Election Cake, like a bite from American history, makes its rounds every November. I make it every year, but only once a year – just before the election. Preparing Election Cake is a celebration of love, of patriotism, of politics and of history.
Election Cake’s History
In early America, the electoral process brought communities together in festivity and revelry. Families traveled from the far reaches of their region to town centers where they enjoyed a holiday – visiting neighbors homes, dancing at balls, drinking, carousing and mustering for the local militia. Indeed, for a time before America revolted and became a nation in her own right, these celebratory spiced cakes that we know (or used to know) as election cakes were called muster cakes.
After the revolution, there was no need to muster, but festivities still surrounded the electoral process and these spiced and fruit-studded cakes were renamed for the annual elections. Election cakes commissioned by local government could often command several hundred dollars by today’s standards, as they were massive, and intended to feed an entire community of voters.
By the middle of the 19th century, states and municipalities no longer commissioned the cakes and what was first a symbol of conviviality and festivity began to take on an ulterior motive: slices of election cake were provided as an incentive to vote a straight ticket or for a particular candidate.
Election Cake’s area a traditional sourdough cake
A charming old-world recipe, preparing an election cake is a slow process, one that fell from favor by the late 19th century when cakes leavened by baking powder became all the rage.
Cakes of the 16th, 17th and 18th centuries were typically produced through soaking or sour leavening – like sourdough breads, while those cakes that weren’t prepared in this manner, such as Portugal Cake (recipe here), excluded wheat flour in favor of blanched almond meal.
Not only were election cakes prepared through a long soak in fresh or sour milk coupled with sour leavening, but they were filled with butter and eggs, spiked with brandy and wine, and then flavored with allspice, cinnamon, nutmeg and coriander. Cooks studded the spiced cakes with dried fruit – mostly prunes, raisins and currants, but whatever was readily available.
Traditional Election Cakes could feed an entire community.
A special occasion food, cakes were prepared in magnificent quantities – enough to make a modern cook blush. In one of the first recorded recipes for election cake, Amelia Simmons calls for more than three dozen eggs, a quart of brandy and fourteen pounds of sugar. The sugar available in this period would have been unrefined and naturally rich in molasses, similar to Mexican piloncillo or Indian jaggery. In this recipe, I use whole unrefined cane sugar.
Where to Find Sourdough Starter for Your Cake
Modern versions of Election Cake typically veer away from the traditional method of sour leavening – after all, sourdough baking is a bit of a lost art and most modern cooks who have even the faintest interest in sourdough usually relegate it to the realm of breads alone.
To prepare a traditional election cake, you will need sourdough starter. The election cake recipe below uses my method for making a sourdough starter which involves water, bread flour or high extraction einkorn flour (find it here) and a bit of an established starter to kickstart the fermentation process (you can find sourdough starters online here).
| Election Cake | Print |
- 4½ cups sifted soft whole white wheat flour
- 1¼ cups buttermilk or sour milk
- ¼ cup proofed and bubbly sourdough starter
- ½ pound butter
- 1 cup unrefined cane sugar (Find it here.)
- ¼ cup blackstrap molasses
- 1 tablespoon white wine
- 2 tablespoons brandy
- 2 eggs, beaten
- 1 teaspoon finely ground sea salt
- 1 tablespoon ground cinnamon
- 1 tablespoon ground coriander
- ½ teaspoon ground allspice
- ½ teaspoon freshly grated nutmeg
- 2 cups dried currants
- In the basin of a standmixer (like this one), beat the flour together with the milk and sourdough starter until it forms a ball. Then oil a large glass bowl (like this one that comes with a lid), plop the dough into the bowl and cover it securely. Allow the dough to rest at least 8 and up to 12 hours.
- Beat the butter, sugar and molasses together with the brandy and wine until fluffy, then beat in the eggs.
- Remove the ball of dough from the bowl, and tear it into ½ inch pieces. Drop them into the bowl with the butter and spoon in the salt and spices. Beat them all together, scraping down the sides of the bowl as needed, until they form a uniform batter. Fold in the currants.
- Preheat the oven to 375 degrees Fahrenheit, and then grease and flour two 9-inch tube pans (these are the ones we used).
- Spoon the batter evenly into the two pans, filling them about ¾ up their sides. Bake the cakes about 50 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the cakes' center comes out clean. Transfer to a wire rack, and allow them to cool completely before unmolding.
Original Election Cake Recipe
Thirty quarts of flour, 10 pound butter, 14 pound sugar, 12 pound raisins, 3 doz eggs, one pint wine, one quart brandy, 4 ounces cinnamon, 4 ounces fine colander seed, 3 ounces ground alspice; wet flour with milk to the consistence of bread over night, adding one quart yeast; the next morning work the butter and sugar together for half an hour, which will render the cake much lighter and whiter; when it has rise light work in every other ingredient except the plumbs, which work in when going into the oven. – Simmons, American Cookery, 1796
.
Those quantities are crazy! And ten pounds! Wow – I love knowing the history of foods.
Looks good!
Denise’s last post: indoor gardening!.
I know it’s not the healthiest starter ever, but what do you think about using Amish Friendship Bread starter for this cake? I’ve been on an AFB kick lately and have plenty of starter.
