Selects: Cake: So Great. So, So Great

Summary

Stuff You Should Know – Episode: “Cake: So Great, So, So Great” (April 12, 2025)

Hosts: Josh Clark and Chuck Bryant
Producer: iHeartPodcasts

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Introduction to Cake

In this episode, Josh Clark and Chuck Bryant delve deep into the delightful world of cake, exploring its history, the science behind baking, various types, and personal anecdotes that highlight their passion for this beloved dessert.

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The Passion for Cake ([01:01] - [06:59])

Chuck Bryant kicks off the conversation with enthusiasm:
"Hi, everybody. Do you want to learn about cake? It's called cake. So great. So, so great." [01:01]

The hosts reminisce about their extensive previous discussions on cake, humorously noting that an entire episode was dedicated to it:
"This is super size because somehow we did 73 minutes on cake. Probably because we talked about cake a lot beyond just the facts and figures." [01:14]

They share their favorite types of cakes, highlighting personal preferences and family favorites:

• Chuck’s Favorites: Carrot cake with cream cheese frosting and red velvet cake.
• Josh’s Favorites: Publix yellow cake with buttercream frosting, praising its simplicity and perfection.

Chuck humorously contrasts his appreciation for buttercream over German chocolate frosting:
"I like sort of a tradish buttercreamy or just good old fashioned birthday cake icing type thing." [07:10]

Josh agrees, emphasizing Publix as the pinnacle of cake perfection:
"There's no better cake on the planet. It's simple, but it's tasty." [08:11]

---

History of Cake ([12:00] - [16:30])

The hosts transition into the historical aspects of cake, uncovering its ancient origins:

• Origins:
  Josh explains that cakes date back to pharaonic Egypt, where they were made using hot stones, honey, and grains:
  "Cakes were made using hot stones and honey and some sort of grain mashed up." [13:16]

• Medieval Britain:
  Chuck adds that during the medieval era in Britain, cakes were essentially sweeter versions of bread with honey added:
  "Cake was like a sweeter version of bread back then." [12:35]

• Industrial Revolution:
  Josh highlights that the modern American cake emerged during the Industrial Revolution, which enabled mass production and widespread home baking:
  "The idea of a cake, what Americans call a cake and know and love, is a cake that came out of the Industrial Revolution." [14:13]

They discuss the evolution of birthday cakes, noting that while candles were originally used by the Greeks to honor deities like Artemis, Germans in the 1400s popularized birthday cakes with candles, solidifying the tradition:
"The Greeks gave us the round cake and putting candles on the cake to honor Artemis..." [15:12]

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The Science of Baking: Ingredients and Chemistry ([20:08] - [27:56])

Chuck shares a personal story about baking a red velvet cake, leading into a detailed discussion on the chemistry of baking:
"My deal is I'm not a great baker because baking requires you to be very precise with your ingredients. Because it is chemistry." [20:39]

Key Ingredients Discussed:

1. Leavening Agents ([21:18] - [25:12])
   Josh explains how leavening agents like yeast, baking soda, and baking powder work to introduce air and CO₂ into the batter, causing the cake to rise:
   "Leavening agents... take air and they expand it and make the cake rise with it." [24:00]

2. Fats ([25:34] - [28:24])
   Chuck emphasizes the importance of fats like butter in improving texture and moisture:
   "Fats improve the texture of a cake, allow it to be moist, flavorful." [25:34]

3. Sugar ([28:24] - [29:20])
   Josh discusses sugar’s role in moisture retention and preventing gluten development:
   "Sugar binds to water and locks it in, keeping moisture in and preventing the cake from becoming tough." [28:24]

4. Eggs ([29:20] - [30:21])
   They highlight eggs as emulsifiers that bind ingredients together and contribute to the cake’s structure:
   "Egg yolks... help give structure to the cake." [29:51]

5. Flour ([30:21] - [33:57])
   Josh and Chuck delve into the role of different flours, explaining how protein content affects gluten formation and, consequently, the cake’s texture:
   "Cake flour... lighter, fluffier cake." [33:36]

6. Liquids ([33:57] - [34:58])
   Chuck talks about how liquids hydrate proteins and contribute to rising during baking through steam generation:
   "Liquid helps keep things moist and fosters the chemical reaction between acids and bases." [34:31]

---

Baking Techniques and Tips ([35:01] - [42:00])

Josh and Chuck discuss essential baking techniques and oven management:

• Oven Consistency ([35:01] - [38:13])
  They stress the importance of a reliable oven temperature and proper cake placement for even baking:
  "Consistency is key. Use an oven thermometer to ensure accurate temperature." [36:07]

• Baking Methods ([55:38] - [61:35])
  Different methods, such as the creaming method, non-aeration method, and foaming method, are explained:

  • Creaming Method:
    "Creaming the butter and sugar incorporates air, essential for a light cake." [55:38]

  • Non-Aeration Method:
    Used for dense cakes like cheesecakes, often requiring a water bath to maintain moisture:
    "Cheesecakes bake in a water bath to prevent cracking." [58:56]

  • Foaming Method:
    Incorporates air through beaten egg whites, creating meringues and spongy cakes:
    "Meringue is used in pavlova cakes, adding lightness." [60:11]

Baking Pan Selection and Adjustments ([54:49] - [55:26])
They advise on the importance of using the correct pan type and adjusting temperatures accordingly:
"A dark nonstick pan requires a 25% reduction in temperature." [54:53]

---

Types of Cakes Around the World ([57:00] - [72:30])

Josh and Chuck explore various international cakes, debunking myths and sharing their experiences:

• Tres Leches:
  A moist cake made with evaporated, condensed, and whole milk:
  "Three kinds of milk make for an incredibly moist cake." [71:17]

• Dorayaki:
  A Japanese cake filled with sweetened red bean paste:
  "Dorayaki is like two pancakes with red bean paste inside." [71:51]

• Pound Cake:
  Originating from Britain, traditionally made with a pound each of butter, sugar, eggs, and flour:
  "Pound cakes were named for their simple, easy-to-remember recipe for the less literate." [57:00]

• German Chocolate Cake:
  An American invention named after a man with the last name German, not actually originating from Germany:
  "German chocolate cake is American, named after a German-American baker." [68:58]

• Red Velvet Cake:
  Discussed earlier, they reaffirm the natural chemical reactions that give it its distinctive color:
  "Red velvet cake naturally turns red from the reaction between cocoa, vinegar, and buttermilk." [65:00]

Personal anecdotes highlight their diverse experiences with these cakes, adding a relatable and humorous touch to the discussion.

---

Personal Stories and Anecdotes ([73:10] - [77:58])

The episode transitions to listener interactions and personal stories:

• Listener Mail:
  Chuck shares a heartfelt story about receiving a care package from a listener, Nick Pagan, including framed posters, CDs, and spirits:
  "Nick sent us a box with framed posters and bourbon. He's a whiskey enthusiast from the Bay Area." [73:10]

• Baking Memories:
  Josh recalls his sister's elaborate Howard Jones-themed keyboard cake, emphasizing the emotional connection and creativity in home baking:
  "Karen made a Howard Jones keyboard cake with Kit Kats and Rolos. It was the greatest cake ever." [53:11]

• Family Kitchen Dynamics:
  They humorously discuss the tension and teamwork in the kitchen, illustrating the real-life challenges of baking with loved ones:
  "The kitchen can be a place of real tension, especially if both of you do different things." [62:34]

---

Baking Mishaps and Tips ([74:07] - [77:58])

Chuck provides practical baking tips and shares common pitfalls:

• Pan Selection:
  "Using the wrong pan can ruin your cake. Adjust temperatures and refer to recipe-specific advice." [54:49]

• Frosting Tips:
  They discuss the evolution of frosting from almond paste to modern buttercream, expressing personal preferences:
  "Almond paste frosting is okay, but I prefer buttercream or Emily's Waldorf Astoria frosting." [63:46]

• Baking Soda vs. Baking Powder:
  Josh clarifies the difference between these leavening agents, debunking myths about their origins:
  "Baking powder contains sodium bicarbonate and two acidic minerals, reacting with water and heat to produce CO₂." [45:34]

Chuck humorously shares his challenges with baking precision:
"Baking soda is good for cleaning clothes and baking, but leave it in the fridge to soak up stank." [47:04]

They emphasize the importance of following recipes meticulously to achieve desired results, highlighting baking as a precise science.

---

Conclusion and Wrap-Up ([77:58] - End)

As the episode winds down, Chuck and Josh reflect on their journey through the world of cake, sharing laughs and reiterating the joy that baking brings to their lives. They encourage listeners to explore different cakes and appreciate the rich history and science behind baking.

Chuck concludes with a nod to their dedicated listener, Nick Pagan, thanking him for his support and gifts:
"Nick Pagan, you are now on the guest list for the San Francisco Sketchfest show. Just hit me up with an email." [73:59]

Josh invites listeners to engage further:
"If you want to know more about cakes, go eat some. You're gonna love them." [72:39]

---

Notable Quotes

• Chuck Bryant ([02:10]):
  "This made me just frankly want to put my face in a cake."

• Josh Clark ([07:10]):
  "Everybody knows that cake perfection was achieved sometime in the 20th century when Publix grocery stores started selling their yellow cake with buttercream frosting."

• Chuck Bryant ([07:18]):
  "That was a good coa."

• Josh Clark ([65:25]):
  "I've never had any bad cheesecake. That's always good."

• Chuck Bryant ([66:45]):
  "See, maybe. I mean, that's sort of like banana nut bread."

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Final Thoughts

Josh Clark and Chuck Bryant's episode on cake offers a comprehensive exploration of this sweet treat, blending historical insights, scientific explanations, and personal stories. Whether you're a baking novice or a seasoned cake enthusiast, this episode provides both informative content and entertaining banter that underscores the universal love for cake.

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Listen to the full episode on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts to immerse yourself in the sweet world of cake with Josh and Chuck!

Transcript

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He wanted to bring the Catholic left to its knees.

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From the producers who brought you Princess of South beach comes a new podcast, the Setup. The setup follows a lonely museum curator, but when the perfect man walks into his life.

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Well, I guess I'm saying I like you, you like me.

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[Harvey Guillen]

Listen to the Setup on the iHeartRadio app, I Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts.

[Chuck Bryant]

Hi, everybody. Do you want to learn about cake? It's called cake. So great. So, so great. That had to be a Josh title. Cake colon. So great. Period. So comma, so great. Yeah, that's Josh. This is from November 30, 2017. This is super size because somehow we did 73 minutes on cake. Probably because we talked about cake a lot beyond just the facts and figures. I know our personal opinions came around in this episode, so I hope you enjoy it as much as you enjoy pie.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

Welcome to Stuff youf Should Know, a production of iHeartRadio.

[Josh Clark]

Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. And there's Charles W. Chuck Bryant. And there's Jerry. The three of us are together, which means it's time for stuff you should know about. Cake.

