Speaker 1: Hi, everybody, do you want to learn about cake?
Speaker 2: It's called cake So Great, so so great.
Speaker 1: That had to be a Josh title Cake colon So
Speaker 1: Great period, so comma so great.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's Josh.
Speaker 1: This is from November thirtieth, twenty seventeen. This is supersize
Speaker 1: because somehow we did seventy three minutes on cake, probably
Speaker 1: because we talked about cake a lot beyond just the
Speaker 1: facts and figures. I know, our personal opinions came around
Speaker 1: in this episode. So I hope you enjoyed as much
Speaker 1: as you enjoyed pie. Welcome to Stuff You Should Know,
Speaker 1: a production of iHeartRadio.
Speaker 3: Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark, and
Speaker 3: there's Charles W Chuck Bryant, there's Jerry. Three of us
Speaker 3: are together, which means it's time. There's stuff you should know.
Speaker 1: About cake, cake, cake, cake, cake, cake, cake, cake, cake.
Speaker 3: Cakeke cake, cake cake cake.
Speaker 2: Cake. Uh.
Speaker 1: This made me just frankly want to put my face
Speaker 1: in a cake.
Speaker 3: I know, sheet caking.
Speaker 2: Oh man, Yeah, I know.
Speaker 1: We had a discussion about cake or pie quite a
Speaker 1: while ago, and I don't remember exactly where you landed
Speaker 1: on that.
Speaker 3: I'm surprised you can only think of one.
Speaker 2: You one time, we've done that.
Speaker 3: Yeah, cake or pie? Both?
Speaker 2: Yeah? Same here?
Speaker 3: Why choose between two wonderful things that you don't have
Speaker 3: to choose between?
Speaker 2: Agreed?
Speaker 3: As a matter of fact, every once in a while
Speaker 3: you'll hit like the birthday party jackpot where they'll have
Speaker 3: like cake and pie and you're like, looks like I'm
Speaker 3: in heaven. But today, today, Chuck, we're not talking about
Speaker 3: pie now. Although we can't talk about one pie in
Speaker 3: particular because we're talking about cake. It turns out I
Speaker 3: saw this somewhere that Boston cream Pie is actually a cake.
Speaker 3: Oh really, Yeah, surprise, Boston, Sorry to ruin your day.
Speaker 1: They're probably the ones that are like that are saying that,
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, probably maybe I don't.
Speaker 3: Know it's a cake. Huh. The article on it was
Speaker 3: written in a thick Boston accent. Yeah, yeah, it is
Speaker 3: a cake. I'm not sure why, but I just know
Speaker 3: it's a cake now. And I want to give a
Speaker 3: hat tip here. I mean, we both worked off of
Speaker 3: the house Stuff Works article, but I also found a
Speaker 3: lot of good stuff on a site called What's Cooking America.
Speaker 3: Did you run across them?
Speaker 2: I did?
Speaker 3: They are good man. They have. You know, clearly their
Speaker 3: niches cooking, baking, all things like culinary. But they've got
Speaker 3: some really well researched articles on their site about like
Speaker 3: the history of cakes and things like that.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's good stuff.
Speaker 3: Kudos to you. You remember kudos the granola bar. Those
Speaker 3: are great.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, are those not around anymore?
Speaker 3: No? No, no, those are gone. And then rip also
Speaker 3: bonkers candy, So.
Speaker 2: Kudo went the way of the Dodo. I never heard
Speaker 2: of bonkers.
Speaker 3: They were like a fruit chew, but like really had
Speaker 3: some chew to it, not like starburst, you know, just
Speaker 3: to cintegrate. So these were like they were chewy. They
Speaker 3: were good. They're about as good as it gets really
Speaker 3: candy wise.
Speaker 1: Yeah, they need I know, you've noticed they need to
Speaker 1: chill out here with the sweets at work. Oh dude,
Speaker 1: Like they have little Debbie Star crunches and Swiss cake
Speaker 1: rolls and.
Speaker 2: Stuff all over the place. I know, I don't need
Speaker 2: that in here.
Speaker 3: There's like three or four people who are like walking
Speaker 3: around toothless. Now, well I'm just rotten right out of
Speaker 3: their heads.
Speaker 2: Well and also not you. My toothlessness is for different reasons.
Speaker 3: Yours is from a Christine.
Speaker 1: And I've also noticed, though, there's this weird mix in
Speaker 1: our office now because they try to.
Speaker 2: Get super healthy.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so there will be like Swiss cake rolls next
Speaker 1: to a bag of like clam chips or something, what chips?
Speaker 3: To know, I have chips sound kind of good?
Speaker 2: Seaweed seaweed strips?
Speaker 3: Oh yeah, yeah, no, I know what you mean. Or
Speaker 3: like just figs.
Speaker 2: Yeah, you know, it's like a fig Newton without the
Speaker 2: good tasting part.
Speaker 3: We take figs and we mash them up, then we
Speaker 3: wrap them in cell a phane and you eat them
Speaker 3: for five dollars.
Speaker 2: Apiece, and your child spits them out because they know better.
Speaker 3: Right, no today, Yes, I'm with you. I do think
Speaker 3: it's gotten a little out of hand, Like it's basically
Speaker 3: just a huge test of willpower at the office, like
Speaker 3: every moment.
Speaker 1: You know, Yeah, I don't, I don't indulge. I'm not
Speaker 1: getting into those Swiss cake rolls. But it is tough
Speaker 1: to walk by the miniature candy bar section, right and
Speaker 1: not be like, well just one of those little guys,
Speaker 1: Look how tiny it is?
Speaker 3: Right? And then the next thing, you know, you get
Speaker 3: like ten rappers laying around your desk thinking like what
Speaker 3: have I done.
Speaker 2: I know it's post Halloween stuff too, so maybe it'll
Speaker 2: die down.
Speaker 3: I don't. I don't think that's gonna happen. But yeah,
Speaker 3: but again though, today, I guess if if you replaced
Speaker 3: all of those candies bars with cakes that were just
Speaker 3: sitting around, you get zero complaints.
Speaker 2: For me.
Speaker 1: Well, and at my house at Halloween, we gave away
Speaker 1: two things. We gave away whole slices of pound cake
Speaker 1: and just pigs.
Speaker 2: It's the worst house in the block.
Speaker 3: Did you you a pound cake fan?
Speaker 2: Not?
Speaker 1: Typically, like I would never order a pound cake or
Speaker 1: say hey, can someone bake me one for my birthday?
Speaker 3: You wouldn't say, like, clark me a pound cake?
Speaker 1: No, And I would never ask someone to clark me
Speaker 1: a pound cake. But occasionally, like in my life, someone
Speaker 1: has had pound cake and said, would you like some
Speaker 1: pound cake?
Speaker 2: And it's you know, it's good. It's good, sugary and
Speaker 2: dense stuff.
Speaker 3: Yeah. I like it because you can just eat it
Speaker 3: with your hand.
Speaker 2: Sure, just pick it up and eat it.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's like cake on the go.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: I am not a fan of lemon cakes. Oh really,
Speaker 1: so like a lemon pound cake I'm not into Well.
Speaker 3: Okay, let's just get it out there. What's your favorite
Speaker 3: cake of all time?
Speaker 1: Oh geez, I'm gonna toss it up between a carrot
Speaker 1: cake with cream cheese frosting.
Speaker 3: That's Bill Clinton's favorite.
Speaker 1: Well, you know, as Bill goes so ghost chuck, which
Speaker 1: is not true, the.
Speaker 2: Carrot cake with cream cheese frosting, or I like a
Speaker 2: red velvet cake.
Speaker 1: Yeah, well that's the or cream cheese frosting either way. Yeah,
Speaker 1: Emily's favorite of all time, hands down is the Waldorf
Speaker 1: Astoria Red velvet Cake, which is red velvet cake with
Speaker 1: a frosting that is basically only like shortening, vanilla and sugar.
Speaker 2: It's not a cream cheese things.
Speaker 3: What's your favorite favorite of all time? Well, everybody knows
Speaker 3: that cake perfection was achieved sometime in the twentieth century
Speaker 3: when Public's grocery stores started selling their yellow cake with
Speaker 3: buttercream frosting. Oh yeah, there's no better cake on the plane.
Speaker 2: It's like a yellow sheet cake.
Speaker 3: It's simple, but it's tasty. It doesn't need any dressing up.
Speaker 3: But if it does, we'll just put like some add
Speaker 3: some more frosting in the shape of balloons on top.
Speaker 2: Right.
Speaker 3: It's just it's just perfection. It's a perfect cake. I
Speaker 3: love it. I can eat it morning, noon and night.
Speaker 3: I can eat stale stuff I found in the dumpster
Speaker 3: behind Publics. I can eat the fresh stuff right out
Speaker 3: of the oven, so hot that it burns my mouth.
Speaker 3: I would eat it anyway that it was given to me.
Speaker 2: Uh.
Speaker 1: I'm a big frosting and icing guy too, so a
Speaker 1: corner piece of sheet cake is pretty much heaven.
Speaker 3: Yeah, that is the tops.
Speaker 2: What is Yumi's favorite cake?
