Wacky Cake

By 1For_Him

Prep time: 5 minutes
Cook time: 30 minutes
Cost: $.88
(flour: .16, sugar: .32, oil: .12, cocoa: .18, other stuff about .10)
A note on frosting: Traditionally, this is made with a flour-based wacky cake frosting. We love this frosting, but we often make it with Kip's chocolate frosting. Because we are sick-o's in the chocolate department. If you use the chocolate frosting, it will be intensely chocolate everything. That works for some people, but not for everyone. Both frosting recipes will be included below.

Ingredients

• For the cake:
• 2 C flour
• 2 C sugar
• 6 Tbsp cocoa
• 2 tsp baking soda
• 1 tsp salt
• 2 C warm water
• 2/3 C oil
• 2 Tbsp vinegar
• 2 tsp vanilla (or 1/2 tsp mint) extract
• Wacky Cake Frosting:
• 4 Tbsp flour
• 1 C milk
• 1 C sugar
• 1 C (2 sticks) butter, softened considerably
• 2 tsp vanilla
• Kip's Chocolate Frosting:
• 3/4 C (1 1/2 sticks) butter, somewhat melted (halfway melted, in Kip's words)
• 1/2 C cocoa
• 1/3-1/2 C milk
• 1 tsp vanilla
• dash salt
• nearly 2 lb powdered sugar (probably 2 C shy of 2 lb--this is the sketchiest part of this recipe--start with less--you can always add more if it's way too runny or thin)

Details

Adapted from tastycheapskate.blogspot.com

Preparation

Step 1

Note: It is possible that if you bake this in an aluminum pan, vinegar/baking soda will react and cause it to taste like metal, so use glass or a non-reactive metal.

In a 9x13 inch pan, mix dry ingredients. Add wet ingredients. Note: We like to make wells for the different wet ingredients--so a little hole for the water, a hole for the oil and a hole for the vinegar and vanilla. Then we make rivers and then mix it all together and the baking soda reacts with the vinegar and fizzes a bit and I don't know why we do this, but we both did when we made versions of this cake as children. It's fun for some reason. A few smallish lumps in the batter are no big deal. Bake at 350 for about 30 minutes or until a toothpick (knife, fork, whatever) comes out clean.

For Wacky frosting: Mix milk and flour in a saucepan, and cook until thickened. Let it get thick. Don't fear it's weirdness. When it's thick, take it off the heat. Make paper mache if you will and create a pinata using newspaper. If you do not, at this juncture, wish to make a pinata, then beat butter and margarine (or all butter) together. Slowly add sugar to butter mixture. Beat well. Add milk mixture (i.e. paper mache stuff). Beat very well until there are no (or almost no) lumps. It will take a few minutes. Add vanilla and beat. Taste it. See that your faith has been rewarded.

For chocolate frosting: Mix butter, cocoa, and 1/3 C milk. Add other ingredients and beat well. If it's too stiff, add more milk.