[Chuck Bryant]

Cake. Cake. Cake. Cake. Cake. Cake. Cake. Cake.

[Josh Clark]

Cake. Cake. Cake.

[Chuck Bryant]

Cake.

[Josh Clark]

Cake. Cake. Cake.

[Chuck Bryant]

This made me just frankly want to put my face in a cake.

[Josh Clark]

I know. Sheet caking.

[Chuck Bryant]

Oh, man.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah, I know.

[Chuck Bryant]

We had a discussion about cake or pie quite a while ago, and I don't remember exactly where you landed on that.

[Josh Clark]

I'm surprised you can only think of one.

[Chuck Bryant]

One time we've done that.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah. Cake or pie? Both.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah, same here.

[Josh Clark]

Why choose between two wonderful things that you don't have to choose between?

[Chuck Bryant]

Agreed.

[Josh Clark]

As a matter of fact, every once in a while, you'll hit like, the birthday party jackpot where they'll have like, cake and pie and you're like, looks like I'm in heaven. But today, today, Chuck, we're not talking about pie. Although we can talk about one pie in particular because we're talking about cake. It turns out I Saw this somewhere. That Boston cream pie is actually a cake.

[Chuck Bryant]

Oh, really?

[Josh Clark]

Yeah. Surprise, Boston. Sorry to ruin your day.

[Chuck Bryant]

They're probably the ones that are like that are saying that.

[Josh Clark]

Oh, yeah, probably.

[Chuck Bryant]

Maybe. I don't know.

[Josh Clark]

The article on it was written in a thick Boston accent.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah. It is a cake. I'm not sure why, but I just know it's a cake now. And I want to give a hat tip here. I mean, we both worked off of the house stuff works article. But I also found a lot of good stuff on a site called what's Cooking America? Mm. Did you run across them?

[Chuck Bryant]

I did.

[Josh Clark]

They are good, man. They have, you know, clearly their niches. Cooking, baking, all things like, culinary. But they've got some really well researched articles on their site about, like, the history of cakes and things like that.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah, that's good stuff.

[Josh Clark]

Kudos to you. You remember kudos, the granola bar? Those are great.

[Chuck Bryant]

Oh, yeah. Are those not around anymore?

[Josh Clark]

No, no, no, those are gone. And then RIP Also bonkers Candy Takudo.

[Chuck Bryant]

Went the way of the dodo. I never heard of bonkers.

[Josh Clark]

They were like a fruit chew, but, like, really had some chew to it. Not like Starburst. You know, it just disintegrates. These were like. They were chewy. They were good. They're about as good as it gets, really. Candy wise.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah, they need. I know you've noticed they need to chill out here with the sweets at work.

[Josh Clark]

Oh, dude.

[Chuck Bryant]

Like, they have little Debbie star crunches and Swiss cake rolls and stuff all over the place.

[Josh Clark]

I know.

[Chuck Bryant]

Well, we don't need that in here.

[Josh Clark]

There's like three or four people who are like walking around toothless now. It's just rotten right out of their heads.

[Chuck Bryant]

Well, and also not you. My toothlessness is for different reasons.

[Josh Clark]

Yours is from a crostini.

[Chuck Bryant]

And I've also noticed, though, there's this weird mix in our office now because they try to get super healthy. So there will be like Swiss cake rolls next to a bag of clam chips or something.

[Josh Clark]

What chips? Clam chips sound kind of good.

[Chuck Bryant]

Seaweed. Seaweed strips.

[Josh Clark]

Oh, yeah, yeah, I know what you mean. Or like just figs. Yeah, you know, it's like a Fig.

[Chuck Bryant]

Newton without the good tasting part.

[Josh Clark]

We take figs and we mash them up. Then we wrap them in cellophane and you eat them for $5 a piece.

[Chuck Bryant]

And your child spits them out because they know better, right?

[Josh Clark]

No, today, yes, I'm with you. I do think it's gotten a little out of hand. Like, it's basically just a huge test of willpower at the, like, every moment, you know?

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. I don't indulge. I'm not getting into those Swiss cake rolls. But it is tough to walk by the miniature candy bar section.

[Josh Clark]

Right.

[Chuck Bryant]

And not be like, well, just one of those little guys. Look how tiny it is.

[Josh Clark]

Right. And then the next thing you know, you've got, like, 10 wrappers laying around your desk thinking, like, what have I done? I know, man.

[Chuck Bryant]

It's post Halloween stuff too, so maybe it'll die down.

[Josh Clark]

I don't think that's gonna happen, but. Yeah. But again, though, today, I guess if you replaced all of those candy bars with cakes that were just sitting around, you'd get zero complaints from me.

[Chuck Bryant]

Well, and at my house at Halloween, we gave away two things. We gave away whole slices of pound cake and just figs. It was the worst house in the block.

[Josh Clark]

Did you a pound cake fan?

[Chuck Bryant]

Not typically. Like, I would never order a pound cake or say, hey, can someone bake me one for my birthday?

[Josh Clark]

You wouldn't say, like, clark me a pound cake?

[Chuck Bryant]

No, I would never ask someone to clark me a pound cake. But occasionally, like, in my life, someone has had pound cake and said, would you like some pound cake? And it's, you know, it's good. Good sugary and dense stuff.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah, I like it because you can just eat it with your hand.

[Chuck Bryant]

Sure. Just pick it up and eat it.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah. It's like cake on the go.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. I am not a fan of lemon cakes.

[Josh Clark]

Oh, really?

[Chuck Bryant]

So, like, a lemon pound cake? I'm not into.

[Josh Clark]

Well, okay. Let's just get it out there. What's your favorite cake of all time?

[Chuck Bryant]

Oh, geez. I'm gonna toss it up between a carrot cake with cream cheese frosting.

[Josh Clark]

That's Bill Clinton's favorite.

[Chuck Bryant]

Well, you know, as Bill goes, so goes Chuck, which is not true.

[Josh Clark]

That was a good coa.

[Chuck Bryant]

The carrot cake with cream cheese frosting. Or I like a red velvet cake.

[Josh Clark]

Really?

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. Well, that's the southern buttercream or cream cheese frosting.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah, you can go either way.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. Emily's favorite of all time, hands down, is the Waldorf Astoria red velvet cake, which is red velvet cake with a frosting that is basically only, like, shortening, vanilla, and sugar.

[Josh Clark]

Oh, that sounds nice.

[Chuck Bryant]

It's not a cream cheese thing.

[Josh Clark]

What's your favorite favorite of all time? Well, everybody knows that cake. Perfection was achieved sometime in the 20th century when Publix grocery stores started selling their yellow cake with buttercream frosting.

[Chuck Bryant]

Oh, yeah.

[Josh Clark]

There's no better cake on the planet.

[Chuck Bryant]

It's like a yellow sheet cake.

[Josh Clark]

It's simple, but it's tasty. It doesn't need any dressing up, but if it does, we'll just put, like, some. Add some more frosting in the shape of balloons on top. Right. It's just. It's just perfection. It's the perfect cake. I love it. I can eat it morning, noon, and night. I can eat stale stuff I found in the dumpster behind Publix. I can eat the fresh stuff right out of the oven, so hot that it burns my mouth. I would eat it any way that it was given to me.

[Chuck Bryant]

I'm a big frosting and icing guy too. So a corner piece of sheet cake is pretty much heaven.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah. That is the tops.

[Chuck Bryant]

What is Yumi's favorite cake?

[Josh Clark]

Yumi's is actually the same as mine. We both are junkies for Publix cake, to tell you the truth. Although I have to say she introduced me to the wonder of Japanese cakes. And there's this little known fact about Japan. It loves to take. I shouldn't say it's a little known. Probably a lot of people know this, but it loves to take things that other cultures came up with and then improve them 10,000%. And one of the things that they've done that with is the French bakery. So if you go to Japan, you'll see all these cute little kind of Provence style French bakeries everywhere that sell the best baked goods you've ever had in your life. Right?

[Chuck Bryant]

Better than Paris.

[Josh Clark]

Yes. Oh, by far. By far.

[Chuck Bryant]

That's very controversial.

[Josh Clark]

It is. But I'm telling you, you would just be like, josh was right. This is better. I'm not kidding. They've improved on it. And they're all very. They're very deferential. So they're like, oh, well, this is. This is crap compared to what the French are making. However, you would say that in Japanese, but they're actually wrong. It actually is better. But one of the things that they make that's just top notch is this what they call cheesecake. It is not what you or I would call cheesecake at all. It's more like a yellow, spongy cake. I don't know where the cheese thing comes in. Maybe there's a little cream cheese in there. I'm not quite sure. But you and I would call it like kind of a dense yellow sponge cake. But it is very, very tasty. And that's a kind of a Japanese tradition that I would Guess Yumi would say is one of her favorites.

[Chuck Bryant]

Okay.

[Josh Clark]

And just a little shout out. There's a place in Toronto. Next time we're there, I'm going to take you there.

[Chuck Bryant]

All right.

[Josh Clark]

Actually, that's not true. I brought you a cake from there from Uncle Tetsu's cheesecake bakery. Yeah, that's a Japanese cheesecake.

[Chuck Bryant]

Oh, that was good.

[Josh Clark]

Ye, the bomb.

[Chuck Bryant]

All I know is get out of my face with any coconut or any pineapple.

[Josh Clark]

I'll take that.

[Chuck Bryant]

I'll just slide that over to your desk then.

[Josh Clark]

Yes. Keep them coming.

[Chuck Bryant]

I don't even like German chocolate cake. Really?

[Josh Clark]

I love German chocolate. All right, well, have you ever heard that German chocolate cake and red velvet cake are the same? It's actually not true.

[Chuck Bryant]

I haven't heard that.

[Josh Clark]

I had heard that many times. It's not true. But that German chocolate frosting is like, man, that's good.

[Chuck Bryant]

I'm not into that. See, I think that's what it does. That's what it is that I don't like. I like sort of a tradish buttercreamy or just good old fashioned birthday cake icing type thing.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah, Pipe on. Yeah. And surely you agree Publix is the pinnacle of that.

[Chuck Bryant]

I don't know if I've ever had a Publix cake.

[Josh Clark]

Oh.

[Chuck Bryant]

I go to Publix three times a week. So next time I'm just gonna.

[Josh Clark]

Well, now that you say that, it might be best that you stay away because you're gonna start adding. They sell it by the slice, which is dangerous.

[Chuck Bryant]

Oh. Because that's the only way I would want to do it.

[Josh Clark]

They sell it by the slice, Chuck.

[Chuck Bryant]

Like, I can't bring a whole cake in my house that's full.

[Josh Clark]

Be sure you look closely, because they have. Yeah, it would be. They sell also the same kind with like a cream cheese frosting. You want yellow cake with buttercream frosting. Okay, just give it a shot and let me know what you think.

[Chuck Bryant]

All right. The funny thing is we really haven't even started yet.

[Josh Clark]

No. Do you want to take a break?

[Chuck Bryant]

No. Let's at least give out, like three facts first.