Speaker 3: Yuma's is actually the same as mine. We both are
Speaker 3: junkie for Public's cake, to tell you the truth, Although
Speaker 3: I have to say she is introduced me to the
Speaker 3: wonder of Japanese cakes. And there's this little known fact
Speaker 3: about Japan. It loves to take I shouldn't say it's
Speaker 3: a little known. Probably a lot of people know this,
Speaker 3: but it loves to take things that other cultures came
Speaker 3: up with and then improve them ten thousand percent. And
Speaker 3: one of the things that they've done that with is
Speaker 3: the French bakery. So if you go to Japan, you'll
Speaker 3: see all these cute, little kind of Provence style French
Speaker 3: bakeries everywhere. That's still the best bake good you've ever
Speaker 3: had in your life, right, and Chris, yes, oh, by far,
Speaker 3: by far. That's very controversial, it is, But I'm telling
Speaker 3: you you would just be like, Josh's right.
Speaker 2: This is better.
Speaker 3: I'm not kidding. They've improved on it, and they're all
Speaker 3: they're very deferential still, they're like, oh, well, this is
Speaker 3: crap compared to what the French are making. However, you
Speaker 3: would say that in Japanese. But they're actually wrong. It
Speaker 3: actually is better. But one of the things that they
Speaker 3: make that's just top notch is this what they call cheesecake.
Speaker 3: It is not what you or I will call cheesecake
Speaker 3: at all. It's more like a yellow spongy cake. I
Speaker 3: don't know where the cheese thing comes in. Maybe there's
Speaker 3: a little cream cheese in there. I'm not quite sure,
Speaker 3: but you and I would call it like kind of
Speaker 3: a dense yellow sponge cake. But it is very, very tasty.
Speaker 3: And that's a kind of a Japanese tradition that I
Speaker 3: would guess Umi would say is one of her favorites. Okay,
Speaker 3: and just a little shout out, there's a place in Toronto.
Speaker 3: Next time we're there, I'm gonna take you there, all right.
Speaker 3: Actually that's not true. I brought you a cake from there,
Speaker 3: from Uncle Tetsu's Oh Cheesecake Bakery. Yeah, that's a Japanese cheesecake.
Speaker 2: Oh that was good.
Speaker 3: Yeah, they're the bomb.
Speaker 1: All I know is, get out of my face with
Speaker 1: any coconut or any pineapple.
Speaker 3: I'll take that you.
Speaker 2: I'll just slide that over to your desk.
Speaker 3: Then, yes, not into them coming.
Speaker 2: I don't even like German chocolate cake. Really, I love.
Speaker 3: German chocolate all right. Well, have you ever heard the
Speaker 3: German chocolate cake and red velvet cake are the same.
Speaker 3: It's actually not true.
Speaker 2: I haven't heard that.
Speaker 3: I had heard that many times. It's not true. But
Speaker 3: that German chocolate frosting is like, Man, that's good.
Speaker 1: I'm not into that. See, I think that's what it does.
Speaker 1: That's what it is that I don't like. I like
Speaker 1: sort of a tradish butter creamy or just good old
Speaker 1: fashioned birthday cake icing type thing.
Speaker 3: Yeah, pie mean yeah, and surely you agree. Publics is
Speaker 3: the pinnacle of that.
Speaker 2: I don't know if I've ever had a public's cake. Oh.
Speaker 2: I go to publics three times a week, so next
Speaker 2: time I'm just gonna.
Speaker 3: Well, now that you say that, it might be best
Speaker 3: that you stay away, well, because you're gonna start adding.
Speaker 3: Is they sell it by the slice, which is dangerous.
Speaker 1: Oh, they do, because that's the only way I would want.
Speaker 2: To do it.
Speaker 3: They sell it by the slice, chuck, like I.
Speaker 2: Can't bring a whole cake in my house.
Speaker 3: Fun be sure you look closely, because they have Yeah,
Speaker 3: it would be. They sell also the same kind with
Speaker 3: like a cream cheese frosting. You want yellow cake with
Speaker 3: butter cream frosting. Okay, just give it a shot and
Speaker 3: let me know what you think.
Speaker 2: All right. The funny thing is we really haven't even
Speaker 2: started yet though.
Speaker 3: Do you want to take a break?
Speaker 2: No, Let's at least give out like three facts first.
Speaker 3: Oh okay, well, I think we just gave a lot
Speaker 3: of facts about what the greatest cakes in the world are.
Speaker 2: All right, how about this?
Speaker 1: Then I'll start you out with the word cake apparently
Speaker 1: is an old Norse word kaka, which is kind of
Speaker 1: funny because here I don't know where it came from,
Speaker 1: but you're in America.
Speaker 2: Coca can mean do doo.
Speaker 1: Yeah, but kaka is where the original word supposedly came from.
Speaker 3: Right, And a lot of English words have like Germanic
Speaker 3: or Norse origins. Did you do you know that?
Speaker 2: Yeah?
Speaker 3: So cake, the word cake is of English origins. So
Speaker 3: there's bread and apparently the bread and the cakes from
Speaker 3: back in the day, say during the medieval era, they
Speaker 3: were very, very similar. Probably the only difference was the
Speaker 3: cake might be slightly smaller, Yeah, and it was definitely sweeter.
Speaker 3: So cake was like a sweeter version of bread back then.
Speaker 2: Yeah, they'd had a little to it, but it's not
Speaker 2: like what we think of as cake today.
Speaker 3: But that's not where the first cakes originate. They actually
Speaker 3: go way, way, way further back than that, right.
Speaker 2: Is that true?
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's true. Toktok uh. That may be a little
Speaker 3: too far back, Yeah, I think so so. But basically
Speaker 3: around the time I believe Egypt, the Puronic Egypt, they
Speaker 3: were making cakes using hot stones and honey and some
Speaker 3: sort of grain mashed up.
Speaker 2: Right, it seems like I bet the Chinese were doing
Speaker 2: it too.
Speaker 1: Didn't say in here, right, but it seems like anytime
Speaker 1: you're talking about who did stuff first, it's like Egyptians, Chinese, Greeks,
Speaker 1: and Romans pretty much.
Speaker 3: I mean, you know, ancient civilization.
Speaker 1: But maybe not China because it doesn't seem like a
Speaker 1: very cakey culture.
Speaker 3: No, I'm not sure about Chinese cakes. I don't think
Speaker 3: I've ever had one.
Speaker 1: I bet you if someone knows, though, and I bet
Speaker 1: you there's like one of the best things.
Speaker 2: In the world. It is probably a Chinese cake, you know.
Speaker 3: One of the other things too. That I didn't realize
Speaker 3: that I learned from this article, Chuck, was that a
Speaker 3: lot of the cakes you see around the world that
Speaker 3: you would mistake for, you know, customary or traditional cakes
Speaker 3: for that culture, they're actually relatively new.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, the cake that we.
Speaker 3: Know and love and understand is very much a nineteenth
Speaker 3: century American invention that came out of the Industrial Revolution.
Speaker 2: That's right.
Speaker 1: I mean clearly, like in Germany, like you talked about,
Speaker 1: in the fifteenth century, they were making cakes. They were
Speaker 1: actually even serving cakes at birthdays, and by all accounts,
Speaker 1: that's probably the first people to start the birthday cake Tradish.
Speaker 1: But and I think they even put candles on top. Well,
Speaker 1: none of the Greeks put candles on top. But it
Speaker 1: wasn't like a happy birthday cake. No, it was more like, hey,
Speaker 1: this cake is round like the moon, and we're going
Speaker 1: to put candles on it. To make them glow, and
Speaker 1: they're probably huge candles now that think about it.
Speaker 3: Yeah, the Greeks gave us the round cake and putting
Speaker 3: candles on the cake to honor Artemis, to make the
Speaker 3: cake look like the moon, and Artemis was the goddess
Speaker 3: of the moon. Right, so they were like, look, Artemis,
Speaker 3: what do you think of this cake? She'd be like,
Speaker 3: it needs some frosting, that's right.
Speaker 1: And then the Germans and the fourteen hundred started doing
Speaker 1: birthday cakes, and then the seventeen hundreds were full on,
Speaker 1: like it's a kid's birthday party, it's got candles, it's
Speaker 1: a cake, and we'll sing some depressing German song.
Speaker 3: Right that makes you reflect on your own existence, that's right,
Speaker 3: and it's eventual. But so by the time the people
Speaker 3: were making birthday cakes in Germany, there was a long, long,
Speaker 3: long tradition of cakes already, and the word cake had
Speaker 3: started to originate in medieval Britain. But there was such
Speaker 3: a thing as a cheesecake already. The Romans created that
Speaker 3: and called it placenta. Seriously, really, yeah, the Greeks had
Speaker 3: created something that was basically a prototype of the fruitcake plocouse.
Speaker 2: I believe yeah, they called it feces.
Speaker 3: Right, So there were all these kind of cakes and
Speaker 3: breads and things that were starting to be developed. And
Speaker 3: I think even that pound cake that you're not so
Speaker 3: hip on came before the Industrial Revolution too.
Speaker 2: Okay, so there's stuff that you.
Speaker 3: Would kind of recognize as cakes, but the idea of
Speaker 3: a cake, what Americans call it cake and no one
Speaker 3: love is a cake that came out of the Industrial Revolution.
Speaker 2: The show sponsored by Cake Cake Eat Some today.
Speaker 1: All right, so let's take a break. We definitely gave
Speaker 1: way more than three facts. Yeah, we have earned our keep,
Speaker 1: and we're going to come back and talk about a
Speaker 1: little chemistry right after this. All right, So we're back,
Speaker 1: and we promised talk of chemistry, and I think we
Speaker 1: talked about this briefly on one show. I have tried
Speaker 1: to bake. I did a birthday cake for Emily a
Speaker 1: couple of years ago, Red Velvet Waldorf Story of.
Speaker 2: Cake, and it was okay.
