Tit Tat Toe Cake

For my latest vintage recipe experiment I took inspiration from one of my antique finds - Sargent's Gem Chopper, which I blogged about a few weeks ago. The 1899 chopper came with a cookbook and I enjoyed browsing through it to find a recipe to try. This one caught my eye:

The combination of flavours, as well as the ombre effect that is so in fashion at the moment, intrigued me.

As it was such an old recipe I was unsure what size of cup to use for measuring. My research didn't prove conclusive, so I just grabbed the nearest vintage cup and hoped that it would work out!

My cake mixture curdled rather a lot. A very thorough whisk sorted this out, but if you try out this recipe it might be an idea to mix the ingredients in a different order.

I decided for full authenticity I ought to use the Gem Chopper itself. It surprised me how effectively it chopped the golden raisins (I must confess to doing a little dance when I realised it was working). Chopping the chocolate was rather less efficient - it stuck to the inside. I guess chocolate has probably changed a lot in the past 100 years.

There were no instructions for how to flavour the lemon layer so I added the grated zest of a whole lemon. I also put some cocoa powder in my chocolate layer to make it a shade darker.  Cooking information was also absent - I did mine at 180ºC for 25 minutes.

Here is the cake in all its graduating glory. It turned out subtle but I like it.

To make the cake live up to its Tit Tat Toe name I had a game of Noughts and Crosses with myself in chocolate frosting. Naturally it was a stalemate!

So that concludes my second vintage recipe experiment. To my surprise the unusual combination of chocolate, raisin and lemon flavours went well together and the texture was good too, almost like a light steamed pudding. The process was pretty fun as well - it is always exciting to try something new and it to actually work!

I'm already looking forward to my next experiment. I'd love suggestions for a vintage recipe to try...