[Josh Clark]

Oh, okay. Well, I think we just gave a lot of facts about what the greatest cakes in the world are.

[Chuck Bryant]

All right, how about this then? I'll start you out with the word cake apparently is an old Norse word, kaka, which is kind of funny because I don't know where it came from, but here in America, kaka can mean doo doo. Yeah, but K A. K A is where the original Word supposedly came from.

[Josh Clark]

Right. And a lot of English words have like Germanic or Norse origins. You know that.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah.

[Josh Clark]

So cake. The word cake is of English origin. So is bread. And apparently the bread and the cakes from back in the day, say during the medieval era, they were very, very similar. Probably the only difference was the cake might be slightly smaller and it was definitely sweeter. So cake was like a sweeter version of bread back then.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah, they'd add a little honey to it, but it's not like we think of as cake today.

[Josh Clark]

But that's not where the first cakes originate. They actually go way, way, way further back than that. Right.

[Chuck Bryant]

Is that true?

[Josh Clark]

Yeah, it's true. That may be a little too far back.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah, I think so.

[Josh Clark]

So. But basically, around the time, I believe, of Egypt, the pharaonic Egypt, they were making cakes using hot stones and honey and some sort of grain mashed up.

[Chuck Bryant]

Right. It seems like. I bet the Chinese were doing it too. Didn't say in here.

[Josh Clark]

Right.

[Chuck Bryant]

But it seems like anytime you're talking about who did stuff first, it's like Egyptians, Chinese, Greeks and Romans pretty much.

[Josh Clark]

I mean, you know, ancient civilization, but.

[Chuck Bryant]

Maybe not China, because it doesn't seem like a very cakey culture.

[Josh Clark]

No, I'm not sure about Chinese cakes. I don't think I've ever had one.

[Chuck Bryant]

I bet you someone knows, though, and I bet you there's like one of the best things in the world is probably a Chinese cake.

[Josh Clark]

You know, one of the other things, too, that I didn't realize that I learned from this article, Chuck, was that a lot of the cakes you see around the world that you would mistake for, you know, customary or traditional cakes for that culture, they're actually relatively new.

[Chuck Bryant]

Oh, yeah.

[Josh Clark]

That the cake that we know and love and understand is very much a 19th century American invention that came out of the industrial revolution.

[Chuck Bryant]

That's right. I mean, clearly, like in Germany, like you talked about in the 15th century, they were making cakes. They were actually even serving cakes at birthdays. And by all accounts, that's probably the first people to start the birthday cake tradish. And I think they even put candles on top. Well, no, the Greeks put candles on top, but it wasn't like happy birthday cake. It was more like, hey, this cake is round like the moon, and we're gonna put candles on it to make them glow. And they're probably huge candles now that I think about it.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah. The Greeks gave us the round cake and putting candles on the cake to honor Artemis, to make the cake look like the Moon. And Artemis was the goddess of the moon. Right, right. So they were like, look, Artemis, what do you think of this cake? She'd be like, it needs some frosting.

[Chuck Bryant]

That's right. And then the germans in the 1400s started doing birthday cakes. And in the 1700s were full on like, it's a kid's birthday party. It's got candles, it's a cake. And we'll sing some depressing German song.

[Josh Clark]

Right. That makes you reflect on your own existence.

[Chuck Bryant]

That's right.

[Josh Clark]

And its eventual end. But there. So by the time people were making birthday cakes in Germany, there was a long, long, long tradition of cakes already. And the word cake had started to originate in medieval Britain. But there was such a thing as a cheesecake already. The Romans created that and called it placenta. Seriously?

[Chuck Bryant]

Really?

[Josh Clark]

Yeah. The Greeks had created something that was basically a prototype of the fruitcake placus, I believe.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. They called it feces.

[Josh Clark]

Right. So there were all these kind of cakes and breads and things that were starting to be developed. And I think even that that pound cake that you're not so hip on came before the Industrial revolution too.

[Chuck Bryant]

Okay.

[Josh Clark]

So there's stuff that you would kind of recognize as cakes, but the idea of a cake, what Americans call a cake and know and love, is a cake that came out of the Industrial Revolution.

[Chuck Bryant]

The show sponsored by Cake Cake.

[Josh Clark]

Eat some today.

[Chuck Bryant]

All right, so let's take a break. We definitely gave way more than three facts.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah.

[Chuck Bryant]

We have earned our keep. And we're gonna come back and talk about a little chemistry right after this.

[Unknown Speaker]

Are your ears bored? Yeah.

[J. Edgar Hoover]

Are you looking for a new podcast that will make you laugh, learn and say que?

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

Yeah.

[Unknown Speaker]

Then tune in to locatora radio season 10 today. Okay.

[J. Edgar Hoover]

I'm Diosa. I'm Mala, the host of Locatora Radio, a radiophonic novella, which is just a.

[Unknown Speaker]

Very extra way of saying a podcast. We're launching this season with a miniseries, totally nostalgic, a four part series about the Latinos who shaped pop culture in the early 2000s.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

It's Lala checking in with all things Y2K 2000s. My favorite memory, honestly, was us having our own media platforms like Mondo's and MTV. Tres. You could turn on the TV. You see Talia, you see JLo, Nina, Sky, Evie Queen, all the girlies doing their things. All of the beauty reflected right back at us. It was everything.

[J. Edgar Hoover]

Tune in to locatora radio season 10.

[Unknown Speaker]

Now that's what I call a podcast. Listen to Locatora Radio Season 10 on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

[Harvey Guillen]

Sonoro and iHeart's Mike Cultura podcast Network present the Setup, a new romantic comedy podcast starring Harvey Yen and Christian Navarro. The setup follows a lonely museum curator searching for love. But when the perfect man walks into his life.

[Christian Navarro]

Well, I guess I'm saying I like you, you like me.

[Harvey Guillen]

He actually is too good to be true.

[Christian Navarro]

This is a con. I'm conning you to get the Delano painting. We could do this together.

[Harvey Guillen]

To pull off this heist. They'll have to get close and jump into the deep end together.

[Unknown Speaker]

That's a huge leap, Fernando, don't you think?

[Chuck Bryant]

After you, Chulito.

[Harvey Guillen]

But love is the biggest they'll ever take.

[Chuck Bryant]

Fernando is never going to love you.

[Unknown Speaker]

As much as he loves this job.

[Christian Navarro]

That painting is ours.

[Harvey Guillen]

Listen to the setup as part of the Mike Podcast Network, available on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

[Unknown Speaker]

On November 5, 2018 at 6:33am, a red Volkswagen Golf was found abandoned in a ditch out in Sleep Hole Valley. The driver's seat door was open. No traces of footsteps leaving the vehicle. No belongings were found, except for a cassette tape. Lodged in the player on that tape were 10 vile.

[Josh Clark]

No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no.

[Unknown Speaker]

Grotesque.

[J. Edgar Hoover]

Oh, my God.

[Josh Clark]

Oh, my God.

[Unknown Speaker]

Horrific stories that to this from the public until now. You feeling this too? A horror anthology podcast. Listen on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

[Chuck Bryant]

All right, so we're back, and we promised talk of chemistry. And I think we talked about this briefly on one show. I have tried to bake. I did a birthday cake for Emily a couple of years ago. Red velvet Waldorf Astoria cake. And it was okay. It wasn't pretty, though.

[Josh Clark]

What do you mean? Like it. Like it was lopsided or there's a horn growing out of it.

[Chuck Bryant]

It just, you know, it didn't look like a cake you would buy in a store, but it tasted really good.

[Josh Clark]

I'll bet it was made with a lot of love, too.

[Chuck Bryant]

Oh, of course. But my deal is I'm not a great baker because baking requires you to be very precise with your ingredients. Because it is chemistry. I'm a much better cook because I'm a fly by the seat of my pants. And throw a little of this in there, throw a little of that in there, and there's a much.

[Josh Clark]

Can't do that with.

[Chuck Bryant]

No, there's much more forgiveness in general cooking than Baking.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah, Cooking's an art. Baking is a science for sure.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah, that's what they say, right?

[Josh Clark]

Yeah, well, that's what I say too.

[Chuck Bryant]

You know you didn't make that up, right?

[Josh Clark]

I think I did. Okay, so with a cake, right, what you're doing is producing a chemical reaction. And I knew that.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah.

[Josh Clark]

But I had no idea on this granular level that this article gets into just how much of a chemical reaction baking a cake is.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. And this helps the understanding of it too, to me.

[Josh Clark]

So you want to start with a leavening agent, right?

[Chuck Bryant]

That's right.

[Josh Clark]

That's how you get from batter, which is kind of flat and soupy and wet, to a nice tall cake. The reason it rises is because of a leavening agent. And way, way, way back in the day, they used to use yeast. They used yeast for everything. They would make some beer, they would make a cake, they'd make some bread.

[Chuck Bryant]

They would throw it into the eyes of their enemy.

[Josh Clark]

They would in a fight, a dirty fight. And then eventually yeast kind of fell to the wayside a little bit as they realized that there's other ways to make cake rise. One of the big ways is to actually introduce air into it. And if you say beat some eggs, what you're doing, you're not just breaking the eggs down into their kind of components or like a mishmash of all of their components. You introducing air into that mix, which will eventually, as we'll see, transfers into the cake to make it rise.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. And like when you're following a recipe, if you've never baked a cake before and it says cream the butter and sugar or sift the flour, you can't just say, eh, like I don't have a sifter, so I'll just throw the flour in here. Like your cake is screwed.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah. Because it's not just like, oh, that makes the flour pretty.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah.

[Josh Clark]

The sifting flour introduces air into the whole mix too.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. This is all very important stuff. So you can't cheat any of these steps.

[Josh Clark]

No, you can't. You really need to follow a cake recipe pretty closely.

[Chuck Bryant]

I mean, I guess if you're a master baker and you know what you're doing, you can do something in lieu of something else.

[Josh Clark]

Sure.

[Chuck Bryant]

But if you're just an ordinary non professional baker at home, just follow the recipe and do what they say.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah. Because you couldn't say, well, I'm going to substitute this flour for a bunch of salt. Like, not only would it, would it taste radically different, like you're affecting the chemical composition of the mixture.

[Chuck Bryant]

True. Unless you're making a traditional South Georgia salt cake.

[Josh Clark]

Right. Which you can also use on those snowy days to clear the road too.

[Chuck Bryant]

That's right.

[Josh Clark]

So you've got yeast as a leavening agent, you've got introducing air through, like whipping something. And I found this mention of a recipe that called for four eggs to be beaten for two hours.

[Chuck Bryant]

Holy cow.

[Josh Clark]

So you can imagine that everybody was pretty psyched when chemical leavening agents were introduced in the mid 19th century.

[Chuck Bryant]

Oh, so that was an old recipe.

[Josh Clark]

Yes.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. And so in other words, you couldn't just put the mixer on with your eggs and leave.

[Josh Clark]

No.