Speaker 3: It wasn't pretty, though, what do you mean, like it
Speaker 3: like it was lopsided or there's a horn growing out
Speaker 3: of it.
Speaker 1: It just you know, it didn't look like a cake
Speaker 1: you would buy in a store, but it tasted really good.
Speaker 3: I'll bet it was made with a lot of love too.
Speaker 2: Oh of course.
Speaker 1: But my deal is is I'm not a great baker
Speaker 1: because baking requires you to be very precise with your ingredients,
Speaker 1: because it is chemistry. I'm a much better cook because
Speaker 1: I'm a fly by the seat of my pants and
Speaker 1: throw a little of this in there, and throw a
Speaker 1: little of that in there.
Speaker 2: And there's a much you can't do that with.
Speaker 1: No, there's much more forgiveness in general cooking than baking.
Speaker 3: Yeah, cooking's in art. Baking is a science for sure.
Speaker 2: Yeah that's what they say, right.
Speaker 3: Yeah, Well that's what I say too.
Speaker 2: You didn't make that up, right.
Speaker 3: I think I did. Okay, So with a with a cake, right,
Speaker 3: what you're doing is producing a chemical reaction, and I
Speaker 3: knew that, yeah, but I had no idea on this
Speaker 3: granular level that this article gets into just how much
Speaker 3: of a chemical reaction baking a cake is.
Speaker 2: Yeah. This hes pretty neat the understanding of it too
Speaker 2: to me.
Speaker 3: So you want to start with a leavening agent, right,
Speaker 3: That's how you get from batter which is kind of
Speaker 3: flat and soupy and wet, to a nice tall cake.
Speaker 3: The reason it rises is because of a leavening agent.
Speaker 3: And way way way back in the day, they used
Speaker 3: to use yeast. They use yeast for everything. They would
Speaker 3: make some beer, they would make a cake, they'd make
Speaker 3: some bread.
Speaker 2: They would throw it into the eyes of their enemy.
Speaker 3: They would in a fight, the dirty fight. And then
Speaker 3: eventually yeast kind of fell to the wayside a little bit.
Speaker 3: Is they realized that there's other ways to you make
Speaker 3: cake rise. One of the big ways is to actually
Speaker 3: introduce air into it. And if you say, you know,
Speaker 3: beat some eggs, what you're doing you're not just breaking
Speaker 3: the eggs down into their kind of components or like
Speaker 3: a mishmash of all of their components. You're also introducing
Speaker 3: air into that mix, which will eventually, as we'll see,
Speaker 3: transfers into the cake to make it rise.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: And like when you're following a recipe, if you've never
Speaker 1: baked a cake before and it says cream the butter
Speaker 1: and sugar or sift the flour, you can't just say, eh, like,
Speaker 1: I don't have a sifter, so I'll just throw the
Speaker 1: flour in here, Like your cake is screwed.
Speaker 3: Yeah, Because it's not just like, oh, that makes a
Speaker 3: flour pretty yeah, the sifting flour introduces air into the
Speaker 3: whole mix too.
Speaker 2: Yeah, this is all very important stuff. So you can't.
Speaker 2: You can't cheat any of these steps.
Speaker 3: No, you can't. You really need to follow a cake
Speaker 3: recipe pretty closely.
Speaker 1: I mean, I guess if you're a master baker and
Speaker 1: you know what you're doing, you can do something in
Speaker 1: lieu something else. Sure, But if you're just an ordinary
Speaker 1: non professional baker at home.
Speaker 2: Right, just follow the recipe and do what they say.
Speaker 3: Yeah, because you couldn't say, well, I'm going to substitute
Speaker 3: this flour for a bunch of salt, like, not only
Speaker 3: would it taste radically different, like you're affecting the chemical
Speaker 3: composition of the mixture.
Speaker 2: True, unless you're making a traditional South Georgia salt.
Speaker 3: Cake, right, which you can also use on those snowy
Speaker 3: days to clear the road too.
Speaker 2: That's right.
Speaker 3: So you've got yeast as a leavening agent, you've got
Speaker 3: introducing air through like whipping something. And I found this
Speaker 3: mention of a recipe that called for four eggs to
Speaker 3: be beaten for two hours.
Speaker 2: Holy cow.
Speaker 3: So you can imagine that everybody was pretty psyched when
Speaker 3: chemical leavening agents were introduced in the mid nineteenth century.
Speaker 1: Oh so that was an old recipe, yes, yeah, And
Speaker 1: so in other words, you couldn't just put the mixer
Speaker 1: on with your eggs and.
Speaker 2: Leave, no and go get on ti.
Speaker 3: No, this was with your arm. Yeah, and yeah it
Speaker 3: was not. I mean, I imagine if the person you
Speaker 3: were working for asked for a cake, You're just like,
Speaker 3: this is a bad day. This is gonna be a
Speaker 3: bad day.
Speaker 2: You beat for three hours, right.
Speaker 3: And the whole reason again you're doing this is to
Speaker 3: introduce some air.
Speaker 2: Right.
Speaker 3: But if you could use something else, say like sodium
Speaker 3: bicarbonate also known as baking soda, and you mixed it
Speaker 3: which is a base, and you added another ingredient in there,
Speaker 3: which is like an acid, say like buttermilk or yogurt
Speaker 3: or vinegar, right, yeah, like in a vinegar cake, that
Speaker 3: sodium bicarbonate, that base and the acid are going to
Speaker 3: mix together and form a chemical reaction and release CO two. Yes,
Speaker 3: And this is how modern cakes rise. CO two is
Speaker 3: released through this chemical reaction and it goes and bubbles
Speaker 3: up through the cake and makes the cake rise with it.
Speaker 3: That's what leavening agents do, is they take air and
Speaker 3: they expand it and make it the cake.
Speaker 1: Yeah, like when you slice a piece of cake, not
Speaker 1: not so much pound cake because it's way more dense
Speaker 1: or other non flowered cakes, but your standard birthday cake.
Speaker 1: You slice it up and you see those it's you
Speaker 1: know those pockets, those holes that you know.
Speaker 2: Those are air holes. Those were where the bubbles were.
Speaker 1: And we'll get to that a little more, but it's
Speaker 1: that's very important stuff.
Speaker 3: That's a that's a famous chef's apron, baker's apron. Ask
Speaker 3: me about my air holes.
Speaker 2: Fat source very important.
Speaker 1: Sure, Fats improve the texture of a cake, allow it
Speaker 1: to be moist, flavorful, because we all know fat tastes great.
Speaker 2: And butter.
Speaker 1: You know, people can use shortening, which is good, Margarine
Speaker 1: is good, cooking oil, this can all be used. But
Speaker 1: for me, just get some real butter. And and I
Speaker 1: say that for all foods. I went on a butter
Speaker 1: not a kick, No, no, no, I am on a
Speaker 1: butter kick. I went on a butter a boycott of
Speaker 1: sorts for a while, like real butter.
Speaker 2: But now I'm back on butter.
Speaker 3: Oh yeah, yeah, I know what you mean. I tend
Speaker 3: to think butter is healthier of all of them too. Yeah,
Speaker 3: although olive oil has a beat, it's just such a
Speaker 3: radically different taste, ye, especially when you're baking with it.
Speaker 3: Although have you ever had an olive oil cake?
Speaker 2: I don't think so.
Speaker 3: I don't remember where I had it. But man, they
Speaker 3: are good, really, yes, they're surprisingly good. But it is
Speaker 3: definitely it's own distinct thing, you know what I'm saying. Like,
Speaker 3: subbing olive oil out for butters can give you a
Speaker 3: weird oh recipe that no one's going to like. But
Speaker 3: they might pretend they do if they like you, Yes,
Speaker 3: but they don't really like that.
Speaker 1: Right, And all these fat sources they can be used
Speaker 1: sometimes together or swapped out for butter.
Speaker 2: But again, you gotta know what you're doing.
Speaker 1: You can't just say, well, I'm not gonna use butter,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna just use the same amount of cooking oil
Speaker 1: as melted butter.
Speaker 3: Right. And one of the reasons why he's swapping something
Speaker 3: out for butter in particular too, I mean, butter gives
Speaker 3: it its richness, it helps improve its moistness and texture. Right,
Speaker 3: Butter's great, but butter also has a tendency to incorporate
Speaker 3: air when you cream butter. When you start to mash
Speaker 3: it around. That's the whole reason. Like, they're not telling
Speaker 3: you to cream the butter just to make it look
Speaker 3: good before you add it to the batter. You're actually
Speaker 3: incorporating air there, so that butter is serving both as
Speaker 3: a fat and as a leavening agent in that recipe. Correct,
Speaker 3: if you come across the recipe that calls for butter
Speaker 3: that it must be creamed, there's something else going on
Speaker 3: besides just getting a buttery taste out of your cake.
Speaker 2: That's right. Sweetener. I was about to say sugar instead
Speaker 2: of sweetener.
Speaker 3: Might as well, though, but let's be honest.
Speaker 1: You can use honey and stuff, you can use a
Speaker 1: gave artificial sweetener, but sugar is the best thing to use.
Speaker 1: In my opinion. It bonds best to water molocles. It's
Speaker 1: really gonna help. That'll help everything be nice and moist
Speaker 1: and soft. And you don't want to overdo it though.
