Oriole Devil's Food Cake

This may be the best chocolate cake I've ever made - and I've made some good ones.

Now, I won't claim that it's the best chocolate cake I've ever eaten. I think that prize goes to Lia Lewis, who made the groom's cake for our wedding last month - holy moly, that was just all kinds of moist chocolatey rich goodness. But I digress....

This Devil's Food cake actually reminds me of the snack cakes of my youth, like Hostess® CupCakes or Ho Hos®. I haven't eaten either in at least 20 years, and probably wouldn't care much for them today, but this cake tastes as delicious as I remember thinking those were, if that makes sense.

I had one slight deviation, because my buttermilk was old and I had to throw it out. Instead, I prepared my own sour milk by putting a tablespoon of white vinegar in a measuring cup, and then filling the rest of the cup with milk. I let that sit while I prepared the rest of the batter. It came out just fine.

I actually made these as cupcakes, because we got a cupcake platter as a wedding gift, so I wanted to break it in with something delicious. It almost worked: I divided the batter evenly into 12 cupcakes, but most of them overflowed and I ended up with lopsided cupcake tops and burned batter on the bottom of the oven. Oops. If I did it again, I'd try making 18 small cupcakes. As it was, I used a knife to trim off the excess edges, and then used lots of frosting to mask the lopsidedness. I even had bits of candied orange rind (left over from the Orange Nut Bread) that made them look festive:

So the frosting is where things got interesting. I searched through all the recipe cards twice, but there was no mention of how to prepare the orange-lemon frosting, so I tried an internet search and came up with just a few recipes. I picked this Orange-Lemon Frosting recipe that called for beating egg whites, sugar, and flavorings in a bowl over simmering water. Unfortunately, I was in a very distracted state and didn't fully read through the directions that said to remove the bowl from the heat and continue beating the frosting until cold. What I ended up with was thick and fluffy and tasted good, but stayed sticky and marshmallow-gooey.

When I sat down to type this entry, though, I decided to go online and look up the full name of this cake, because I was curious as to what "Oriole" meant. I didn't find out the answer, unfortunately, but I did find a link to a 1936 vintage ad for Baker's Chocolate that included the recipe for both this cake and the orange-lemon frosting! I had a little trouble reading the numbers in the recipe, but I'm pretty sure my transcription below is right.

Now I need to make this cake again along with the proper frosting - I'll update after I've tried it.

Also, I'd appreciate any insights on the Oriole reference!
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Oriole Devil's Food Cake

1½ cups sifted cake flour
1 tsp baking soda
¼ tsp salt
4 tbsp butter or other shortening
1 cup sugar
1 egg, unbeaten
2 [oz] squares unsweetened chocolate, melted
1 cup sour milk or buttermilk
1 tsp vanilla

Sift flour once before measuring, add soda & salt, and sift together 3 times.
Cream butter & sugar.
Add egg and beat very thoroughly; then add chocolate and blend.
Add flour alternately with milk, a small amount at a time, beating after each addition until smooth.
Add vanilla.
Bake in 2 greased 8" layer pans in mod. oven (350°) about 30 min.
Spread orange-lemon frosting between layers & on top & sides of cake.


Orange Lemon Frosting

2 tsp grated orange rind
¼ tsp
3 tbsp butter
1 egg, unbeaten
dash of salt
3¼ cups sifted confectioner's [powdered] sugar
2 tbsp orange juice
1 tbsp lemon juice

Add orange and lemon rinds to butter and cream well.
Add egg and salt and blend.
Add sugar, alternately with fruit juices, beating until smooth and light consistency to spread.
Makes enough frosting to cover tops and sides of two 8-inch cakes.
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