Mrs. Morrison's Mace Cake

I pulled the following file from the net over ten years ago, and made this page one of the original files I added to the fledgling World Wide Web in 1994. I leave it here for you to try. The comments at the end of the recipe are from Brent S. Noorda, who originally posted the recipe.

I eventually did make this cake a few times, with mixed results. First of all, I recommend doubling the amount of mace, if you want to be able to taste it at all. Second, I can't say the mace does much for me as anything other than flavoring. The effects of the massive amounts of sugar and fat in this cake are much more noticeable. I mean, if you cut this cake into 40 pieces, each piece will have about a tablespoon of sugar in it!

- from The Chesapeake Bay Cookbook, by John Shields published by the Aris division of Addison Wesley

Ingredients:

• 1 cup milk
• 1/2 cup (1/4 pound) butter, softened
• 4 eggs, beaten
• 2-1/2 cups sugar
• 2 cups flour
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1 tablspoon plus 1/2 teaspoon ground mace

Instructions:

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.
2. In a saucepan combine milk and butter. Bring to a boil and remove from the heat.
3. Cream together the eggs and 2 cups sugar in a mixing bowl.
4. Sift together the flour, baking powder, salt, and 1 tablespoon mace.
5. Mix the dry ingredients into the creamed mixture. Add the milk and butter while still hot and mix well. Mrs. Morrison always insisted on 300 strokes to blend the mixture well.
6. Pour into a greased and floured 9-by-13-inch pan. For the topping, mix the remaining 1/2 cup sugar and 1/2 teaspoon mace together and then sprinkle the mixture overtop the batter.
7. Bake 25 to 35 minutes. (Alternatively, bake the cake in a 10-inch tube pan at 325 degrees F for 1 hour.)

Notes:

It explains in the book the Mrs. Morrison was the houskeeper at an Episcopal church for at least two to three generations, and this cake was revered by each succeeding congregation. The wife of the priest says that this cake is great for funerals.

I prefer the 10-inch tube pan. Careful, it's addicting. Don't eat the whole cake yourself. Also, if it works for you as it did for me, don't expect to get any serious stuff done for at least 24 hours.

Let me know how it goes.