Speaker 1: You want to use again, the right amount of sugar,
Speaker 1: because not only could it affect the taste, but it
Speaker 1: could make the texture it could be too tough.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and sugar is another one too, where if you
Speaker 3: see sugar and you sell it out for something else,
Speaker 3: it can have an impact on that chemical reaction for sure,
Speaker 3: because it does all those things you're talking about. Like
Speaker 3: one of the things it does is the crystalline structure
Speaker 3: of sugar actually cuts through the batter to help release
Speaker 3: CO two more easily. And like you said, it binds
Speaker 3: to water, which means it does two things. That locks
Speaker 3: it in so that it keeps moisture in, but it
Speaker 3: also sugar also robs that water from some of the
Speaker 3: proteins and the starches that give the cake its structure,
Speaker 3: which means that they're not going to be able to
Speaker 3: become tough and dense like you were saying, because sugar's
Speaker 3: already grabbed onto that water molecule, right, and sugar in particularly,
Speaker 3: you're not going to get same thing with like stevia
Speaker 3: or honey, Like it's not gonna have the same effect.
Speaker 3: It's it's crystalline sugar, and it doesn't have to be
Speaker 3: white refined sugar. You have the same effect I think
Speaker 3: with like turbinato cane sugar too.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and you can, I mean, if you don't want
Speaker 1: to use sugar and you want to use honey, look
Speaker 1: up a recipe that is specific to honey, and they
Speaker 1: will help account for that in certain ways, but it's
Speaker 1: still to me. You know, white sugar do it right.
Speaker 3: And then they sugar also gives it that nice golden
Speaker 3: brown color through the Mayerd reaction.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that in the eggs for sure.
Speaker 3: Yeah, well we're at eggs, sugar and eggs.
Speaker 2: Eggs are big, yeah, especially if they're ostrich eggs.
Speaker 3: Eggs. I know, eggs have proteins in them, right, and
Speaker 3: there's a couple of things in there. Those proteins help
Speaker 3: give structure to the cake, I believe.
Speaker 2: Yes, absolutely, the almost fires in the yolk. They help.
Speaker 1: It's also kind of serves as a binding agent. There
Speaker 1: are a lot of things, including flour that help bind
Speaker 1: things together, but those eggs and those yolks very much
Speaker 1: do because there's certain things in cake sometimes that.
Speaker 2: Don't want to mix.
Speaker 3: Yeah, the water.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and the egg comes together and says, what you know,
Speaker 1: can we all just kind of stick together here?
Speaker 2: Literally?
Speaker 3: Nice?
Speaker 2: Yes, that wasn't meant to be a pun. I meant that.
Speaker 3: And I think the two big emulsifiers are actually in
Speaker 3: the egg yolk. Cholesterol and less than are found in
Speaker 3: egg yolk. And they're like, hey, everybody, come on, let's
Speaker 3: hang out.
Speaker 1: That's right, And there's also fats an egg, and we
Speaker 1: also we already mentioned that fats are awesome and taste delicious.
Speaker 3: Plus also, if you're using whole eggs, most of the
Speaker 3: egg white is water. The vast majority is water. And
Speaker 3: as we'll see, water and liquids play a big role
Speaker 3: in the cake too. So it's all like the idea
Speaker 3: of people figuring all this out through millennia of little
Speaker 3: contributions here or there. It's just it's just a blessing
Speaker 3: on humanity ca cakes.
Speaker 2: It is.
Speaker 3: It's a really neat accomplishment that everyone had came together
Speaker 3: to figure this out over the span of time and
Speaker 3: wonderful kitchens on cold winter days where that were like,
Speaker 3: you know, you've got like a nice cake baking in
Speaker 3: the oven. You're contributing to humanity's knowledge of being great.
Speaker 1: Yeah, a lot of bad the carcasses of a lot
Speaker 1: of bad cakes have been left in its wake, sure
Speaker 1: to get where we are today.
Speaker 3: A lot of unhappy families and a lot of unpleasant
Speaker 3: conversations about those cakes.
Speaker 1: But still in a bet in the olden days, when
Speaker 1: times are a little tougher, they probably still.
Speaker 3: Late those cakes oh yeah, I would guess.
Speaker 2: So you know you probablydn't just toss it out to
Speaker 2: the mules.
Speaker 3: No, you gave them to sailors who were glad to
Speaker 3: have them.
Speaker 2: All right.
Speaker 1: That brings us to flour, very very important ingredient in
Speaker 1: most baked goods, and flour is what is going to
Speaker 1: really be the binding agent. It's really good, going to
Speaker 1: hold everything together.
Speaker 2: Give it its structure, Yeah, a lot.
Speaker 1: Of structure and strength. And this is when when you
Speaker 1: mix these proteins with water, it's going to form gluten
Speaker 1: and gluten. I know a lot of people hate gluten,
Speaker 1: my wife being one of them, but gluten is a
Speaker 1: pretty key ingredient here. Although I will say they've come
Speaker 1: a long way now with gluten free cakes they have.
Speaker 3: It doesn't make you quite as sad to eat one.
Speaker 2: An they're pretty good now. If you get a good
Speaker 2: gluten free cake.
Speaker 3: It's well, the cheesecake is gluten free, so that's okay
Speaker 3: with me.
Speaker 1: I mean, you know, your standard substitute flour, they've just
Speaker 1: gotten a lot better.
Speaker 2: I think.
Speaker 3: Yeah. So in a standard glutenous cake, that gluten from
Speaker 3: the from the flour mixing with the water forms of
Speaker 3: gel and it gives it that structure, it gives it
Speaker 3: that consistency, the texture that you're looking for. But again,
Speaker 3: the sugar's robbing the proteins and the starches from getting
Speaker 3: too much water, because the more water it gets, the
Speaker 3: more the tougher the cake is going to be, the
Speaker 3: more gluten. So you actually want to make sure that
Speaker 3: your sugar's taking away some of the liquids. But also
Speaker 3: the type of flour you use has a lot to
Speaker 3: do with how tough your cake's going to turn out. So, like,
Speaker 3: there is such a thing as cake flour. Yes, that's
Speaker 3: something like seven percent seven and a half percent protein,
Speaker 3: which is going to translate into less gluten when you
Speaker 3: mix it with water, right, Yeah, so it's gonna be
Speaker 3: a lighter, fluffier cake. And then there's all purpose flours
Speaker 3: ten and a half percent, bread flours twelve percent, And
Speaker 3: depending on what kind of consistency you want in your cake,
Speaker 3: you would use these different kinds of flour, and all
Speaker 3: of it comes down to the amount of gluten that's
Speaker 3: going to be produced when it interacts with the liquids.
Speaker 2: That's right.
Speaker 1: And finally that brings us to the liquids. The liquids
Speaker 1: are obviously going to help keep things moist. They hydrate
Speaker 1: those proteins, they allow all those chemical changes to take place.
Speaker 2: But that liquid does when.
Speaker 1: You actually bake the cake, when it comes time to
Speaker 1: put it in the oven, which we're gonna get to
Speaker 1: here in a sec that creates a steam. Like that
Speaker 1: liquid cooks out and vaporizes, so that steam expands the
Speaker 1: air cells and that volume, and it really lends itself
Speaker 1: to the light, airy structure and texture that you're gonna get.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it blows up the CO two bubbles in it
Speaker 3: even further, which helps make the cake rise. Plus it
Speaker 3: also chuck fosters that chemical reaction between the acids and
Speaker 3: the bases that act as leavening agents that release CO
Speaker 3: two in the first place. The presence of liquids in
Speaker 3: the presence or water specifically, I think in heat, really
Speaker 3: make that CO two go berserk.
Speaker 2: All right, Well we should talk about ovens.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 1: I was about to say you can't bake a cake
Speaker 1: without an oven, but apparently you can.
Speaker 2: You can in Egypt, Yeah, ancient Egypt.
Speaker 1: All right, So let's say we're not an ancient Egypt.
Speaker 1: Let's say we're in regular North America and Europe. In
Speaker 1: the eighteenth century is basically when the semi closed oven
Speaker 1: came around. And before this, if you were baking cakes,
Speaker 1: well you were probably a professional baker, because these ovens
Speaker 1: weren't in every household.
Speaker 3: Right, and even in the eighteenth century they weren't in
Speaker 3: every household either, but they tried to become a lot
Speaker 3: more prevalent around that time. That was a big first
Speaker 3: step toward people baking at home, not just cakes but anything.
Speaker 3: You know. Yeah, in cake history, that was a huge
Speaker 3: monumental moment when the enclosed oven became kind of ubiquitous
Speaker 3: among households.
Speaker 1: For sure, because what you get there is consistency. You
Speaker 1: get a consistent even temperature, and of course that just
Speaker 1: got better and better over the years with advances oven technology,
Speaker 1: and more than anything, you get a reliable temperature ideally, right.
Speaker 3: And if you have those things, you can make a
Speaker 3: cake after cake after cake that your family won't be
Speaker 3: mad about. The sailors will stop coming by and being like,
Speaker 3: you got any more of them terrible cakes you made, sailors, Yeah,
Speaker 3: that's who you give the terrible cakes too. Sure, all right,
Speaker 3: So with the oven in particular, I didn't realize this,
Speaker 3: but you know how the liquid and the heat and
Speaker 3: the sodium bicarbonate and the acids are mixing together to
Speaker 3: make the cake rise. That is actually a really fragile
Speaker 3: state of affairs. While the cake is baking and the structure,
Speaker 3: the proteins and the starches and the gluten are actually
Speaker 3: solidifying and making this cake. And if you mess with
Speaker 3: the oven, meaning like you open and close the door
Speaker 3: too often, or you slam it shut too hard, you're
Speaker 3: gonna The change in temperature, on the one hand, can
Speaker 3: cool those gases and make your cake fall, and it
Speaker 3: makes a sound as it does, as everyone knows. And
Speaker 3: then the air pressure from slamming the door can burst
Speaker 3: those co two bubbles, and again you're the proteins haven't
Speaker 3: had a chance to solidify and make the cake structure,
Speaker 3: so the cake can fall from that as well. And
Speaker 3: if you'll notice, once a cake gets to a certain point,
Speaker 3: if it falls, it falls in the middle. The outside
Speaker 3: usually stays up because that part has solidified already. The
Speaker 3: stuff in the middle hasn't quite cooked through, so that
Speaker 3: would be the part that falls, and that also proves
Speaker 3: my point.
