary baked and served this cake to Lincoln while they courted. It was said to be Lincoln's favorite cake, and after his assassination this cake, it was baked and served at inaugural and military banquets as a memorial to him.
As is the case with hickory nuts, particular ingredients often tell the story of an old and historic recipe. And in the case of a third first lady cake, the cake's ingredients were the secret to unlocking the real story behind the popular recipe.
To backtrack briefly, in 1908 the Congressional Club in Washington, D.C., opened as a social club for wives of the U.S. Senate and House. A self-supporting organization, the members collaborated on a fund-raising cookbook in 1927 and have continued to do so. The second edition of that book was published in 1948. It was introduced by Bess Truman, who shared her recipe for Ozark Pudding. A cross between a pecan pie and a macaroon, with chopped apples thrown in, it would become a favorite apple cake of the time.
And from that day in 1950, the Huguenot Torte became a slightly hijacked homage to Charleston's old history. It would have continued had the food writer and historian John Martin Taylor not found out the real story about the apple cake and given former First Lady Bess Truman and her Ozark Pudding recipe the credit they deserved.
Place egg whites, salt and almond extract in a bowl. Beat for two minutes until stiff peaks form. Fold in vanilla and rind. Fold in cake meal and potato starch until completely blended. Add almonds and coconut. Spoon tablespoons-size cookies onto parchment paper. Bake for 15 minutes at 325 degrees. When cookies are cool, drizzle with melted chocolate chips.
These are the cakes your grandmother used to make - or would have if she had really known her way around the kitchen: mouthwatering, masterful and emphatically unfussy. Having acquired a treasure trove of recipes dating to the 1920s, Julie Richardson, who owns a small-batch bakery in Portland, Ore., went on to examine old cookbooks and poll family and friends about childhood favorites.
She tested the most promising recipes and revised them for the modern palate (less sugar, more flavor). The results include old favorites (carrot cake with cream cheese frosting) as well as twists on the classics (angel cake with chocolate and orange freckles) and temptations for the more adventurous baker: Peppermint Patty flourless chocolate cake.
Like her cakes, Richardson's book is simple and beautiful. I loved the insistence on quality ingredients, as well as the wide range of recipes (Ozark pudding cake, anyone?) and the winning back stories (Bess Truman, wife of President Harry Truman, put Ozark pudding on the menu for a dinner with Winston Churchill).
The Texas sheet cake recipe produced a moist, flavorful chocolate cake with rich, gooey frosting that was a big hit at a recent block party. My only quibble was that the directions were a little vague about when to start the frosting. I'd now suggest starting it 10 minutes before the cake comes out of the oven; I gave mine too much time to cool, and it didn't achieve the smooth, glossy finish in the photo.
Is Ozark pudding really pudding?
Sort of. It's a dry custard, which means it's solid unlike other puddings. This recipe is actually more of a cake than a pudding - kind of like bread pudding.
We all have that one special recipe our mom made us when we were sick, when it was our birthday, or just to make us smile. For First Lady Bess Truman, that nostalgia-evoking treat was the sponge cake her mother, Madge Gates Wallace, baked. Try your hand at this mother-approved classic!
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Lady Baltimore Cake: Per What's Cooking America, A Southern specialty that in the present day has many recipe variations. A favorite wedding cake, this mountainous cake is a white cake topped with a boiled or "Seven Minute Frosting." What makes the cake so distinctive is the combination of chopped nuts and dried or candied fruits in its frosting. It takes its name from the main character in Owen Wister's Lady Baltimore. For more lore and a vintage recipe, visit The Old Foodie.
Battenberg cake (also called window cake): Per Wikipedia: This is a sponge cake which, when cut in cross section, displays a distinctive two-by-two check pattern alternately colored pink and yellow. The cake is covered in marzipan and, when sliced, the characteristic checks are exposed to view. These coloured sections are made by dying half of the cake mixture pink, and half yellow, then cutting each resultant sponge into two long, uniform cuboids, and joining them together with apricot jam, to form one cake. Though the origins of the name are not clear, it is rumored that the cake was created in honor of the 1884 marriage of Queen Victoria's grand-daughter to Prince Battenburg, with each of the four squares representing each of the four Battenburg Princes: Louis, Alexander, Henry and Francis Joseph. Here's a recipe.
Dione's Chocolate Roll: This very chocolatey jellyroll style cake was the single dessert served at onetime NYC eatery The Egg Basket, and was named for proprietress Dionne Lucas. A recipe can be found in Maida Heatter's Great Desserts, and a variation can be found here.