[Chuck Bryant]

And go get on social media.

[Josh Clark]

No. This was with your arm.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah.

[Josh Clark]

And yeah, it was not. I mean, I imagine if the person you were working for asked for a cake, you're just like, this is a bad day. This is going to be a bad day.

[Chuck Bryant]

Did you beat for three hours?

[Josh Clark]

Right. And the whole reason, again you're doing this is to introduce some air. Right. But if you could use something else, say like sodium bicarbonate, also known as baking soda, and you mixed it, which is a base, and you added another ingredient in there, which is like an acid, say like buttermilk or yogurt or vinegar. Right?

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah.

[Josh Clark]

Like in a vinegar cake, that sodium bicarbonate, that base and the acid are going to mix together and form a chemical reaction and release CO2.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yes.

[Josh Clark]

And this is how modern cakes rise. CO2 is released through this chemical reaction and it goes and bubbles up through the cake and makes the cake rise with it. That's what leavening agents do is they take air and they expand it and make it the cake.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. Like when you slice a piece of cake, not so much pound cake because it's way more dense, or other non floured cakes, but your standard birthday cake, you slice it up and you see those, it's, you know, those pockets, those holes that, you know, those are air holes. Those were where the bubbles were. And we'll get to that a little more. But that's very important stuff.

[Josh Clark]

That's a famous chef's apron. Baker's apron. Ask me about my air holes.

[Chuck Bryant]

Fat source, very important.

[Josh Clark]

Sure.

[Chuck Bryant]

Fats improve the texture of a cake, allow it to be moist, flavorful, because we all know fat tastes great. And butter, you know, people can use shortening, which is good, margarine is good cooking oil. This can all be used, but for me, just get some real butter. And I say that for all foods. I went on a butter, not a kick.

[Josh Clark]

No.

[Chuck Bryant]

No, no, I am on a butter kick. I went on a boycott of sorts for a while, like real butter, but now I'm back on butter.

[Josh Clark]

Oh, yeah, yeah, I know what you mean. I tend to think butter is healthier of all of them, too. Yeah. Although olive oil has a beat, it's just such a radically different taste.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah, sure.

[Josh Clark]

I love olive oil, especially when you're baking with it. Although, have you ever had an olive oil cake?

[Chuck Bryant]

I don't think so.

[Josh Clark]

I don't remember where I had it, but, man, they are good.

[Chuck Bryant]

Really?

[Josh Clark]

Yes, they're surprisingly good. But it is definitely its own distinct thing, you know what I'm saying? Like, subbing olive oil out for butter is going to give you a weirdo recipe that no one's going to like, but they might pretend they do if they like you. Yes, but they don't really like that.

[Chuck Bryant]

Right. And all these fat sources, they can be used sometimes together or swapped out for butter. But again, you got to know what you're doing. You can't just say, well, I'm not going to use butter. I'm going to just use the same amount of cooking oil as melted butter.

[Josh Clark]

Right. And one of the reasons why swapping something out for butter in particular, too, I mean, butter gives it its richness. It helps improve its moistness and texture. Right. Butter is great, but butter also has a tendency to incorporate air when you cream butter, when you start to mash it around. That's the whole reason, like, they're not telling you to cream the butter just to make it look good before you add it to the batter. You're actually incorporating air there. So that butter is serving both as a fat and as a leavening agent in that recipe.

[Chuck Bryant]

Correct.

[Josh Clark]

If you come across a recipe that calls for butter that must be creamed, there's something else going on besides just getting a buttery taste out of your cake.

[Chuck Bryant]

That's right. Sweetener. I was about to say sugar instead of sweetener.

[Josh Clark]

Might as well, though.

[Chuck Bryant]

But let's be honest. You can use honey and stuff. You can use agave artificial sweetener, but sugar is the best thing to use in my opinion. It bonds best to water molecules. It's really gonna help. That'll help everything be nice and moist and soft. And you don't overdo it, though. You want to use, again, the right amount of sugar because not only could it could affect the taste, but it could make the texture. It could be too tough.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah. And sugar is another one too, where if you see sugar and you sub it out for something else. It can have an impact on that chemical reaction, for sure, because it does all those things you were talking about. Like, one of the things it does is the crystalline structure of sugar actually cuts through the batter to help release CO2 more easily. And like you said, it binds to water, which means it does two things. It locks it in so that it keeps moisture in, but it also, sugar also robs that water from some of the proteins and the starches that give the cake its structure, which means that they're not going to be able to become tough and dense, like you were saying, because sugar's already grabbed onto that water molecule.

[Chuck Bryant]

Right.

[Josh Clark]

And sugar in particular, you're not going to get the same thing with, like, stevia or honey. Like, it's not going to have the same effect. It's crystalline sugar, and it doesn't have to be white refined sugar. You have the same effect, I think, with, like, turbinado cane sugar, too.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. And you can. I mean, if you don't want to use sugar and you want to use honey, look up a recipe that is specific to honey, and they will help account for that in certain ways. But it's still, to me, you know, white sugar, do it.

[Josh Clark]

Right. And then sugar also gives it that nice golden brown color through the Maillard reaction.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah, that and the eggs, for sure.

[Josh Clark]

Yep. Well, we're at eggs, sugar, and eggs.

[Chuck Bryant]

Eggs are big.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah.

[Chuck Bryant]

Especially if they're ostrich eggs.

[Josh Clark]

Eggs. I know eggs have proteins in them. Right. And there's a couple of things in there. Those proteins help give structure to the cake, I believe.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yes, absolutely. The emulsifiers and the yolk, they help. It also kind of serves as a binding agent. There are a lot of things, including flour, that help bind things together, but those eggs and those yolks very much do. Because there are certain things in cake sometimes that don't want to mix.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah. Like the water.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. And the egg comes together and says, can't we all just kind of stick together here? Literally?

[Josh Clark]

Nice.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yes. That wasn't meant to be a pun. I meant that.

[Josh Clark]

And I think the two big emulsifiers are actually in the egg yolk. Cholesterol and lecithin are found in egg yolk. And they're like, hey, everybody, come on, let's hang out.

[Chuck Bryant]

That's right. And there's also fats in egg. And we also. We already mentioned that fats are awesome and taste delicious.

[Josh Clark]

Plus, also, if you're using whole eggs, most of the egg white is water. The vast majority is water. And as we'll see. Water and liquids play a big role in the cake, too. So it's all like the idea of people figuring all this out through millennia of little contributions here or there. It's just a blessing on humanity.

[Chuck Bryant]

It is.

[Josh Clark]

It's a really neat accomplishment that everyone had came together to figure this out over the span of time in the wonderful kitchens on cold winter days that were like, you know, you've got like a nice cake baking in the oven. You're contributing to humanity's knowledge of being great.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. A lot of bad. The carcasses of a lot of bad cakes have been left in its wake.

[Josh Clark]

Sure.

[Chuck Bryant]

To get where we are today.

[Josh Clark]

A lot of unhappy families and a lot of unpleasant conversations about those cakes.

[Chuck Bryant]

But still, and I bet in the olden days when times were a little tougher, they probably still ate those cakes.

[Josh Clark]

Oh, yeah, I would guess so.

[Chuck Bryant]

You know, you probably didn't just toss it out to the mules.

[Josh Clark]

No. You gave them to sailors who were glad to have them.

[Chuck Bryant]

All right, that brings us to flour. Very, very important ingredient and most baked goods and flour is what is going to really be the binding agent. It's really going to hold everything together.

[Josh Clark]

Give it its structure.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah, a lot of structure and strength. And this is when you mix these proteins with water, it's going to form gluten and gluten. I know a lot of people hate gluten, my wife being one of them, but gluten is a pretty key ingredient here. Although I will say they've come a long way now with gluten free cakes they have.

[Josh Clark]

It doesn't make you quite as sad to eat one.

[Chuck Bryant]

No, they're pretty good. Now, if you get a good gluten free cake, it's.

[Josh Clark]

Well, the cheesecake is gluten free, so that's okay with me.

[Chuck Bryant]

I mean, you know, your standard substitute flour, they've just gotten a lot better, I think.

[Josh Clark]

Yep. So in a standard glutinous cake, that gluten from the flour mixing with the water forms a gel and it gives it that structure, it gives it that consistency, the texture that you're looking for. But again, the sugar is robbing the proteins and the starches from getting too much water, because the more water it gets, the tougher the cake is going to be, the more gluten. So you actually want to make sure that your sugar is taking away some of the liquids. But also the type of flour you use has a lot to do with how tough your cake's going to turn out. So, like, there is such a thing as cake flour? Yes, that's something like 7%, 7 and a half percent protein, which is going to translate into less gluten when you mix it with water, right?

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah.

[Josh Clark]

So it's going to be a lighter, fluffier cake. And then there's all purpose. Flour is 10 and a half percent. Bread flour is 12%. And depending on what kind of consistency you want in your cake, you would use these different kinds of flour. And all of it comes down to the. The amount of gluten that's going to be produced when it interacts with the liquids.

[Chuck Bryant]

That's right. And finally, that brings us to the liquids. The liquids are obviously going to help keep things moist. They hydrate those proteins, they allow all those chemical changes to take place. But that liquid does. When you actually bake the cake, when it comes time to put it in the oven, which we're going to get to here in a sec, that creates a steam like that liquid cooks out and vaporizes. So that steam expands the air cells and that volume and it really lends itself to the light, airy structure and texture that you're going to get.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah, it blows up the CO2 bubbles in it even further, which helps make the cake rise. Plus it also, chuck, fosters that chemical reaction between the acids and the bases that act as leavening agents that release CO2 in the first place. The presence of liquids and the presence or water specifically, I think, in heat really make that CO2 go berserk.

[Chuck Bryant]

All right, well, we should talk about ovens.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah.

[Chuck Bryant]

I was about to say you can't bake a cake without an oven, but apparently you can.

[Josh Clark]

You can in Egypt. Yeah, Ancient Egypt.

[Chuck Bryant]

All right, so let's say we're not in ancient Egypt. Let's say we're in regular North America and Europe in the 18th century is basically when the semi closed oven came around. And before this, if you were baking cakes, well, you were probably a professional baker because these ovens weren't in every household. Right.

[Josh Clark]

And Even in the 18th century, they weren't in every household either. But they started to become a lot more prevalent around that time. That was a big first step toward people baking at home. Not just cakes, but anything, you know.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah.

[Josh Clark]

In cake history, that was a huge monumental moment when the enclosed oven became kind of ubiquitous among households for sure.

[Chuck Bryant]

Because what you get there is consistency. You get a consistent even temperature. And of course, that just got better and better over the years with advances in oven technology. And more than anything, you get a reliable temperature, ideally Right.

[Josh Clark]

And if you have those things, you can make a cake after cake after cake that your family won't be mad about, the sailors will stop coming by and being like, you got any more of them terrible cakes you made?

[Chuck Bryant]

Sailors?