Speaker 2: That's right.
Speaker 1: You also want to put your cake in the middle
Speaker 1: where you place your cake in the oven can even
Speaker 1: cause problems.
Speaker 2: It's very finicky cakes are.
Speaker 3: Sure, well again it's a science experiment.
Speaker 1: Yeah, they're basically like, do this right, jerk, or I
Speaker 1: might just take a nap here in the in the
Speaker 1: middle of the in the middle of the cake.
Speaker 3: Maybe I'll burn, maybe I'll stick up your whole house.
Speaker 1: But like you said about opening the door, like, ideally
Speaker 1: you know the temperature your oven, you know how long
Speaker 1: it takes, and maybe don't wait till literally you think
Speaker 1: I can pull it out, although if you're a good baker,
Speaker 1: you're not sweating it. You pull it out and you
Speaker 1: know it's pretty much ready. But definitely don't keep opening it.
Speaker 1: Try and lease wait till the end. And if you have,
Speaker 1: they're not quite as in fashion now, I don't think.
Speaker 1: But ovens with a window and a light m hm.
Speaker 1: You can obviously take a little peak that way. Sure
Speaker 1: those are kind about a fashion, right or are they?
Speaker 3: I don't not that I know.
Speaker 2: I feel like I don't see those a lot. Do
Speaker 2: you have a window in your rubin? Sure? Of course?
Speaker 3: What am I a communist?
Speaker 2: Do you?
Speaker 3: Yes? With the light?
Speaker 2: Oh man? What do you have just to stay in
Speaker 2: the steel door.
Speaker 3: That's a dishwasher, man.
Speaker 2: Oh that's my problem.
Speaker 3: Yeah, like my cakes always come out wet and soapy.
Speaker 2: Wait a minute, do I have a window?
Speaker 3: Sure you do, I think everyone does.
Speaker 2: I'm literally cannot picture my kitchen right now.
Speaker 3: Jerry, he's got a window, right.
Speaker 2: If I've been baking in the dishwasher.
Speaker 3: Jerry, and I say, yes, you have a window, and you're.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that might be. I might have just said something
Speaker 2: very dumb.
Speaker 3: So so it's stand in.
Speaker 1: Well, I do know, you know what, I think. I
Speaker 1: do have a window, but I don't have a working light.
Speaker 1: That's why I think I don't have a window.
Speaker 3: You need to replace the light bulb.
Speaker 2: Yeah, but wyone's a bottle of that for all it.
Speaker 3: You can go to like any any big box hardware
Speaker 3: store and killipop hardware store off the internet.
Speaker 2: Sure, I don't replace light bulbs at my house.
Speaker 3: Matter of fact, I think they probably sell them at
Speaker 3: the grocery store. Even you go find yourself some gulf wax,
Speaker 3: and you're probably near the refrigerator oven light bulbs, all right.
Speaker 2: The heat of the oven is very important.
Speaker 1: So depending on how good your oven is, it may
Speaker 1: be a little off maybe a little hotter or cooler,
Speaker 1: So you might want to purchase an oven thermometer just
Speaker 1: to give it a double check, because baking is science.
Speaker 1: And when you think that that cake is done, take
Speaker 1: a little peek through your window that everyone has, or
Speaker 1: open it. If you really think it's done, give a
Speaker 1: little tap in the center. If it springs back, then
Speaker 1: it's probably done. If you're an experienced baker, you just
Speaker 1: know by looking at it. Or you can always do
Speaker 1: the old toothpick trick, which is sticking that toothpick wooden
Speaker 1: toothpick in the center of the cake and pull it out,
Speaker 1: and if there's no cake on it, then it's pretty
Speaker 1: much done. Right If it's if it's covered in goo,
Speaker 1: that means it's not done.
Speaker 3: Uh, that is correct, chuck.
Speaker 2: But then you can also lick that goo off that toothpick.
Speaker 2: That's not bad.
Speaker 3: No, you can, but you're it's just never quite as good.
Speaker 3: And I think it's it always tastes like disappointment, you
Speaker 3: know what I mean, because you want it to come
Speaker 3: out clean. Anytime you're doing that, you're never really putting
Speaker 3: it in ex it to come out battery.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 3: Yeah, So even though you do get to lick it.
Speaker 3: That's like the one plus side of that that experience.
Speaker 2: I think that's true. And if your cake is done,
Speaker 2: you're not finished baking it yet. Even you need to
Speaker 2: let it cool in the pan.
Speaker 3: Yeah, that's a big one.
Speaker 2: You don't just pull the cake.
Speaker 1: Out and and turn it upside down in your sink
Speaker 1: and eat it with your hands while it's still hot.
Speaker 2: Right, that's not the way to do it.
Speaker 1: No, No, you want to let it finish in the
Speaker 1: pan cooling, because it's still doing a little bit of
Speaker 1: baking and it's getting used to its new room in
Speaker 1: the kitchen and saying, all right, this is a different
Speaker 1: temperature in here.
Speaker 2: Kept, I think I can hang with you guys.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I'm alive.
Speaker 1: Ten or fifteen minutes later, get out that wire rack,
Speaker 1: flip it over and ideally it comes out all in
Speaker 1: one nice thing.
Speaker 3: Yep. And the other good thing about letting it cool
Speaker 3: in the pan first, too, is when you cool it
Speaker 3: on the wire rack, it won't get those wire indentations
Speaker 3: in the cake because it is stable enough.
Speaker 2: I never thought about that.
Speaker 3: Nobody likes us. Sure you can fill it in with
Speaker 3: a little extra frosting. Yeah, Actually, now I think about it.
Speaker 3: That's great. Those indentations are just fun.
Speaker 2: The frosting grooves.
Speaker 3: In other words, yep, should we.
Speaker 1: Take a break, Yes, all right, we're gonna talk, well,
Speaker 1: just about other kkey stuff right after this.
Speaker 3: Okay, Chuck. You remember I was talking about baking soda
Speaker 3: and how that changed everything. Yep, that was a big one.
Speaker 3: That was from the eighteen forties. Baking soda sodium bicarbonate
Speaker 3: just good old fashioned, regular old baking soda. SORR to
Speaker 3: be added to it, but at the time you needed
Speaker 3: to also add another ingredient that was an acid, so
Speaker 3: that the two would react and form CO two or
Speaker 3: produce CO two. Right, somebody about twenty years after baking
Speaker 3: soda was developed said, oh, I got this. We're gonna
Speaker 3: come up with something called baking powder. And I never
Speaker 3: knew this, but this is the difference between baking soda
Speaker 3: and baking powder. Baking soda is just sodium bicarbonate. Baking
Speaker 3: powder is sodium bicarbonate and two other dry acidic minerals
Speaker 3: that when dry, they don't do anything. You can mix
Speaker 3: them together all day long and they just sit there
Speaker 3: like what. But in the presence of water and heat,
Speaker 3: then they start to react chemically with one another. So
Speaker 3: you can add just a little baking powder and you
Speaker 3: don't need an extra ingredient like yogurt or vinegar or
Speaker 3: some other acid. It's got the base and the acid
Speaker 3: that's going to produce the CO two in there. That
Speaker 3: was a huge, huge advancement for cakes, but it actually
Speaker 3: came kind of toward the end of cake advancements. Prior
Speaker 3: to that. Just the mass production of the Industrial Revolution
Speaker 3: had a big impact on cakes, among many many other things,
Speaker 3: but definitely had an impact on the spread of cake baking,
Speaker 3: especially in the United States.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and then so just you know, leave that baking
Speaker 1: soda in your fridge to soak up the stink.
Speaker 2: Sure, that's all it's good for. Well that No, you
Speaker 2: can use the baking soda for a lot of stuff.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it also gets stink out of like clothes too.
Speaker 3: Oh yeah, you can use it to well, that's it.
Speaker 2: No, like school science projects. You want to make a volcano.
Speaker 3: Yeah, vinegar and baking soda.
Speaker 2: That's right, I'll love with your parents help. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Pre packaged cake mix was a very big deal when
Speaker 1: it came out in the nineteen thirties, but it was
Speaker 1: a company named p. Duff and Sons. And they said,
Speaker 1: we got a problem here. We got too much molasses
Speaker 1: on our hands. So, and this is kind of how
Speaker 1: a lot of great things have been invented. They had
Speaker 1: too much of something. They say, well, what can we
Speaker 1: use this for? So they got to work and they said,
Speaker 1: mister John Duff, the owner, said, you know what, the
Speaker 1: little wheat flour in there, with this molasses, a little shortening,
Speaker 1: some spices, we got a gingerbread mix that we can
Speaker 1: sell to the public. All you got to do is
Speaker 1: add water, dumb, dumb, and you can bake yourself some
Speaker 1: gingerbread cookies.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 3: And the public went hooray because remember they had ovens
Speaker 3: now in their houses. Yes, and they had this. The
Speaker 3: idea that you could just get a mix from the
Speaker 3: store and just add water was huge. It was a
Speaker 3: huge change. And what's interesting is this whole like p
Speaker 3: duffin Son's story, they're out of Pittsburgh by the way
Speaker 3: from them coming up, because I think they quickly went
Speaker 3: from just gingerbread mixes to cake mixes themselves as well.
