Today’s post is a vintage baking piece brought to you by sugar-sweet and candy-coated blogger Sara Lily from In A Nutshell, who loves blog about her favorite looks, concoctions from the kitchen, interesting reads, as well as some of her freelance photography portraits. Prepare for a delicious treat!

Hey there! Sara Lily from In a Nutshell… here! Have you ever tried making a recipe from a vintage cookbook? It can be super fun! It can also be super…interesting. Recipes from the 50s and 60s are quite funny – some of them call for the weirdest ingredients while others have such complicated steps that they deter you immediately. Others have such elaborate explanations and others are so simple they make you feel quite silly.

I do love a good vintage cookbook. Many of them provide you with hundreds of recipes as well as seemingly endless advice on how to properly run your home and host a dinner party. Oh it’s a riot! I can find a good cake recipe and learn how I should best present it to my guest all in one place? Perfection!

As I looked through the few vintage cookbooks I owned recently, this recipe from the General Foods Kitchens Cookbook caught my eye. I began to read the recipe, dying to know why it was called Orange Lemon Funny Cake.

What was so funny about it?

I have to be honest, while I know why it is called funny, there were quite a few quirky details of making this cake! At first, I thought it very well could be the concept of baking a cake in a pie crust. Hmm cake pie anyone? Nope. Could it be the fact that you add your sugar to the flour and dry ingredients? A bit different from other recipes but certainly not too strange. So nope.

OK, I’ll tell you. It’s because you pour the orange sauce mixture on top of the cake batter prior to baking it and when it comes out, the sauce magically appears between the baked cake and pie shell! It’s baking sorcery, I say!

In all honesty, it’s not magic. It’s really simple – the sauce is heavier than the cake batter so as the cake bakes, the sauce moves right through the cake and settles in against the pie crust. By doing so, it creates a sweet, tangy, gooey center that’s to die for.

As I made this, I was doubtful. I even had ingredients for a back up recipe that was a bit more common just in case. I didn’t know what to expect once it was baked. Then I took a bite.

Wow! It sure was an interesting experience baking this treat but it came out super tasty! The cake surprised me most – it only called for a teaspoon of lemon rind but it was super flavorful! The lemon flavor wasn’t strong at all but it was scrumptious and moist – the perfect companion to the thick and sweet orange sauce underneath.

I have to say, the pie crust works with it as well! It’s mostly there to serve as a cradle for the orange sauce but who doesn’t enjoy pie crust? It sure doesn’t hurt a cake, that’s for sure!

So what’s the lesson here, kids? Don’t let vintage recipes scare you. Some may be a bit odd, complicated, and sorta funny, but you never know! Some of them may surprise you!Orange Lemon

Adapted from The General Foods Kitchens Cookbook

For the sauce:

• 1/2 cup orange juice
• 3/4 cup sugar
• 2 tablespoons butter
• 1 teaspoon grated orange rind

For the cake:

• Pastry for 1 crust pie (I used store bought!)
• 1 1/4 cup flour
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 3/4 cup sugar
• 1/4 cup shortening
• 2 teaspoons grated lemon rind
• 1/2 cup milk
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1 egg

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
2. Combine 1/4 cup of the orange juice with 3/4 cup sugar in a sauce pan and cook over low heat, stirring until mixture comes to a boil. Boil for one minute.
3. Add remaining 1/4 cup orange juice, 2 tablespoons butter, and grated orange juice, and mix well.
4. Set sauce aside and cool.
5. Roll pastry on floured board (if made from scratch) and gently line your pie plate with dough. For store bought, follow directions on package to prepare dough.
6. In a medium bowl, combine dry ingredients: flour, baking powder, salt, and 3/4 cup sugar.
7. Place shortening into mixing bowl. Add in your dry ingredients followed by the lemon rind, milk, and vanilla. Mix until flour is dampened and then beat for 2 minutes.
8. Add egg to mixture and beat another minute.
9. Pour batter into pastry-lined pie plate.
10. Pour lukewarm sauce gently over cake batter (when cake is baked, sauce will form a layer between cake and crust).
11. Bake in oven for 50 minutes to an hour or until tooth pick comes out of center clean.

Orange Lemon Funny Cake

Recipe by Adapted from The General Foods Kitchens Cookbook

Ingredients

• 1/2 cup
  orange juice
• 3/4 cup
  sugar
• 2 tablespoons
  butter
• 1 teaspoon
  grated orange rind
• Pastry for
  1 crust pie (I used store bought!)
• 1 1/4 cup
  flour
• 1 teaspoon
  baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon
  salt
• 3/4 cup
  sugar
• 1/4 cup
  shortening
• 2 teaspoons
  grated lemon rind
• 1/2 cup
  milk
• 1 teaspoon
  vanilla extract
• 1
  egg

Cooking Directions

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
2. Combine 1/4 cup of the orange juice with 3/4 cup sugar in a sauce pan and cook over low heat, stirring until mixture comes to a boil. Boil for one minute.
3. Add remaining 1/4 cup orange juice, 2 tablespoons butter, and grated orange juice, and mix well.
4. Set sauce aside and cool.
5. Roll pastry on floured board (if made from scratch) and gently line your pie plate with dough. For store bought, follow directions on package to prepare dough.
6. In a medium bowl, combine dry ingredients: flour, baking powder, salt, and 3/4 cup sugar.
7. Place shortening into mixing bowl. Add in your dry ingredients followed by the lemon rind, milk, and vanilla. Mix until flour is dampened and then beat for 2 minutes.
8. Add egg to mixture and beat another minute.
9. Pour batter into pastry-lined pie plate.
10. Pour lukewarm sauce gently over cake batter (when cake is baked, sauce will form a layer between cake and crust).
11. Bake in oven for 50 minutes to an hour or until tooth pick comes out of center clean.