[Josh Clark]

Yeah. That's who you give the terrible cakes to.

[Chuck Bryant]

Bumpkin sailors, sure. All right.

[Josh Clark]

So with the oven in particular, I didn't realize this, but you know how the liquid and the heat and the sodium bicarbonate and the acids are mixing together to make the cake rise?

[Chuck Bryant]

Yes.

[Josh Clark]

That is actually a really fragile state of affairs. While the cake is baking and the structure, the proteins and the starches and the gluten are actually solidifying and making this. This cake. And if you mess with the oven, meaning, like, you open and close the door too often or you slam it shut too hard.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah.

[Josh Clark]

You're going to. The change in temperature on the one hand can cool those gases and make your cake fall. And it makes a wa. Sound as it does.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah.

[Josh Clark]

As everyone knows. And then the air pressure from slamming the door can burst those CO2 bubbles. And again, your. The proteins haven't had a chance to, like, solidify and make the cake structure, so the cake can fall from that as well. And if you'll notice, once a cake gets to a certain point, if it falls, it falls in the middle. The outside usually stays up because that part has solidified already. The stuff in the middle hasn't quite cooked through. So that would be the part that falls. And that also proves my point.

[Chuck Bryant]

That's right. You also want to put your cake in the middle. Where you place your cake in the oven can even cause problems. It's very finicky. Cakes are.

[Josh Clark]

Sure. Well, again, it's a science experiment.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. They're basically like, do this right, jerk. Or I might just take a nap here in the middle of the cake.

[Josh Clark]

Maybe you'll burn. Maybe I'll stick up your whole house.

[Chuck Bryant]

But like you said about opening the door, ideally, you know the temperature of your oven, you know how long it takes, and maybe don't wait till literally, you think, I can pull it out. Although if you're a good baker, you're not sweating it. You pull it out and you know it's pretty much ready.

[Josh Clark]

Right.

[Chuck Bryant]

But definitely don't keep opening it. Try at least wait till the end. And if you have, they're not quite as in fashion now, I don't think, but ovens with a window and a light, you can obviously take a little peek that way.

[Josh Clark]

Sure.

[Chuck Bryant]

Those are kind of out of fashion. Right. Or are They.

[Josh Clark]

I don't. Not that I know of.

[Chuck Bryant]

I feel like I don't see those a lot. Do you have a window in your oven?

[Josh Clark]

Sure. Of course. What am I, a communist?

[Chuck Bryant]

Do you?

[Josh Clark]

Yes. With the light.

[Chuck Bryant]

Oh, man.

[Josh Clark]

What do you have?

[Chuck Bryant]

Just a stainless steel door.

[Josh Clark]

That's a dishwasher, man.

[Chuck Bryant]

Oh, that's my problem.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah. Like, my cakes always come out wet and soapy.

[Chuck Bryant]

Wait a minute. Do I have a window?

[Josh Clark]

Sure you do. I think everyone does.

[Chuck Bryant]

I literally cannot picture my kitchen right now.

[Josh Clark]

Jerry, he's got a window, right?

[Chuck Bryant]

I've been baking in the dishwasher, Jerry.

[Josh Clark]

And I say, yes, you have a window in your oven.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah, that might be. I might have just said something very dumb. So.

[Josh Clark]

So it's staying in, though.

[Chuck Bryant]

Well, I do know. You know what? I think I do have a window, but I don't have a working light. That's why I think I don't have a window.

[Josh Clark]

Need to replace the light bulb.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah, but who wants the bottom of that?

[Josh Clark]

For all that, you can go to, like, any. Any big box. Hardware store. Lollipop hardware store. Off the Internet. Sure.

[Chuck Bryant]

I don't replace light bulbs in my house.

[Josh Clark]

Matter of fact, I think they probably sell them at the grocery store even. You go find yourself some Gulf wax, and you're probably near the refrigerator. Oven light bulbs.

[Chuck Bryant]

All right. The heat of the oven is very important. So depending on how good your oven is, it may be a little off, maybe a little hotter or cooler. So you might want to purchase an oven thermometer just to give it a double check, because baking is science. And when you think that cake is done, take a little peek through your window that everyone has. Or open it. If you really think it's done, give a little tap in the center. If it springs back, then it's probably done. If you're an experienced baker, you just know by looking at it. Or you can always do the old toothpick trick, which is sticking that toothpick. Wooden toothpick in the center of the cake and pull it out. And if there's no cake on it, then it's pretty much done, right. If it's covered in goo, that means it's not done.

[Josh Clark]

That is correct, Chuck.

[Chuck Bryant]

But then you can also lick that goo off that toothpick. That's not bad.

[Josh Clark]

No, you can, but you're. It's just never quite as good. I think it always tastes like disappointment. You know what I mean? Because you want it to come out clean. Anytime you're doing that, you're never really Putting it in, expecting it to come out. Battery.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. Yeah.

[Josh Clark]

So even though you do get to lick it, that's like the one plus side of that, that experience.

[Chuck Bryant]

I think that's true. And if your cake is done, you're not finished baking it yet even you need to let it cool in the pan.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah, that's a big one.

[Chuck Bryant]

You don't just p the cake out and turn it upside down in your sink and eat it with your hands while it's still hot. Right. That's not the way to do it. No, no, you want to let it finish in the pan, cooling, because it's still doing a little bit of baking and it's getting used to its new room in the kitchen and saying, all right, this is a different temperature in here. I think I can hang with you guys.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah, I'm alive.

[Chuck Bryant]

Ten or 15 minutes later, get out that wire rack, flip it over, and ideally it comes out all in one nice thing.

[Josh Clark]

Yep. And the other good thing about letting it cool in the pan first, too, is when you cool it on the wire rack, it won't get those wire indentations in the cake because it'll be stable enough.

[Chuck Bryant]

I never thought about that.

[Josh Clark]

Nobody likes those. Sure. You can fill it in with a little extra frosting. Yeah. Actually, now I think about it, it's great. Those indentations are just fine.

[Chuck Bryant]

The frosting grooves, in other words.

[Josh Clark]

Yep.

[Chuck Bryant]

Should we take a break?

[Josh Clark]

Yes.

[Chuck Bryant]

All right. We're gonna talk, well, just about other cakey stuff right after this.

[Unknown Speaker]

On November 5, 2018, at 6:33am, a red Volkswagen Golf was found abandoned in a ditch out in Sleep Hole Valley. The driver's seat door was open. No traces of footsteps leaving the vehicle. No belongings were found, except for a cassette tape. Lodged in the player on that tape were 10. Vile.

[Josh Clark]

No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no.

[Unknown Speaker]

Grotesque.

[J. Edgar Hoover]

Oh, my God.

[Josh Clark]

Oh, my God.

[Unknown Speaker]

Horrific stories that to this day have been kept restricted from the public. Until now. You feeling this too? A horror anthology podcast. Listen on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Are your ears bored?

[Josh Clark]

Yeah.

[J. Edgar Hoover]

Are you looking for a new podcast that will make you laugh, learn, and say gay Ye?

[Unknown Speaker]

Then tune in to locatora radio season 10 today. Okay.

[J. Edgar Hoover]

I'm Diosa. I'm Mala, the host of Locatora Radio, a radiophonic novella, which is just a.

[Unknown Speaker]

Very extra way of saying a podcast. We're launching this season with a mini series, totally nostalgic, a four part series about the Latinos who shaped pop culture in the early 2000s.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

It's Lala checking in with all things Y2K 2000s. My favorite memory, honestly, was us having our own media platforms like Mundos and MTV Tres. You could turn on the TV. You see Thalia, you see JLo, Nina Sky, Evie Queen. All the girlies doing their things. All of the beauty reflected right back at us. It was everything.

[J. Edgar Hoover]

Tune in to locatora radio season 10.

[Unknown Speaker]

Now that's what I call a podcast. Listen to locatora radio season 10 on the iHeartRadio Apple podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts.

[Harvey Guillen]

Sonoro and iHeart's Mikeultura Podcast Network present the Setup, a new romantic comedy podcast starring Harvey Guillen and Christian Navarro. The setup follows a lonely museum curator searching for love. But when the perfect man walks into his life.

[Christian Navarro]

Well, I guess I'm saying I like you, you like me.

[Harvey Guillen]

He actually is too good to be true.

[Christian Navarro]

This is a con. I'm conning you to get the Delato people. We could do this together.

[Harvey Guillen]

To pull off this heist. They'll have to get close and jump into the deep end together.

[Unknown Speaker]

That's a huge leap, Fernando, don't you think?

[Chuck Bryant]

After you, Chulito.

[Harvey Guillen]

But love is the biggest risk they'll ever take.

[Chuck Bryant]

Fernando's never going to love you as.

[Unknown Speaker]

Much as he loves this job.

[Josh Clark]

Chulito.

[Christian Navarro]

That painting is ours.

[Harvey Guillen]

Listen to the setup as part of the Mike Ultura Podcast network, available on the Ipod, Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

[Josh Clark]

Okay, Chuck, you remember I was talking about baking soda and how that changed everything?

[Chuck Bryant]

Yep.

[Josh Clark]

That was a big one. That was from the 1840s. Baking soda. Sodium bicarbonate. Just good old fashioned, regular old baking soda started to be added to it. But at the time, you needed to also add another ingredient that was an acid so that the two would react and form CO2 or produce CO2. Right?

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah.

[Josh Clark]

Somebody about 20 years after baking soda was developed said, oh, I got this. We're going to come up with something called baking powder. And I never knew this, but this is the difference between baking soda and baking powder. Baking soda is just sodium bicarbonate. Baking powder is sodium bicarbonate and two other dry, acidic minerals that, when dry, they don't do anything. You can mix them together all day long, and they just sit there, like, what? But in the presence of water and heat, then they start to react chemically with one another. So you can add just a little baking powder, and you don't need an extra ingredient like yogurt. Or vinegar or some other acid. It's got the base and the acid that's going to produce the CO2 in there. That was a huge, huge advancement for cakes. But it actually came kind of toward the end of cake advancement. Prior to that, just the mass production of the industrial revolution had a big impact on cakes, among many, many other things, but definitely had an impact on the spread of cake baking, especially in the United States.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. And then. So just, you know, leave that baking soda in your fridge to soak up the stank.

[Josh Clark]

Sure.

[Chuck Bryant]

That's all it's good for.

[Josh Clark]

Well, that and no, you can use.

[Chuck Bryant]

Baking soda for a lot of stuff.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah. It also gets stink out of like clothes too.

[Chuck Bryant]

Oh, yeah.

[Josh Clark]

Mm. You can use it to. Well, that's it.

[Chuck Bryant]

No, like school science projects. You want to make a volcano.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah. Vinegar and baking soda.

[Chuck Bryant]

That's right. With your parents help.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah.