Speaker 3: But that busts several myths actually, some like long standing
Speaker 3: food myths. Yeah, one of them is that cake mix
Speaker 3: came out of a surplus of flour from World War Two.
Speaker 3: That's where the cake mix came from.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean cake pre made cake mixes did get
Speaker 1: way more popular after World War Two.
Speaker 2: But it wasn't because there was so much flour.
Speaker 3: No, it was because that a lot of the food
Speaker 3: companies started getting into pre mixed foods. Yeah, that you
Speaker 3: could make pretty easily in your kitchen. But then the
Speaker 3: other one. I'd love this one. There's this long standing
Speaker 3: myth or this story about a guy named Ernest Dickter
Speaker 3: who back in the nineteen fifties, Ernest Dicktor, he was
Speaker 3: a psychologist. I believe he came up with the term
Speaker 3: focus group. He came up with the whole idea of
Speaker 3: focus groups to help companies figure out why their new
Speaker 3: product wasn't doing so well, or how to make a
Speaker 3: product that they hadn't launched yet even more appealing. This
Speaker 3: guy came up with that whole idea of focus groups, right, correct.
Speaker 3: So he's also credited with being the man who saved
Speaker 3: cake mixes because cake mixes came out, everybody kind of
Speaker 3: loved them, and then supposedly sales went flat and Ernest
Speaker 3: Dictor got a focus group together and found out that
Speaker 3: women who made cakes using these cake mixes felt guilty.
Speaker 3: They weren't contributing anything to their families. They were just
Speaker 3: adding water and making a cake and then quietly sobbing
Speaker 3: while their family ate it.
Speaker 2: Right about the patriarchal brainwashing.
Speaker 3: Right, So Dictor realized that the best thing that these
Speaker 3: cake mix companies could do is to remove the dried
Speaker 3: egg ingredients from the mix and tell the consumer to
Speaker 3: add her own eggs, so then that way she was contributing. Well,
Speaker 3: it was a huge success, and cake mixes took off
Speaker 3: and became part of the American pantheon from that point on.
Speaker 2: Right.
Speaker 1: Not true, No, Yeah, that is a total urban myth.
Speaker 1: Most of these pre made mixes for years had said
Speaker 1: to add your own eggs because it just was better
Speaker 1: to add fresh eggs. Yeah, it tastes better and perform better.
Speaker 2: So I don't know how that got started the myth,
Speaker 2: Yeah was it?
Speaker 3: I'm not sure either. Okay, I don't know, but it
Speaker 3: is a long standing food myth that you can find,
Speaker 3: like some very credible sources who say, like, oh this
Speaker 3: is this happened, It's just everywhere. But it turns out
Speaker 3: that's not true. But I think the reason why it
Speaker 3: has had legs for so long is because Ernest Dictor
Speaker 3: is actually rightfully credited with saving the cake mix market
Speaker 3: through a focus group, and he did find that women
Speaker 3: were kind of they didn't feel guilty about it about,
Speaker 3: you know, not contributing more to the cake mix. They
Speaker 3: think they were more bored by it. So he advised
Speaker 3: companies to figure out a way to make cake baking
Speaker 3: about way more than just baking the cake. And so
Speaker 3: companies decided that they were going to start promoting cakes
Speaker 3: as just the beginning part. That the real point of
Speaker 3: baking cakes was to make these elaborate, amazing cakes that
Speaker 3: you decorated, and it took you hours and hours to
Speaker 3: make these things, and it was like a scene of
Speaker 3: like Humpty Dumpty on a brick wall, but the whole
Speaker 3: thing was made out of cake. And that was fostered
Speaker 3: by the introduction of frosting, and that came from Ernest Dictor,
Speaker 3: And that actually is save the cake mix industry.
Speaker 2: That's right.
Speaker 1: You want to know something about my mom? Yeah, champion
Speaker 1: cake decorator, is that right? Not literal champion, Like she
Speaker 1: never won a.
Speaker 3: Contest, Yeah, because it is out there, but.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean as far as the home. The home
Speaker 1: cake baker goes like she couldn't go on one of
Speaker 1: these shows now where they make like the Giant British
Speaker 1: Bake Off. Yeah, like giant submarines and stuff out of Fondon.
Speaker 1: But just for like mom making special cakes every year
Speaker 1: for the birthday. Every year she would say what kind
Speaker 1: of cake you want this year? I'd be like, I.
Speaker 2: Want a Star Wars cake. I want to Atlanta.
Speaker 1: Falcons cake, and lo and behold, I would get my
Speaker 1: Atlanta Falcons cake.
Speaker 2: That's awesome, very cool stuff. You know.
Speaker 3: I had an older sister who she died actually when
Speaker 3: I was sixteen in a car accident.
Speaker 2: But she.
Speaker 3: Used to be the equivalent of your mom at making cakes.
Speaker 3: Oh really, but she didn't even need to ask. She
Speaker 3: would just she'd just make something up, right. Yeah, And
Speaker 3: there was this one year, I'll never forget this cake.
Speaker 3: We were all big time into Howard Jones, so it
Speaker 3: must have been saying but yeah, it must have been
Speaker 3: like my ninth or tenth birthday. My whole like, both
Speaker 3: my sisters and me were totally into Howard Jones and
Speaker 3: Karen my sister, my oldest sister, made a Howard Jones
Speaker 3: keyboard cake.
Speaker 2: Wow.
Speaker 3: And it was a couple of sheet cakes put together
Speaker 3: frosted so it looked like one big thing that like
Speaker 3: the black keys were kit kats, like the the knobs
Speaker 3: on the synthesizer were rollos, and I was I just
Speaker 3: looked around at all my friends, like, does everyone see
Speaker 3: my cake? This is the greatest cake anyone's ever had?
Speaker 2: And no one couldn't have any but me.
Speaker 3: No, I shared, of course I wanted to everyone did
Speaker 3: partake in the bounty?
Speaker 2: Was it a key tar or a keyboard? It was
Speaker 2: a keyboard, okay, yeah, you never know.
Speaker 1: Strap a yeah, strap a guitar strap on it. You
Speaker 1: might could have held it.
Speaker 3: I would not have put it past her to make
Speaker 3: it a key tar.
Speaker 2: Man.
Speaker 1: That is very sweet story. Yeah, it literally and figured
Speaker 1: thank you Hojo fans.
Speaker 2: Huh, yes, when that is nickname?
Speaker 3: I don't think so.
Speaker 2: Did I make that up?
Speaker 3: Yeah? I think that's the hotel chain.
Speaker 2: I think you're totally right. All right. Well, another tip
Speaker 2: here for baking a cake. If you are looking at
Speaker 2: recipes and it says use this kind of pan, you think, well,
Speaker 2: I don't have that kind of pan.
Speaker 1: I've got this kind of pan. It's aluminum and square,
Speaker 1: and they're calling for a round dark pan's it makes
Speaker 1: a big difference.
Speaker 2: Like it can literally ruin your cake.
Speaker 3: Yeah, you supposedly want to reduce the heat. I think,
Speaker 3: not the heat or the cook time, one of the two.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: It says a dark nonstick pan requires twenty five percent
Speaker 1: reduction in temperature.
Speaker 3: So you want to knock that heat down twenty five percent.
Speaker 2: Yeah, but also like google that stuff.
Speaker 1: Don't just say Josh and Chuck said this should work,
Speaker 1: you know, like, you have to have this the right
Speaker 1: pan for that recipe and they will tell you in
Speaker 1: the recipe and if you don't have it, just look
Speaker 1: up the cheat it.
Speaker 3: Basically, Yeah, two things you don't want to take our
Speaker 3: advice blindly on medical stuff and baking stuff. Yeah, everything
Speaker 3: else is fine.
Speaker 1: I don't know about that, but those are the two
Speaker 1: leading ways that we will mess.
Speaker 2: Your life up for sure.
Speaker 1: All Right, Well, I guess we need to talk about
Speaker 1: the different methods we're getting super wonky into cakes here.
Speaker 3: Well, I mean that's what we do.
Speaker 2: All right.
Speaker 1: Well, let's talk about creaming then, because that is one
Speaker 1: kind of method of making a cake and creaming is
Speaker 1: what we talked about. You may not have known exactly
Speaker 1: what we meant. But when you combine like the butter
Speaker 1: and sugar and it says cream it with an electric beater,
Speaker 1: that's what you're doing. And it's it's really tough at
Speaker 1: first to get it going, but just hang in there
Speaker 1: because that butter will start to break apart mixing it
Speaker 1: with that sugar, and you you've got a nice, a
Speaker 1: nice creamed mix of ingredients starter mix of ingredients on
Speaker 1: your hand there, right, But you don't skimp on that.
Speaker 2: That that first step.
Speaker 3: And that's like that I think the creaming method that's
Speaker 3: that's that's the one that best gets across this point
Speaker 3: that this is like, this is a it's a chemical reaction.
Speaker 3: I know we've kind of been beating that horse, but
Speaker 3: it's really true. Like you, if you don't follow the
Speaker 3: steps correctly, the chemical reaction is not going to come
Speaker 3: out correctly. Right, And when you step back, you're like,
Speaker 3: but I'm making a cake. That's true, But do you
Speaker 3: want your cake to be good or do you want
Speaker 3: to just waste your time?
