Tuesday, May 12, 2009

Gooey butter cake = love

So I mentioned in yesterday's post that I would get to gooey cake in a later post - and I'll briefly get into it now.

Gooey Butter Cake (that is its full name...Gooey Cake or Gooey for short) is a treat that is popular in the Midwest - my family picked it up in St Louis. My mom made it for us when we were little but I didn't remember/pick it back up until college. I started making it for friends in college and continued on making it at my first job. I thought that people out here in Columbus would have heard of the greatness that is Gooey before I came around, but apparently it's really not all that widely known outside of St. Louis. Gooey butter cake tastes like nothing else. It's not like yellow cake, it's not like coffee cake. It's like happiness in cake form. It seriously just tastes like sweet butter. I wish I could describe it better...but you really have to taste it for yourself.

Given that the recipe is currently printed on the side of the Kroger brand cream cheese box, I'm not going to be shy about sharing the recipe...so pls see below:
Preheat oven to 350 degrees...pull out a 9" x 13" pan (no need to grease since there is so much butter in the cake)
Ingredients:
3 eggs
1 stick of butter (melted)
1 8 oz brick of cream cheese (softened)
1 box of butter cake mix (I recommend Duncan Hines)
1 lb of powdered sugar

Mix together melted butter, 1 egg, and cake mix. Once all of the cake mix is moistened, press into the bottom of the pan (I recommend turning out the dough, covering it with plastic wrap, and using your hands to press it uniformly into the pan - much easier than trying to use a spatula).

Mix together softened cream cheese, remaining 2 eggs, and 1 lb of powdered sugar (reserve a couple of tablespoons to sprinkle on top of the cake). The ingredients will form a thick liquid. Once all the ingredients are combined, pour over the top of the dough that has been pressed into the bottom of the pan.

Bake for 30-35 minutes, until top is golden brown and puffy. Sprinkle with reserved powdered sugar.

Devour, and/or fend off hoards of people with forks trying to steal your cake.

ANYWAY.

Today I brought a gooey cake to work for a friend's birthday. I saved a piece to the side for a friend on my desk, and while it was sitting there, a guy from my design team came over and was talking to me about some comments...the conversation went like this:

Brian: Ok so I think we're going to get out these (stops short and grabs my wrist in a vice) IS THAT GOOEY BUTTER CAKE?
Me: Ummm...yes? Do you like gooey cake?
Brian: SHUT UP. SHUT UP.
Me: Are you from St. Louis??
Brian: I'm from Springfield!!
Me: GO TO THE CONFERENCE ROOM RIGHT NOW AND GET SOME.

So Brian goes into the conference room and gets some gooey cake and bites into it and says "This tastes like childhood...and love." And then he turns to me and says "Don't you love it when you like someone a lot...and then something happens and you LOVE them?"

See?

Gooey = love.

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