Red Velvet Cake is a recipe that is older than you might think!
Red Velvet cake has enjoyed an explosion in popularity over the past few years and it is understandable how it can get mistaken as a twentieth century creation it’s true origins date back to the 1800’s.
Early cake recipes instructed bakers in the 1800s to use almond flour, cocoa or cornstarch to soften the protein in flour and make finer-textured cakes that due to their softer texture came to be named velvet cakes.
Alongside the popularity of velvet cakes was that of the Mahogany Cake with its ingredients including buttermilk, vinegar, cocoa powder and coffee, and its cousin, the devil’s food cake. These are all distant cousins of the Red Velvet Cake for whilst the colour of the cake comes later in history these recipes were making way for its emergence.
By the early 1900s recipes were beginning to appear for cocoa velvet cakes, red cocoa cakes, and other variations of velvet cake and this was the path towards the birth of the beloved red velvet cake that we enjoy today. Whilst a red velvet cake should taste of cocoa, vanilla and buttermilk, it main appeal is its soft, silky texture and distinctive crimson colour set against pale frosting.
The crimson hue of the Red Velvet Cake originally resulted from a collision of alkaline bicarbonate of soda with the acidic cocoa, or the “red” brown sugar sometimes used. By the mid 20th century the red hue had become the signature of this light textured cake.
Today, many recipes rely on the addition of food colouring to get that rich crimson colour that makes the Red Velvet Cake live up to its name. Indeed this is nothing new for a recipe for Red Velvet Cake printed in Texas’s Amarillo Globe-Times in the summer of 1960, calls for four tablespoons of food dye to be added to the batter. Whilst it is certain that World War II had a role to play in the concept of birth of colouring cakes, for with the advent of rationing, butter and sugar became in short supply and so inventive bakers experimented with other ingredients to improve the taste, texture and appearance of their frugal bakes. This led to some bakers adding beetroot flesh or beetroot juice to their cakes. The red from the beetroot juice made the cakes more aesthetically pleasing but also acted as filler and kept the cakes moist. So adding natural or synthetic dyes to cake mixtures is nothing new, in fact some red velvet recipes do actually call for beetroot, although there is no clear connection between beetroots and Red Velvet Cake.
So apart from a show-stopping crimson colour what makes for a great Red Velvet Cake? Well, for this cake to be perfect it should have a fine, silky texture; that should be smooth rather than fluffy; and it should moist, but never dense.
There are many that would like to lay claim to the invention of the Red Velvet Cake with The Adams Extract Company claiming to have made the “original” Red Velvet cake in the 1920s. Whilst the Waldorf Astoria Hotel in New York City claims it is the birthplace of the Red Velvet cake, with it being a popular menu item in the 1950s. Meanwhile, some argue that the Red Velvet cake started in the south of America. The reality is that there is no clear evidence of the Red Velvet Cake being invented, instead it seems feasible that it evolved from early ‘velvet cakes’and has enjoyed popularity in America for decades, making its way to the mainstream of British palettes much later, in the noughties, after being popularized in TV hit Sex in the City and various American recipe books.
Whilst the exact origins of the Red Velvet Cake may be a mystery its glamour and popularity are in no doubt and indeed one can never forget its role in the 1980’s film Steel Magnolias, where the armadillo groom’s cake was cut to reveal a deep crimson centre and in 2002 Red Velvet Cake was the official Wedding Cake of Jessica Simpson and Nick Lachey. Indeed the Red velvet cake is one that has captured not only our imaginations and taste buds but has also penetrated our popular culture.