Does it matter if Im on the wagon?
Looks awesome!
Thank you for the recipe – and the research and knowledge behind it!
It looks as if you are baking it in a springform pan? I assume a Dutch Oven would also be ok? I am looking forward to this – what an amazing tradition!!
Hi Jolee –
Yes, I bake it in a springform pan. A Dutch oven might work – I think many people also bake this in a Bundt pan.
I made mine in a dutch oven. I cooked it at a lower temp for a bit longer b/c it started to brown before the inside was finished. It turned out great! Our election party loved the cake and I love that it’s not very sweet. Thanks for the recipe!
Do you know what might be an okay substitution for brandy and wine?
Is there supposed to be sugar in it or just molasses?
Both, I think. I noticed that sugar wasn’t in the ingredients list above too, but if you taste your blackstrap molasses (it’s good, but almost bitter, because it’s not really sweet), I think you’d want to add sugar. ♥ I’m making mine right now!
Thanks for sharing this! I think I have all on hand and hope to try it this week!
Your post brought back good memory of visiting Mount Vernon over 10 years ago when I lived in VA, and a recipe sheet I got there for Martha Washington’s Great Cake. (similar in scale to what you quoted above – 40 eggs! ).
And thanks for the print feature on your site now too, by the way!
Also wondering if sugar is supposed to be in there somewhere as the instructions mentions it, but the ingredient list does not.
Wowsers–think of the size of the bowl to mix the original. Especially since it would need to be big enough for the yeast to double.
I just mixed up the dough and noticed that I couldn’t incorporate all of the flour, so I added more milk (maybe my starter was not hydrated enough?). Also wondering about the sugar. Not in the ingredient list, but in the directions?
I am having the same problem. Wondering if it’s meant to be a dough that you knead a bit? It is so thick. Or maybe I’ll add a bit more liquid, so it’s more like a cake! ♥
That happened to me too, Jessica. I just added a teeny bit more sourdough starter. It’s still a pretty stiff dough though.
This cake turned out beautifully! I added the 1 1/2 cup of sucanat as the body of the directions indicated. It was a little tricky to mix the stiff bread-like dough into the butter-sugar-egg mix, but after working it for a while, I was able to incorporate it. The directions said to let it rise again while the oven preheated, but I never saw it rise. After waiting half an hour, I ran out of time ( I needed to vote, after all!) and just stuck it in the oven. It baked up beautifully – a dense, moist, chewy cake, perfectly sweet to my taste. My children and husband also adore it. Eating a thick slice with butter and a cup of warm milk was the perfect way to pass the election night, watching the votes come in. Thank you for this wonderful recipe! This will be our new tradition!
Made this cake for Election Day with a rye sourdough starter, used slightly over half soft whole wheat and most of the remainder was millet flour. Whether it was the low gluten content or the strength of my starter, I had no rise at all, but a very lovely cake nonetheless. I also subbed 3/4 c honey for the cane sugar and omitted the white wine. Cake took a little longer to bake and cracked a little but still tastes wonderful! I would say it easily serves 10-12. Great with coffee … Definitely having a bit at breakfast!
Whilst I applaud your stance on keeping politics to yourself you did not practice what you preach.Before the revolution it wasn’t an occupying force,it was your force and protected your ancestors.Unless your ancestors were not British and you still hold a grudge.
Sadly I will not be following you any more.
D Chandler
Yes and now we in the “colonies” are all Traitors to Britain! Treasonous traitors!!!
As such I always fly a pirate Jolly Roger and talk like a pirate every day of the year!!
Could you make this without the fruit? None of us here particularly like fruit cake, but the rest sounds delicious.
Yum!!!! Made it tonight.
where do you buy your currants? I seem to have a hard time finding the “real” ones. Reviews online of some products say that what they received were actually raisins and not currants. My problem is that I’ve never had any and don’t know if they’re so similar that many people can’t tell, or if “currants” is also another name for raisins and nobody bothers to label their products either way….. does that make sense? Thanks for your help! And thanks for all your amazing recipes on your beautiful blog! I’m hard core into ferments and traditional foods and I’m doing this with no hand-me-down experience or recipes, so I’m very happy to have found you!
Hi Susu, I can usually find currants in the bulk buns at my health food store, but you can order them online. I’ve never once found that the currants I bought were mislabeled raisins.
Which of the einkorn flours did you use in your recipe, the all purpose or the whole wheat? Thanks so much. Enjoyed the history with the recipe.
Hi Sarah!
I actually used whole white wheat flour, but whole einkorn flour would be your best option.
Your history of the Election Cake not only brings us back to a simpler time, but I think to a time when candidate dart throwing was more subdued. Bravo to days gone by and hoping the future tames the great divide. I’ll eat to that !!!
Where to get that cake Pan??
Right here: http://nourishedkitchen.com/recommends/silicon-tube-pan/
I have to say that in the original recipe, the “1 quart of yeast” wouldn’t have actually been a sourdough starter. Back then they use ‘barm’, the yeasty froth from the top of fermenting beer, to add yeast to bread. Jas. Townsend & Son on Youtube has a couple good videos on barm and yeast in colonial times.
Good feedback, Logan!
A cake with sourdough starter? I’ll have to try it! There is only so much bread one can make….