[Chuck Bryant]

Pre packaged cake mix was a very big deal when it came out in the 1930s, but it was, it was a company named P. Duff and Sons and they said, we got a problem here. We got too much molasses on our hands. So. And this is kind of how a lot of great things have been invented. They had too much of something. They say, well, what can we use this for? So they got to work and they said, Mr. John Duff, the owner said, you know what, throw a little wheat flour in there with this molasses, little shortening, some spices. We got a gingerbread mix that we can sell to the public. All you gotta do is add water, dum dum, and you can bake yourself some gingerbread cookies.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah. And the public went hooray. Because remember, they had ovens now in their houses.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yes.

[Josh Clark]

And they had this. The idea that you could just get a mix from the store and just add water was huge. That was a huge change. And what's interesting is this, this whole like P. Duff and Sons story. They're out of Pittsburgh, by the way, from them coming up. Because I think they quickly went from just gingerbread mixes to cake mixes themselves as well. But that busts several myths, actually. Some like long standing food myths.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah.

[Josh Clark]

One of them is that cake mix came out of a surplus of flour from World War II. That's where the cake mix came from.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. I mean pre made cake mixes did get way more popular after World War II. But it wasn't because there was so much flour.

[Josh Clark]

No. It was because that a lot of the food companies started getting into premixed foods.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah.

[Josh Clark]

That you could make pretty easily in your kitchen. But then the other one, I love this one. There's this long standing myth or this story about a guy named Ernest Dichter. Who? Back in the 1950s, Ernest Dichter, he was a psychologist. I believe he came up with the term focus group. He came up with the whole idea of focus groups to help companies figure out why their new product wasn't doing so well or how to make a product that they hadn't launched yet even more appealing. This guy came up with that whole idea of focus groups, right?

[Chuck Bryant]

Correct.

[Josh Clark]

So he's also credited with being the man who saved cake mixes, because cake mixes came out, everybody kind of loved them. And then supposedly sales went flat and Ernest Dichter got a focus group together and found out that women who made cakes using these cake mixes felt guilty that they weren't contributing anything to their families. They were just adding water and making a cake and then quietly sobbing while their family ate it.

[Chuck Bryant]

Talk about a patriarchal brainwashing.

[Josh Clark]

Right? So Dichter realized that the best thing that these cake mix companies could do is to remove the dried egg ingredients from the mix and tell the consumer to add her own eggs. So then that way she was contributing. Well, it was a huge success and cake mixes took off and became part of the American pantheon from that point on. Right.

[Chuck Bryant]

Not true.

[Josh Clark]

No.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. That is a total urban myth. Most of these pre made mixes for years had said to add your own eggs because it just was better to add fresh eggs. It tastes better and perform better. So I don't know how that got started.

[Josh Clark]

The myth.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. Was it.

[Josh Clark]

I'm not sure either.

[Chuck Bryant]

Okay.

[Josh Clark]

I don't know. But it is a long standing food myth that you can find like some very credible sources who say, like, oh, this happened, it's just everywhere. But it turns out that's not true. But I think the reason why it has had legs for so long is because Ernest Dichter is actually rightfully credited with saving the cake mix market right. Through a focus group. And he did find that women were kind of not. They didn't feel guilty about it, about, you know, not contributing more to the cake mix. They think they were more bored by it. So he advised companies to figure out a way to make cake baking about way more than just baking the cake. And so companies decided that they were going to start promoting cakes as just the beginning part. That the real point of baking cakes was to make these elaborate, amazing cakes that you decorated. And it took you hours and hours to make these things. And it was like a scene of like Humpty Dumpty on a brick wall. But the who thing was made out of cake, and that was fostered by the introduction of frosting. And that came from Ernest Dichter. And that actually is what saved the cake mix industry.

[Chuck Bryant]

That's right. You want to know something about my mom?

[Josh Clark]

Yeah.

[Chuck Bryant]

Champion cake decorator.

[Josh Clark]

Is that right?

[Chuck Bryant]

Not literal champion. Like, she never won a contest.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah. Because it is out there.

[Chuck Bryant]

But yeah. I mean, as far as the home. The home cake baker goes. Like, she. She couldn't go on one of these shows now where they make, like, the.

[Josh Clark]

Great British Bake Off.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. Like, giant submarines and stuff out of fondant. But just for, like, mom making special cakes every year for the birthday. Every year she would say, what kind of cake you want? This year I'd be like, I want a Star wars cake. I want an Atlanta Falcons cake. And lo and behold, I would get my Atlanta Falcons cake.

[Josh Clark]

That's awesome.

[Chuck Bryant]

Very cool stuff.

[Josh Clark]

You know, I had an older sister who. She died, actually, when I was 16 in a car accident. But she used to be the equivalent of your mom at making cakes.

[Chuck Bryant]

Oh, really?

[Josh Clark]

But she didn't even need to ask. She would just. She'd just make something up, right?

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. Yeah.

[Josh Clark]

And there was this one year. I'll never forget this cake. We were all big time into Howard Jones, so it must have been. Yeah, it must have been like, my 9th or 10th birthday. My whole. Like, both my sisters and me were totally into Howard Jones. And Karen, my sister. My oldest sister, made a Howard Jones keyboard cake.

[Chuck Bryant]

Wow.

[Josh Clark]

And it was a couple of sheet cakes put together, frosted, so it looked like one big thing. Like, the black keys were Kit Kats. Like, the knobs on the synthesizer were Rolos. And I was. I just looked around at all my friends, like, does everyone see my cake? This is the greatest cake anyone's ever.

[Chuck Bryant]

Had, and no one can have any but me.

[Josh Clark]

No, I shared.

[Chuck Bryant]

Of course.

[Josh Clark]

I wanted everyone to partake in the bounty.

[Chuck Bryant]

Was it a keytar or a keyboard?

[Josh Clark]

It was a keyboard.

[Chuck Bryant]

Okay. Yeah, you never know. Strap a. Yeah, strap a guitar strap on it. You might could have held it.

[Josh Clark]

I would not have put it past her to make it a key tar.

[Chuck Bryant]

Man. That is a very sweet story.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah.

[Chuck Bryant]

Literally and figuratively.

[Josh Clark]

Thank you.

[Chuck Bryant]

Hojo fans, huh?

[Josh Clark]

Yes.

[Chuck Bryant]

Wasn't that his nickname?

[Josh Clark]

I don't think so.

[Chuck Bryant]

Did I make that up?

[Josh Clark]

Yeah. I think that's the hotel. Ching.

[Chuck Bryant]

I think you're totally right. All right, well, another tip here for baking a cake. If you were looking at recipes and it says, use this kind of pan. You think, well, I don't have that kind of pan. I've got this kind of pan. It's aluminum and square. And they're calling for a round, dark pan. It makes a big difference. Like, it can literally ruin your cake.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah. You supposedly want to reduce the heat, I think. Not the heat or the cook time. One of the two.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. It says a dark Nonstick pan requires 25% reduction in temperature.

[Josh Clark]

So you want to knock that heat down 25%.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. But also, like, Google that stuff. Don't just say, Josh and Chuck said this should work. You know, like, you have to have this, the right pan for that recipe. And they will tell you in the recipe, and if you don't have it, just look up the cheat for it. Basically.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah. Two things. You don't want to take our advice blindly on medical stuff and baking stuff.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah.

[Josh Clark]

Everything else is fine.

[Chuck Bryant]

I don't know about that. But those are the two leading ways that we will mess your life up for sure. All right, well, I guess we need to talk about the different methods. We're getting super wonky into cakes here.

[Josh Clark]

Well, I mean, that's what we do.

[Chuck Bryant]

All right, well, let's talk about creaming, then, because that is one kind of method of making a cake, and creaming is what we talked about. You may not have known exactly what we meant, but when you combine, like, the butter and sugar and it says cream it with an electric beater, that's what you're doing. And it's really tough at first to get it going, but just hang in there because that butter will start to break apart mixing it with that sugar. And you've got a nice creamed mix of ingredients, starter mix of ingredients on your hand there.

[Josh Clark]

Right.

[Chuck Bryant]

But you don't skimp on that first step.

[Josh Clark]

No. And that's like, I think the creaming method, that's. That's the one that best gets across this point, that this is like, it's a chemical reaction. I know we've kind of been beating that horse, but it's really true. Like, if you don't follow the steps correctly, the chemical reaction is not going to come out correctly.

[Chuck Bryant]

Right.

[Josh Clark]

And when you step back, you're like, but I'm baking a cake. That's true. But do you want your cake to be good or do you want to just waste your time?

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. So in the creaming method, when it says, then mix ingredients in this order, wet, then dry. Do that.

[Josh Clark]

Right.

[Chuck Bryant]

Don't just say, I'll just Throw it all in there. Right?

[Josh Clark]

Yep.

[Chuck Bryant]

It makes a difference.

[Josh Clark]

And it says that pound cakes are like a variation on the theme.

[Chuck Bryant]

Sure.

[Josh Clark]

I looked into pound cakes, man. Do you know. So the idea that pound cakes called for a pound of each ingredient. That's actually true.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah, I know.

[Josh Clark]

But the reason why it called for a pound of each ingredient was because a lot of the British people at the time in the early 1700s couldn't read. So it was just an easy way to remember the recipe.

[Chuck Bryant]

Oh, interesting.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah.

[Chuck Bryant]

All right. I'll buy that.

[Josh Clark]

They'd be like, what's a tibz?

[Chuck Bryant]

And also pound cakes, too. The reason why you're not going to find a pound cake with a big buttercream frosting is because that will send you into sugar shock in a second. The pound cake is already really dense and sugary. Like, that's why you just have it like a little glaze on top.

[Josh Clark]

Yep.

[Chuck Bryant]

I do like that glaze, actually. I'll eat a pound cake.

[Josh Clark]

I think that glazes. What's it called?

[Chuck Bryant]

Delicious.

[Josh Clark]

Something icing. Imperial icing.

[Chuck Bryant]

Oh, I don't know.

[Josh Clark]

I can't remember. Okay, so the next one is the. Not the. No aeration method to where you're not really. You're not whipping anything up. Yeah.

[Chuck Bryant]

You probably don't even have flour in this. In this. Probably a flourless cake.

[Josh Clark]

Right. So this. This is the kind of thing that you use to make like a cheesecake or a flourless chocolate cake.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah, those can be very good.

[Josh Clark]

Sure. And you are probably going to need to add some sort of moisture because cakes like this tend to crack while they're baking, which is why a lot of them cheesecakes in particular, you cook in a water bath in the oven because that water vaporizes and steams around it and helps keep that moisture in.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah.

[Josh Clark]

I never knew that the reason for the water bath.

[Chuck Bryant]

I didn't know that he used a water bath. That was news to me.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah.

[Chuck Bryant]

I've never made a cheesecake.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah, they can be quite good.

[Chuck Bryant]

Oh, I love cheesecake.

[Josh Clark]

I don't think I've ever had any bad cheesecake. That's always good. That's another thing, too. Publix cheesecake is incredible, man.

[Chuck Bryant]

They need to sponsor us and they.

