½ cup margarine
½ cup salad oil
1 3/4 cups sugar
Cream the first three ingredients. Add:
2 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla
½ cup sour milk
2 ½ cups flour
½ teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon soda
½ teaspoon cinnamon
½ teaspoon salt
4 Tablespoons cocoa [powder, not drink mix]
2 cups chopped zucchini
Blend thoroughly and spread in a 9 x 13-inch pan. Sprinkle ½ cup chocolate chips and ½ cup nuts over the top. Bake 40-45 minutes at 325°F.
This recipe by Evelyn Booy appeared in Hallelujah! Another Cook Book by the Women’s Ministries Group, First Assembly of God Church, Mountain Home, AR.
[Editors note: Homemade cakes are easier than people think. You can have more wholesome ingredients, fewer artificial ingredients, and new flavors with not a whole lot more effort!
The salad oil of days gone by is the vegetable oil of today.
Breaking and stirring eggs before adding them to cakes makes the mixing easier.
When flour and liquids are mixed, it is best to stir the least amount necessary to get the job done as this prevents the gluten in flour from developing. Gluten is a natural component of wheat and is important for developing elasticity of dough in most breads and pizza dough where rising is important in trapping yeast bubbles. It it makes a resilient, elastic dough if fully developed. But you want cakes to be tender, so it is important to mix the least necessary for cakes and light treats to prevent toughness.
Its always a good idea to mix dry ingredients well in a separate bowl before adding them together with wet ingredients to allow them to be equally distributed in a cake without having to mix a long time.
Sour milk is a reality of farm life. Unless milk is heated just enough to kill the enzymes in it (pasteurized), then it will go bad more quickly than milk from the grocery store does. There are benefits to the enzymes and many home milk producers do not pasteurize their milk. “Sour” is the stage milk goes through between sweet and spoiled. You can create your own ½ cup of sour milk by adding 1½ teaspoons vinegar or lemon juice to a measuring cup and filling it with milk to the ½ cup mark. Stir it gently for about 30 seconds, and then let it sit for a few minutes until it begins to curdle or thicken. Voila! Sour milk. Sour milk made this way is also used as a substitute in recipes calling for buttermilk!]
