TheSorghum Cake

Sorghum Cake Being Mixed

Note:  As I write this the snow is falling heavily and the farm looks a winter wonderland.

There was a time when farmers on Sand Mountain did not have the money to buy sugar, but many of them had sorghum and that was used in place of sugar.  John remembers working all day for a man and was paid with a gallon of sorghum.  In lots of homes the syrup was kept in a syrup pitcher and was left setting on the table all the time.

Syrup Pitcher

In the 1930’s and ’40’s sorghum came in a gallon bucket with a bail and cost fifty cents.  Today it comes in quart jars which sell for $12.  I opted to mix my cake in a four-cup measuring cup, using the hand mixer because I could fling it all in the dishwasher.  Clean up is harder for me than the cooking is.

I baked the cake in an iron skillet because that’s how it was done in olden days.  Mother would rake the hot coals out on the hearth rock, put the iron skillet (with legs) on the coals and lay the lid up on the burning logs to heat.  She’d put the sorghum cake (which she called a sponge cake) in the hot skillet, put the lid on and then heap red hot coals on the lid.  The cake would bake in no time and to cut a piece of that hot cake and fill it with butter was some more good eating.  Sorghum was a little different back then — I don’t know if it was a different variety of cane — I contend cooking it with wood made a different taste than cooking it with gas as it’s done today.  Anyway, Mother’s cakes were darker in color than mine is.  Try the sorghum for a little twist on country living.

Sorghum Cake

1/4 cup sugar
1/4 cup Sand Mountain sorghum
1/4 cup shortening
1/4 tsp each of nutmeg, ginger, cloves, salt and soda
1 tsp baking powder
1 egg
1/3 cup milk
1 cup flour
Mix shortening, syrup, egg, milk and syrup. Sift dry ingredients together and add to the above mixture. Bake at 350 for 30 minutes or until done.

1/4 cup shortening
1/4 tsp. Nutmet

Sorghum Cake ready for butter