A Cake Occupies Wall Street*

Baking for the revolution that's happening just a few miles from my house seems the perfect way to show support and a wonderful way to channel both my inner radicalism and inner Betty Crocker.
Plus, those occupiers deserve cake.

To feed more people, I opted to make a sheet cake, inspired by Marty Reimer, who baked for the revolution in Egypt earlier this year. Commenting on my blog post, Egyptian Cake: When Politics and Pastry Collide, she wrote:
"i've been baking a sheet cake most days of the revolution and distributing it to my neighbors. every day i make a different recipe and call it something related to the revolution: "revolution cake," "tahrir cake," "curfew cake," "perseverance cake," etc."

The chocolate sheet cake I made (also called cookie sheet cake) is from one of my very favorite sources: the Indiana Rural Letter Carriers' Auxiliary Cookbook, published in Hope, Indiana in 1977, and given to me personally by the auxiliary president, Mrs. Howard D. [Katherine] Stewart, as she referred to herself. Southern Indiana is also home to some of my most conservative friends (that's you, John Beach!), a real contrast to the occupiers of Wall Street.

This is an easy cake to put together and is baked, not in a cake pan, but in a 11 x 16 inch cookie sheet, aka, a hotel pan. First heat the water, two sticks of butter (use that instead of the margarine called for in the recipe) and cocoa powder.

After a few minutes, the mixture will look like this. Let it come to a boil before pouring it on the flour and sugar that you have waiting in a mixing bowl.

The cake bakes in just 20 minutes. It's important to start the frosting about five minutes before you take the cake from the oven, as it needs to be poured over the cake while hot.

I didn't like the way the cake looked with just the frosting (the unfrosted cake is pictured above), so I put some sweetened shredded coconut on top. It adds flavor, texture and an extra yum factor. The occupiers are going the extra mile, so I thought I should too.