Speaker 2: Yeah?
Speaker 1: So, in the creaming method, when it says then makes
Speaker 1: ingredients in this order, wet then dry, right, do that right?
Speaker 1: Don't just say I'll just throw it all in there, right, yep.
Speaker 1: It makes a difference.
Speaker 3: And it says that pound cakes are like a variation
Speaker 3: on the theme. Sure, I looked at the pound cakes. Man,
Speaker 3: do you know so that the idea that poundcakes called
Speaker 3: for a pound of each ingredient? That's actually true.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I know.
Speaker 3: But the reason why it called for a pound of
Speaker 3: each ingredient was because a lot of the British people
Speaker 3: at the time, in the early seventeen hundreds couldn't read,
Speaker 3: so it was just an easy way to remember the recipe.
Speaker 3: Oh interesting, yeah, all right, I'll buy that they'd be
Speaker 3: like what's a TIBs?
Speaker 2: And also pound cakes too.
Speaker 1: The reason why you're not going to find a pound
Speaker 1: cake with a big butter cream frosting is because that
Speaker 1: will that will send you into sugar shock.
Speaker 2: In a second.
Speaker 1: Is why a pound cake is already really dense and sugary. Like,
Speaker 1: that's why you just have it like a little glaze
Speaker 1: on top.
Speaker 3: Yep.
Speaker 2: I do like that glaze. Actually, I eat a pound cake.
Speaker 3: I think that glaze is oh what's it called? Deli something? Icing? Imperializing.
Speaker 3: Oh I don't know, I can't remember. Uh, okay, So
Speaker 3: the next one is the not the no aeration method
Speaker 3: to where you're not really you're not whipping anything up.
Speaker 1: Yeah, you probably don't even have flour in this in
Speaker 1: this this probably a flowerless.
Speaker 3: Cake, right, So this, this is the kind of thing
Speaker 3: that you use to make like a cheesecake or a
Speaker 3: flower or less chocolate cake.
Speaker 2: Yeah, this can be very good.
Speaker 3: Sure, and you are probably going to need to add
Speaker 3: some sort of moisture because cakes like this tend to
Speaker 3: crack while they're baking, which is why a lot of them,
Speaker 3: cheesecakes in particular, you cook in a water bath in
Speaker 3: the oven because that water vaporizes and steams around it
Speaker 3: and helps keep that moisture in.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 3: I never knew that the reason for the water bath.
Speaker 1: I didn't know that you used a water bath. That
Speaker 1: was news to me.
Speaker 2: Yeah. I never made a cheesecake.
Speaker 3: Yeah, they can be quite good.
Speaker 2: Oh. I love cheesecake.
Speaker 3: I don't think I've ever had any bad cheesecake. It's
Speaker 3: always good. That's another thing too. Public's cheesecake is incredible.
Speaker 2: Man.
Speaker 3: They need to sponsor us and they sell it by
Speaker 3: the double slice for those Oh, like, you get two
Speaker 3: slices and they have a key lime one too. Chuck.
Speaker 3: That's just man. Although if you don't like lemon stuff,
Speaker 3: you might not like that.
Speaker 2: Oh No, I love key lime in Okay, try their
Speaker 2: key lime cheesecake.
Speaker 3: Yeah, they should send us some stuff.
Speaker 1: Frankly, at Isle of Palms that for my vacation that
Speaker 1: I've spoken about, they had one of the I can't
Speaker 1: remember which one, but one of the seafood joints where
Speaker 1: I would get all the fresh seafood had a homemade
Speaker 1: key lime pie and I bought and ate one of
Speaker 1: them with my friends that week, and I bought two
Speaker 1: to go home with.
Speaker 3: Did they make it home?
Speaker 2: Huh?
Speaker 3: Did they make it all the way home?
Speaker 2: No?
Speaker 1: Yeah, I stopped and stopped at the border. Yeah, just
Speaker 1: put my base in it. No, they made it home.
Speaker 1: I think there's still one in the freezer actually, And
Speaker 1: then one of them was consumed.
Speaker 3: Nice. Yeah, good key lime pie is.
Speaker 1: And finally, with a non narration method, you are you're
Speaker 1: not doing the the beating, you're not creaming that stuff.
Speaker 1: You were folding the batter. And we could describe it here,
Speaker 1: but if you don't know what folding is and baking.
Speaker 1: Just just look it up on the YouTube for proper
Speaker 1: folding technique right, generally done with a like a rubber spatula.
Speaker 3: Yep, there's a foaming method too, where you you are
Speaker 3: basically using just egg whites usually and you're errating it
Speaker 3: by whipping them up, which makes a merangue. You can
Speaker 3: just stop there and incorporate sugar and you've got marangue,
Speaker 3: which would make a Pavlova cake, which apparently Australia and
Speaker 3: New Zealand have been fighting over the origin of for
Speaker 3: close to one hundred years now.
Speaker 2: But doesn't New Zealand win.
Speaker 3: Supposedly, although I saw another article from some researchers who
Speaker 3: said no, it came even earlier, a decade earlier out
Speaker 3: of America via Germany, so who knows, But yes, out
Speaker 3: of Australia New Zealand. New Zealand's apparently won that fight.
Speaker 3: But that's marangu and Pavlova cake is like a merangue
Speaker 3: cake with like fruit in the middle of it. And
Speaker 3: then and then a listener sent us Pavlova once we
Speaker 3: made it, it was pretty good. It is pretty good. Yeah,
Speaker 3: And then you can also take that egg foam and
Speaker 3: turn it into it like a sponge cake, like an
Speaker 3: angel food cake or something like that. You don't like those.
Speaker 2: Either, No, not big into angel food cake.
Speaker 3: Although you can use sponge cake for strawberry short.
Speaker 2: Cake that I will have.
Speaker 3: Okay, so those spongy cakes that uses the egg foaming method,
Speaker 3: but if you're making a true strawberry shortcake, you're going
Speaker 3: to use an actual short cake.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Those are really good.
Speaker 3: And the reason they're called short cake or short bread
Speaker 3: is called short bread is short is apparently a British
Speaker 3: term for crumbly. Oh okay, so that's where that came from.
Speaker 3: Has nothing to do with the size.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Emily makes a really good gluten free short bread.
Speaker 1: She's kind of gotten into baking a bit in the
Speaker 1: last five or six years and gotten pretty good at it.
Speaker 1: So she makes a good gluten free short bread that
Speaker 1: we've had at short cake with homemade whip topping and
Speaker 1: good fresh strawberries.
Speaker 2: Those are good.
Speaker 1: But my one complaint with her baking is it literally
Speaker 1: looks like she came in there and just started throwing
Speaker 1: ingredients everywhere with her bare hands like a three year old.
Speaker 2: And then baked and then said I'm done.
Speaker 3: Yeah, good night.
Speaker 1: It is a it is a mess, yeah, a big,
Speaker 1: big mess. And she always just says, get out of here.
Speaker 1: I'll clean it up afterwards, don't worry about it.
Speaker 3: Yeah. Yeah, yeah, it's funny. The kitchen can be a
Speaker 3: place of real tension sometimes, huh.
Speaker 1: Oh for sure, Yeah, especially if both of you do
Speaker 1: different things in the kitchen.
Speaker 3: Right, like once hovering like are you going to clean
Speaker 3: that up?
Speaker 1: Well, I'm the kitchen cleaner. So that's why she's just like,
Speaker 1: just stay out of here, dude.
Speaker 3: Right, just wait until the end. Yeah, and you show up,
Speaker 3: You're like, it's Marge's time to shine.
Speaker 2: Well, I'll do this.
Speaker 1: And this is such a passive aggressive move for me,
Speaker 1: which is my style. Not endorsing that, I'm just saying
Speaker 1: it's one of my downfalls I need to work on.
Speaker 1: But I will just go in there and just like
Speaker 1: groan or something.
Speaker 2: She's like, oh god, and she'll just say no out right.
Speaker 3: Again.
Speaker 2: That's life at the Brian House.
Speaker 3: That's a pretty nice chuck.
Speaker 2: It's always with love though.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it always comes out. There's always a cake out
Speaker 3: the on the other end, right.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, yeah, I mean it's not gonna get in
Speaker 1: serious fights with the kitchen stuff.
Speaker 2: Right.
Speaker 3: Yeah. So what's the last thing here.
Speaker 2: Something called the all in one method.
Speaker 3: Yeah, that's just like a cake makes you put it
Speaker 3: all all together at once.
Speaker 1: Yeah, well, we should talk a little bit about frosting
Speaker 1: and icing. The earliest versions of frosting was just sort
Speaker 1: of an almond and sugar paste.
Speaker 2: Eh, not so big on that, but really, I mean
Speaker 2: it can be.
Speaker 3: Okay, but almond croissants are like one of my great
Speaker 3: joys in life.
Speaker 2: Like, oh, yeah, they're so good.
Speaker 1: I suppose that's kind of what a bear claw is too, right, Yeah,
Speaker 1: all right, I take it.
Speaker 3: Yeah, but that almond that's sweet almond paste inside is man, No, it.
Speaker 2: Is good, but I'm like, don't put that on top of.
Speaker 3: A cake, for sure, understood.
Speaker 2: Stuff it in a pastry.
Speaker 1: A friend chef that was the first person they think
Speaker 1: that created like the first legit iced layer cake in
Speaker 1: the fifteenth century, and then about the middle of the
Speaker 1: seventeenth century is when the first frosting recipes started spreading
Speaker 1: around on the internet.