Doboschtorte or Dobostorta: Per Wikipedia, It is a five-layer sponge cake, layered with chocolate buttercream and topped with thin caramel slices. The sides of the cake are sometimes coated with ground hazelnuts, chestnuts, walnuts or almonds but the original cake is without coat, since it was a slice of a big cake. It is named for its creator, Hungarian pastry chef Josef Dobos. Just look at this recipe.
Elvis: I am going to go ahead and say that the banana, peanut butter and fluff combination is associated enough with Elvis to make the list. Uses for the flavor combination range from his favorite sandwich to pies and cakes. Here's just one wonderful recipe.
Cherry Garcia ice cream: This is a cherry and chocolate flake-flecked ice cream homage to Jerry Garcia of the Grateful Dead by Ben & Jerry. And, there's actually a recipe to make it yourself at home!
German chocolate cake: It's named after a good German, but he wasn't actually German. This chocolate and coconut throwback to the 1950's to Sam German, who developed Baker's German's Sweet Chocolate (which falls somewhere between milk and semi-sweet) in 1852. Here's a recipe.
Gianduja: Per Wikipedia, this is a sweet chocolate containing about 30% hazelnut paste, invented in Turin by Caffarel and Prochet in 1852. It takes its name from Gianduja, a Carnival and marionette character who represents the archetypal Piedmontese, the Italian region where hazelnut confectionery is common. Here's a recipe from Dana Treat for gianduja mousse!
Gundel Palacsinta: This is a crêpe-like pancake stuffed with rum-infused raisins and nuts and served with a chocolate-rum sauce, named for (and invented by) Hungarian chef Gundel Károly. Recipe? This one sounds good to me.
Houdini Bar: I am not sure about the origins of this delicious cream cheese, yellow cake, nut and coconut bar cookie, but I discovered it fairly recently; it is said to be named because the bars are so delicious they disappear as quickly as the famous magician. Here's the recipe.
Lamingtons: Per Joy of Baking, Lamingtons are very popular in Australia and consist of a small square of white cake (sponge, butter, or pound) that is dipped in a sweet chocolate icing and then rolled in desiccated coconut. I suspect Lord Lamington (Governor of Queensland from 1896 - 190l), their namesake, might be surprised at how popular these cakes have become. Joy of Baking also features a recipe.
Sally Lunn: Sweet, yeast-risen buns which are considered a British classic. They are traditionally served warm, split in half and spread generously with butter or cream. So who is Sally? Well, some claim that the chef who invented them in Bath, England was named Sally Lunn. Others claim that the name actually comes from the phrase "sol et lune", a French cake. Yet others claim that it is derived from the Alsatian bread solilmeme, a rich type of brioche. Whatever the true story is though, bet you'll enjoy this recipe (which can be translated).
Madeleine: These tres-Frenchie sponge cake cookies are best known for their shape (usually a scalloped shell) and for their famous writeup in Proust's Remembrance of Things Past. Alas, which Madeleine inspired the name is a bit less clear. Per Wikipedia, some sources, including the New Oxford American Dictionary, say madeleines may have been named for a 19th century pastry cook, Madeleine Paulmier, but other sources have it that Madeleine Paulmier was a cook in the 18th century for Stanisław Leszczyński, whose son-in-law, Louis XV of France, named them for her. The Larousse Gastronomique offers two conflicting versions of the Madeleine's history. Want a recipe? How about Orange and Brown Butter madeleines, via Cannelle et Vanille?
Queen Elizabeth Cake (Canada): What's the story behind this rich date-based cake? According to Practically Edible,
Apparently the recipe might have been sold, for 15 cents a copy, as a fund-raiser during the Second World War, and as Queen Elizabeth, the Queen Mother, was very popular in Canada and rallied people during the war, it may have been named in her honour there. It definitely appeared in war-time cookbooks during the 1940s. It re-appeared in Canadian cookbooks in 1953, for the coronation of Queen Elizabeth II, and since then, due to its ease, has been a staple at country fairs since then. It is also known in the UK and in the States, though it's not as ubiquitous there as it is in Canada.
Practically Edible also has a recipe.
Queen Elizabeth Cake (USA): This is a fruit-and-whipped cream cake which was made in the 1950's by Chicago area bakery Deerfield's in honor of a Chicago visit by Queen Elizabeth; it's still one of their popular cakes. It seems to be unrelated to the Queen Mother's cake in flavor, it is nonetheless named for the same queen.