[Josh Clark]

Sell it by the double slice. For those, like, you get two slices and they have a key lime one too. Chuck this in. Oh, man. Although if you don't like lemon stuff, you might not like that.

[Chuck Bryant]

Oh, no, I love key lime anything.

[Josh Clark]

Okay. Try their key lime cheesecake. Yeah, they really should send us some stuff, frankly.

[Chuck Bryant]

At Isle of Palms for my vacation that I've spoken about, they had one of the. I can't remember which one, but one of the seafood joints where I would get all the fresh seafood had a homemade key lime pie and I bought and ate one of them with my friends that week and I bought two to go home with.

[Josh Clark]

Did they make it home?

[Chuck Bryant]

Huh?

[Josh Clark]

Did they make it all the way home?

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah, yeah, stopped in. I stopped at the border. Yeah, just put my face in it. No, they made it home. I think there's still one in the freezer actually. And then one of them was consumed.

[Josh Clark]

Nice. Yeah, good. Key lime pie.

[Chuck Bryant]

And finally, with the non aeration method, you are, you are not doing the, the beating. You're not creaming that stuff, you're folding the batter. And we could describe it here, but if you don't know what folding is in baking, just, just look it up on the YouTube for a proper folding technique.

[Josh Clark]

Right.

[Chuck Bryant]

Generally done with a, like a rubber spatula.

[Josh Clark]

Yep. There's a foaming method too where you are basically using just egg whites usually and you're aerating it by whipping them up, which makes a meringue. You can just stop there and incorporate sugar and you've got meringue, which would make a pavlova cake, which apparently Australia and New Zealand have been fighting over the origin of for close to 100 years now.

[Chuck Bryant]

But didn't New Zealand win supposedly?

[Josh Clark]

Although I saw another article from some researchers who said no, it came even earlier, a decade earlier out of America via Germany. So who knows? But yes, out of Australia and New Zealand. New Zealand's apparently won that fight. But that's meringue. And Pavlova cake is like a meringue cake with like fruit in the middle of it. And then a listener sent us pavlova once we made it. It was pretty good. It is pretty good. Yeah. And then you can also take that egg foam and turn it into like a sponge cake, like an angel food cake or something like that.

[Chuck Bryant]

Not me.

[Josh Clark]

You don't like those either?

[Chuck Bryant]

No, not big into angel food cake.

[Josh Clark]

Although you can use sponge cake for strawberry shortcake that I will have. Okay, so those spongy cakes that uses the egg foaming method, but if you're making a true strawberry shortcake, you're going to use an actual shortcake.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah, those are really good.

[Josh Clark]

And the reason they're called shortcake or shortbread's called shortbread is short is apparently a British term for crumbly.

[Chuck Bryant]

Okay.

[Josh Clark]

So that's where that came from has nothing to do with the size.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. Emily makes a really good gluten free shortbread. She's kind of gotten into baking a bit in the last five or six years and gotten pretty good at it. So she makes a good gluten free shortbread that we've had as shortcake with homemade whipped topping and good fresh strawberries. Those are good. But my one complaint with her baking is it literally looks like she came in there and just started throwing ingredients everywhere with her bare hands, like a three year old. And then baked and then said, I'm done.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah, good night.

[Chuck Bryant]

It is a mess. Yeah, a big, big mess. And she always just says, get out of here. I'll clean it up afterward. Don't worry about it.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah. It's funny, the kitchen can be a place of real tension sometimes, huh?

[Chuck Bryant]

Oh, for sure. Yeah. Especially if both of you do different things in the kitchen.

[Josh Clark]

Right. Like one's hovering, like, are you gonna clean that up?

[Chuck Bryant]

Well, I'm the kitchen cleaner, so that's why she's just like, just stay out of here, dude.

[Josh Clark]

Right. Just wait until the end.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah.

[Josh Clark]

And you show up. You're like, it' charges. Time to shine.

[Chuck Bryant]

Well, I'll do this. And this is such a passive aggressive move for me, which is my style. Not endorsing that. I'm just saying it's one of my downfalls I need to work on. But I will just go in there and just like, groan or something and she'll just say, no out.

[Josh Clark]

Right Again.

[Chuck Bryant]

That's life at the Bryant house.

[Josh Clark]

That's pretty nice, Chuck.

[Chuck Bryant]

It's always with love, though.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah. It always comes out. There's always a cake on the other end, right?

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, it's not like we get in serious fights over the kitchen stuff, right?

[Josh Clark]

Yeah. So what's the last thing here?

[Chuck Bryant]

Something called the all in one method.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah, that's just like a cake mix. You put it all together at once.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. Well, we should talk a little bit about frosting and icing. The earliest versions of frosting was just sort of an almond and sugar paste. Eh, not so big on that, but.

[Josh Clark]

Oh, really?

[Chuck Bryant]

I mean, it could be okay, but.

[Josh Clark]

Almond croissants are, like, one of my great joys in life.

[Chuck Bryant]

Oh, yeah.

[Josh Clark]

They're so good.

[Chuck Bryant]

I suppose that's kind of what a bear claw is too, right?

[Josh Clark]

Yeah. All right.

[Chuck Bryant]

I'd take it.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah. But that almond. That sweet almond paste inside is. Man, that's good stuff.

[Chuck Bryant]

No, it is good, but I'm like, Don't put that on top of a cake for me.

[Josh Clark]

Sure. Understand.

[Chuck Bryant]

Stuff it in a pastry. A French chef, though, is the first person they think that created like the first legit iced layer cake in the 15th century. And then about the middle of the 17th century is when the first frosting recipe started spreading around on the Internet.

[Josh Clark]

Right. And fondant is gross.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah, I'm not into it.

[Josh Clark]

No. I mean, you can make a neat looking cake, but it's gross tasting, I think.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah, I'm not into it. Buttercream or cream cheese or even Emily's Waldorf Astoria frosting, believe it or not. I mean, it has a bit of a mouthfeel because of the shortening, but like a residue on the palate, on the roof of your mouth.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah, but it's still good. Well, let's talk about cakes. Like the. Well, no specific cakes. Like the red velvet cake. Right.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. Delicious.

[Josh Clark]

Do you know why it's red? Well, food coloring that they use that to make it a little richer. But it actually naturally turns red. It's a chemical reaction between the cocoa, the vinegar in it, and the buttermilk, I believe.

[Chuck Bryant]

Really?

[Josh Clark]

Yes. That turns it red.

[Chuck Bryant]

All right. I don't know about that.

[Josh Clark]

No, it's true.

[Chuck Bryant]

Okay.

[Josh Clark]

I read it on what's Cooking America?

[Chuck Bryant]

I'll try it. Because I'm making Emily. Her birthday's in a couple weeks, and I'm making another. Taking another stab at it.

[Josh Clark]

Try the try. Go find, like, an original, like, recipe.

[Chuck Bryant]

Well, I mean, what do you mean?

[Josh Clark]

Like one. If you see one that actually uses buttermilk, be like, okay, this one. This is one of the ones I'm gonna try.

[Chuck Bryant]

No, no, no. I have to use the recipe she tells me to use.

[Josh Clark]

Oh, I gotcha.

[Chuck Bryant]

Which isn't the gluten free Waldorf Astoria version.

[Josh Clark]

Oh, gotcha. I see. But you have cocoa. Does it have, like, vinegar and buttermilk in it?

[Chuck Bryant]

Mmm, I can't remember. It's been a couple years since I tried it.

[Josh Clark]

Okay, well, it should turn red on its own, but I don't think there's any harm in adding some more synthetic chemical red dye.

[Chuck Bryant]

Well, and the thing is too, a lot of people that don't try red velvet cake don't try it because they think it doesn't like it tastes like chocolate cake.

[Josh Clark]

Pretty much, yeah.

[Chuck Bryant]

It just is red.

[Josh Clark]

Doesn't taste red.

[Chuck Bryant]

No, that'd be weird. It's not ketchup cake.

[Josh Clark]

There's. Yeah, that's Canadian, isn't it? There's hummingbird cakes.

[Chuck Bryant]

Well, what do you mean by the hummingbird? What is that?

[Josh Clark]

Hummingbird cake has like some nuts and some fruit in it, lots of frosting. I think it's a Southern cake.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. Like we called my grandmother Bryant called one of the great all time Southern cooks and bakers, like, you know, banana nut bread.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah.

[Chuck Bryant]

She called that hummingbird. And I don't know if that was specific to her or if they are interchangeable.

[Josh Clark]

I don't know. I'm not actually a Southern native, so I would not say one way or the other. All my experience with hummingbird cake is it's more like a carroty cake with, say, like pineapple in it and some other fruits in it and a thick layer of frosting. And supposedly the reason it's called a hummingbird cake is because it's so sweet it could attract hummingbirds.

[Chuck Bryant]

Mmm. See, maybe. I mean, that's sort of like banana nut bread. So I don't know if they're interchangeable or for variation, but give me some banana nut bread, which is not a cake, but it sort of is. And slice it up and put some butter on it. Toast it in the oven.

[Josh Clark]

Yep. No, I'm with you. Our freezer is always chock full of black bananas blackened with age.

[Chuck Bryant]

Oh, sure.

[Josh Clark]

Because Yumi makes a killer banana nut bread from scratch using. I mean, you just can't look at the bananas when she's incorporating them. Yeah.

[Chuck Bryant]

What does that do? Why is that the key? Do you know?

[Josh Clark]

They just are supposed to be mushy.

[Chuck Bryant]

Okay. Oh, okay, Gotcha.

[Josh Clark]

And like, the best way to make bananas mushy is to let them age. Let them age, freeze. Age them.

[Chuck Bryant]

All right, let's talk about Indian pound cake. Apparently that's a thing that has cornmeal in it, and I can't imagine that taste, but I'd like to try it.

[Josh Clark]

Well, yeah, and that was one of the earliest cakes in the US And I think what the author Leah Hoyt's pointing out is that, like, cakes came from all over the place through time and, and geography, and that the mass immigration tore into America over, say, like the 17th, 18th, 19th centuries and 20th two. All these people from all these different lands brought their ideas or ingredients of cake, and they kind of went through this Americanized grinder to where eggs were added, butter was added, and like, you've got these ingredients, so it bears a resemblance to its original one. But it's been like cake ified in the American way. And that started basically right as European settlers got to North America.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. Apparently the good old Fashioned chocolate layer cake came out of Boston because there were chocolate companies there.

[Josh Clark]

Even the German chocolate cake is not German, it's American. It's named after a man whose last name was German.

[Chuck Bryant]

Oh, interesting. Well, that means he's German. German American.

[Josh Clark]

Could be.

[Chuck Bryant]

Maybe they should call it the German American Chocolate Cake.

[Josh Clark]

Or just German Chocolate Cake. But it's really American, Everybody is. What the real title should be Strawberry.

[Chuck Bryant]

Shortcake that you mentioned, that does come from the old world.

[Josh Clark]

I'm not much of a jingoist either, I think you might say.

[Chuck Bryant]

Of course not.

[Josh Clark]

I've never felt more national pride than in talking about cakes.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah, yeah.

[Josh Clark]

This is where cakes were born, really.

[Chuck Bryant]

The pineapple upside down cake. Heaven help you if you eat that stuff.

[Josh Clark]

I love it.

[Chuck Bryant]

Do you really?

[Josh Clark]

Man, it's so good. Yeah.

[Chuck Bryant]

I just don't like fruit anywhere near my cake.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah.

[Chuck Bryant]

Unless it's strawberry shortcake.

[Josh Clark]

You definitely wouldn't like a hummingbird cake then, even.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. Maybe that's the difference between a hummingbird and banana bread. Although banana's in there. Right.

[Josh Clark]

That's a.

[Chuck Bryant]

Well, see, that's not a fruitcake to me.

[Josh Clark]

No. You just don't like the juicy fruits in your cake. It sounds like.

[Chuck Bryant]

No. Or coconut, which isn't the German chocolate cake. Coconut in the icing.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah, yeah.

[Chuck Bryant]

See that?

[Josh Clark]

That's so good.

[Chuck Bryant]

I don't want coconut anywhere near my cakes. But that pineapple upside down cake, apparently that stuff sort of sprang out of a contest. Dole had the Dole company in the mid-1920s that said, hey, bake some cakes with fruit. And so thousands of pineapple upside down cakes came out. So I don't think they were invented for that, but maybe that's just what made them so popular. I don't know.

[Josh Clark]

Gotcha. And then there's other again. There's cakes around the world that look like cakes. Kind of like tiramisu.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yum.

[Josh Clark]

Is it? Quintessential Italian cake, but it was invented in the 1960s. Black Forest Cake actually is from Germany. It was invented in 1915. So what happened was again, cake explosion happened here in the good old US of A. And it spread back out to the world. There was an influx of cake ideas into America. America perfected the cake and it went back out to the world.

[Chuck Bryant]

That's right.

[Josh Clark]

That's what happened.

[Chuck Bryant]

What else? What about tres leches?

[Josh Clark]

It's great too. Three kinds of milk, evaporated, condensed and whole. It's tough to go wrong with that.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. Talk about moist.

[Josh Clark]

And I've like. I've had good and bad tres leches, but I've never had an actual tres leches. I was like, this is so bad, I'm not gonna finish it.

[Chuck Bryant]

Right.

[Josh Clark]

Have you?

[Chuck Bryant]

No.

[Josh Clark]

And then there's dota yaki, which is like, have you ever had this?

[Chuck Bryant]

I don't think so.

[Josh Clark]

One of the big things that people in Japan love is, like, sweetened red beans paste.

[Chuck Bryant]

Okay.

[Josh Clark]

You can find it here or there in, like, sweets, but this dorayaki in particular is, like, between two pancakes. It's like a filling. Sometimes it's not even two pancakes. It's like a hole with, like, a red bean paste inside.

[Chuck Bryant]

Okay.

[Josh Clark]

It's like this light, kind of fluffy cake, like, thing with red bean paste inside. It's good. You can. They're best, like, hot off of the street from somebody who just made it. That's when it's absolutely best. But it's like the kind of thing you can also find in a 711 or something too, like in cellophane.

[Chuck Bryant]

Wow.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah, it's good. It's no cheesecake. No Japanese cheesecake, I'll tell you that.

[Chuck Bryant]

Nope.

[Josh Clark]

But it's still pretty good, man.

[Chuck Bryant]

That was a good one, I think.

[Josh Clark]

Cakes. All right. Are you done?

[Chuck Bryant]

I'm done.

[Josh Clark]

Okay. If you want to know more about cakes, go eat some. You're gonna love them.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yes.

[Josh Clark]

There's a cake out there for you. And since I said that, it's time for listener man.

[Chuck Bryant]

All right. I'm going to call this a special one. Man. Administrative details shout.

[Josh Clark]

Oh, wow.

[Chuck Bryant]

Because we got a box today from a man named Nick Pagan from San Jose Bay Area, and he sent us just a lot of stuff. Like, good stuff. It wasn't a box full of garbage he sent.

[Josh Clark]

Not that anyone ever has sent us a box full of garbage.

[Chuck Bryant]

He sent us framed things. Sent me a framed pavement poster, which is great. And sent us CDs of music. He sent bottles of liquid stuff, most notably wine for Jerry and then bourbon and scotch for us. And he is a whiskey enthusiast that lives in the Bay Area, like, big time.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah.

[Chuck Bryant]

And just a good dude. And beyond that, he. He added this. He added. He's a. He's a list maker. An amateur list maker.

[Josh Clark]

Right.

[Chuck Bryant]

And he sent us a list. And Nick, if you're listening, please send us the. The Word document digital version of this printout that you sent. Because he said every time you said we should do a podcast on that.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah.

[Chuck Bryant]

He made a list alphabetically of that stuff.

[Josh Clark]

Nice work, Nick.

[Chuck Bryant]

And the list is so comprehensive and awesome that we need it to work from.

[Josh Clark]

Yes.

[Chuck Bryant]

He made a list of films that each of us said we need to see, which is pretty good. And then finally, he sent us a list and encouraged us to play a little game here, which we'll do very quickly. See if Chuck can see if Josh can guess how many times we've done the following things. You ready?

[Josh Clark]

Why me?

[Chuck Bryant]

Well, because I have the list in my hand, and you're sitting across from me, and you can't see it through this paper? I don't think so. How many coas? And for people that don't know it means cover our butts. How many coas have we issued? Over a thousand shows.

[Josh Clark]

I'm going to say 2775.

[Chuck Bryant]

Wow.

[Josh Clark]

Wow. We are really good at that, huh?

[Chuck Bryant]

How many times have we admitted on the air that it is a take? 2. You're not gonna get anything. Or maybe you might.

[Josh Clark]

It'll be total luck if I do. Eight.

[Chuck Bryant]

Seven.

[Josh Clark]

Oh, so close.

[Chuck Bryant]

Rare listener mail shout outs.

[Josh Clark]

Mm. Oh, I don't know what that means.

[Chuck Bryant]

Like, where we say, hey, can you say hello to my boyfriend?

[Josh Clark]

Oh, yeah. Three.

[Chuck Bryant]

No, 62.

[Josh Clark]

What?

[Chuck Bryant]

That's pretty rare, though. Out of a thousand.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah. But still, it seems like. I thought it was even rarer than that. Did we used to do it more than we do now?

[Chuck Bryant]

I think so.

[Josh Clark]

I think that's what it was.

[Chuck Bryant]

We're a little more generous in our earlier days.

[Josh Clark]

Yeah.

[Chuck Bryant]

Trips in the Wayback Machine.

[Josh Clark]

Oh, there's a lot of those. I'm gonna say, out of a thousand episodes, 320.

[Chuck Bryant]

He says 59. So I don't know about this, Nick.

[Josh Clark]

I think he missed a few. Nick, you're just making up numbers, aren't you? Drinking scotch at home and making up numbers.

[Chuck Bryant]

How many paper lists have you eaten?

[Josh Clark]

Me?

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah.

[Josh Clark]

One that I know of.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yep. You nailed it.

[Josh Clark]

I remember the episode, too. It was how geniuses work or what makes a Genius. And I said that if this list. If the list of geniuses, if the number one genius was Einstein, I would eat the list. And it turned out it was Einstein.

[Chuck Bryant]

How many Glenn Danzig or Misfits references. Those would be all you.

[Josh Clark]

17.

[Chuck Bryant]

4.

[Josh Clark]

Need to step it up.

[Chuck Bryant]

How many times has Chuck was. How many times have I done this?

[Josh Clark]

Wow. I think it's literally countless. If he came up with a number, it's a lie.

[Chuck Bryant]

He says 288.

[Josh Clark]

That's gotta be more than that.

[Chuck Bryant]

Simpsons references. I'll just go ahead and tell you. 197. Apparently, we have high.

[Josh Clark]

Does that include the two episodes on the Simpsons.

[Chuck Bryant]

No, No, I don't think so. Apparently we have high fived once. Okay, I'm surprised we even did that.

[Josh Clark]

Sure.

[Chuck Bryant]

Number of times. Josh has done this a lot.

[Josh Clark]

I don't know. I think a lot. Just. Just works for that.

[Chuck Bryant]

426 times. Almost half of our episodes. That's great. Yeah. And then bonus, name all of Josh's nicknames for Chubby. I'll just go ahead and read those. You have called me Chuckers. You've called me Beautiful. Don't remember that one. The famous Chuck Tran, Cheech, Rusty, Zonkers, and the Flash. Nick is my new favorite listener.

[Josh Clark]

This.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah, this is all gold.

[Josh Clark]

Plus, thanks for. For buttering us up with the care package too, Nick. That was nice of you.

[Chuck Bryant]

Yeah. So, Nick Pagan, you are now on the guest list for the San Francisco San Francisco Sketchfest show. Just hit me up with an email. Send that list of shows that we need to do via digital document and you are in like Flynn.

[Josh Clark]

Cool. Thanks a lot, Nick. Well, if you want to be like Nick, you can send us an email the stuffpodcastowstuffworks.com and as always, join us at our home on the web. StuffYou Should Know.com.

[Charles W. Chuck Bryant]

Stuff youf Should Know is a production of iHeartRadio. For more podcasts My Heart Radio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts are wherever you listen to your favorite shows.

[Brendan Patrick Hughes]

My name is Brendan Patrick Hughes, host of Divine Intervention. This is a story about radical nuns in combat boots and wild haired priests trading blows with J. Edgar Hoover in a hell bent effort to sabotage a war.

[J. Edgar Hoover]

J. Edgar Hoover was furious.

[Unknown Speaker]

He was out of his mind and.

[Josh Clark]

He wanted to bring the Catholic left to its knees.

[Brendan Patrick Hughes]

Listen to Divine intervention on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts.

[Harvey Guillen]

From the producers who brought you Princess of South beach comes a new podcast, the Setup. The Setup follows a lonely museum curator, but when the perfect man walks into his life.

[Christian Navarro]

Well, I guess I'm saying I like you. You do you like me?

[Harvey Guillen]

He actually is too good to be true.

[Christian Navarro]

This is a con. I'm conning you to get the Dalama painting. We could do this together.

[Harvey Guillen]

Listen to the Setup on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts.

[Unknown Speaker]

Are your ears bored?

[J. Edgar Hoover]

Yeah. Are you looking for a new podcast that will make you laugh, learn and say G. Yeah.

[Unknown Speaker]

Then tune in to locatora radio season 10 today. Okay.

[J. Edgar Hoover]

Now that's what I call a podcast. I'm Fiosa. I'M Mala, the host of Locatora Radio, a radiophonic novella, which is just a.

[Unknown Speaker]

Very extra way of saying a podcast. Listen to Locatora Radio Season 10 on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.