Speaker 3: Right, and fondant is gross.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I'm not into it.
Speaker 3: No, I mean, you can make a neat looking cake,
Speaker 3: but it's gross. Tasting, I think, Yeah.
Speaker 1: I'm then into it butter cream or cream cheese or
Speaker 1: even Emily's Waldorf Astoria frosting, believe.
Speaker 2: It or not.
Speaker 1: I mean it has a bit of a mouthfeel because
Speaker 1: of the shortening, but like a residue on the.
Speaker 2: Pallet, Yeah, on the roof of your mouth. Yeah, but
Speaker 2: it's still good.
Speaker 3: Well, let's talk about cakes like the well, no specific
Speaker 3: cakes like the red velvet cake.
Speaker 2: Right, yeah, delicious.
Speaker 3: Do you know why it's red?
Speaker 2: Well, food coloring.
Speaker 3: They use that to make it a little richer, but
Speaker 3: it actually naturally turns red. It's a chemical reaction between
Speaker 3: the cocoa, the vinegar in it, and the buttermilk. I believe, yes,
Speaker 3: it turns it red.
Speaker 2: All right, I don't know about that.
Speaker 3: No, it's true. Okay, I read it on What's cook
Speaker 3: in America.
Speaker 1: I'll try it because i'm making Emily. Her birthday is
Speaker 1: in a couple of weeks, and I'm making another. I'm
Speaker 1: taking another stab at it.
Speaker 3: Try the try go find like an original like like recipe.
Speaker 2: Well, I mean, what do you mean.
Speaker 3: Like one if if you see one that actually uses buttermilk,
Speaker 3: bea like Okay, this one, this is one of the
Speaker 3: ones I'm going to try.
Speaker 2: No, no, no, I have to use the recipe she tells
Speaker 2: me to use.
Speaker 3: Oh, I gotcha. Which isn't the.
Speaker 2: Waldor the gluten free Waldorf for story version?
Speaker 3: Oh gotcha? I see, But you have cocoa? Does it
Speaker 3: have like vinegar and buttermilk in it? M?
Speaker 2: I can't remember. It's been a couple of years since
Speaker 2: I tried it.
Speaker 3: Okay, well, it should turn red on its own, but
Speaker 3: I don't think there's any harm in adding some more
Speaker 3: synthetic chemical red dye.
Speaker 1: Well, and the thing is, to a lot of people
Speaker 1: that don't try red velvet cake don't try it because
Speaker 1: they think it doesn't like it tastes.
Speaker 2: Like chocolate cake pretty much. Yeah, it just is red.
Speaker 3: It tastes red.
Speaker 2: No, weird, It's not ketchup cake.
Speaker 3: There's Yeah, that's Canadian, isn't it. There's hummingbird cakes.
Speaker 2: Uh, well, what do you mean by the hummingbird?
Speaker 3: Hummingbird cake has like some nuts and some fruit in it,
Speaker 3: lots of frosting. I think it's a Southern cake.
Speaker 1: Yeah, like we called my grandmother Bryant called one of
Speaker 1: the great all time Southern cooks and bakers like you know,
Speaker 1: banana nut bread. Yeah, she called that hummingbird and I
Speaker 1: don't know if that was specific to her or if
Speaker 1: they are interchangeable.
Speaker 3: I don't know. I'm not actually a Southern native, so
Speaker 3: I would not say one way or the other. All
Speaker 3: my experience with hummingbird cake is it's more like a
Speaker 3: carrity cake with say, like pineapple in it and some
Speaker 3: other fruits in it, and a thick layer of frosting.
Speaker 3: And supposedly the reason it's called the hummingbird cake is
Speaker 3: because it's so sweet it could attract hummingbirds.
Speaker 1: See maybe, I mean that's sort of like banana nut bread.
Speaker 1: So I don't know if they're interchangeable or for variation.
Speaker 1: But give me some banana nut bread, which is not
Speaker 1: a cake but it sort of is, and slice it
Speaker 1: up and put some butter on it. Yeah, toasted it
Speaker 1: in the oven. YEP, No, I'm with you.
Speaker 3: Our freezer is always chuck full of black bananas blackened
Speaker 3: with age. Oh sure, because you makes a killer banana
Speaker 3: nut bread from scratch.
Speaker 2: Using.
Speaker 3: I mean, you just can't look at the bananas when
Speaker 3: she's incorporating.
Speaker 2: What does that do? Why is that the key? Do
Speaker 2: you know?
Speaker 3: They just are supposed to be mushy.
Speaker 2: Okay, oh, okay, gotcha.
Speaker 3: And like the best way to make bananas mushy is
Speaker 3: to let them age, let them age freeze agent.
Speaker 1: All right, let's talk about Indian pound cake. Apparently that's
Speaker 1: a thing that has corn meal in it, and I
Speaker 1: can't imagine that taste, but I'd like to try it.
Speaker 3: Well. Yeah, and that was one of the earliest cakes
Speaker 3: in the US. And I think what the author Leah
Speaker 3: Hoy is pointing out is that like cakes came from
Speaker 3: all over the place through time and geography, and that
Speaker 3: the mass immigration tore into America over say like the seventeenth, eighteenth,
Speaker 3: nineteenth centuries, in twentieth too. All these people from all
Speaker 3: these different lands brought their ideas are ingredients of cake,
Speaker 3: and they kind of went through this americanized grinder to
Speaker 3: where eggs were added, butter was added, and like you've
Speaker 3: got these ingredients. So it bears a resemblance to its
Speaker 3: original one, but it's been like cakeified in the American way,
Speaker 3: and that started basically right as European settlers got to
Speaker 3: North America.
Speaker 1: Yeah, apparently the good old fashioned chocolate layer cake came
Speaker 1: out of Boston because there were chocolate companies there.
Speaker 3: Even the German chocolate cake is not German, it's American.
Speaker 3: It's led after a man whose last name was German.
Speaker 1: Oh interesting, well that means he's German. German American could
Speaker 1: be maybe they should call it the German American Chocolate.
Speaker 3: Cake or just German chocolate cake. But it's really American,
Speaker 3: everybody is what the real title should be.
Speaker 2: Strawberry shortcake that you mentioned that does come from the
Speaker 2: old world.
Speaker 3: I'm not much of a jingo list either, I think
Speaker 3: you might say. Of course, I've never felt more national
Speaker 3: pride than in talking about cakes.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 3: Yeah, this is where cakes were born.
Speaker 1: Really, the pineapple upside down cake. Heaven help you if
Speaker 1: you eat that stuff.
Speaker 3: I love it, do you really, man? It's so good.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I just don't like fruit anywhere near my cake. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's a strawberry shortcake.
Speaker 3: You definitely win like a hummingbird cake then even.
Speaker 1: Yeah, maybe that's the difference between it hummingbird and the
Speaker 1: banana bread. Right, although banana's in there, right, that's a
Speaker 1: well see though, that's not a fruitcake to me.
Speaker 3: No, you just don't like the juicy fruits in your cake.
Speaker 3: It sounds like.
Speaker 1: No or coconut, which isn't the German chocolate cake in
Speaker 1: that coconut in the icing.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, I see that.
Speaker 3: That's so good.
Speaker 2: I don't want coconut anywhere near my cakes.
Speaker 1: But that pineapple upside down cake apparently that stuff sort
Speaker 1: of sprang out of a contest Dole had the Doll
Speaker 1: Company in the mid nineteen twenties. They said, hey, bake
Speaker 1: some cakes with fruit, and so thousands of pineapple upside
Speaker 1: down cakes came out. So I don't think they were
Speaker 1: invented for that, but maybe that's just what made them
Speaker 1: so popular.
Speaker 2: I don't know, gotcha.
Speaker 3: And then there's other Again, there's cakes around the world
Speaker 3: that looked like cakes, kind of like tear Me Sue
Speaker 3: Yum is a quintessential Italian cake, but it was invented
Speaker 3: in the nineteen sixties. Black forest cake actually is from Germany.
Speaker 3: It was invented in nineteen fifteen. So what happened was again,
Speaker 3: cake explosion happened here in the good old US of A,
Speaker 3: and it spread back out to the world. There was
Speaker 3: it influx of cake ideas into America. America perfected the cake,
Speaker 3: and it went back out to the world. That's right,
Speaker 3: that's what happened.
Speaker 2: What else? What about sled chase?
Speaker 3: It's great too. Three kinds of milk, evaporated, condensed, and
Speaker 3: a whole. It's tough to go wrong with that.
Speaker 2: Yeah, talk about moist.
Speaker 3: And I've like, I've had good and bad trace lay chase,
Speaker 3: but I've never had an actual trace lay chase. I
Speaker 3: was like, this is so bad, I'm not gonna finish.
Speaker 2: It, right, have you no?
Speaker 3: And then there's doda yaki, which is like have you
Speaker 3: ever had this?
Speaker 2: I don't think so.
Speaker 3: One of the big things that people in Japan love
Speaker 3: is like sweetened red bean paste. Okay, you can find
Speaker 3: it here there in like sweets, but this dori yaky
Speaker 3: in particular, is like between two pancakes. It's like a filling.
Speaker 3: Sometimes it's not even two pancakes. It's like a hole
Speaker 3: with like a red bean paste inside. It's like this light,
Speaker 3: kind of fluffy cake like thing with red bean paste inside.
Speaker 3: It's good. You can their best like hot off of
Speaker 3: the street from somebody who just made it. That's when
Speaker 3: it's absolutely best. But it's like kind of thing you
Speaker 3: can also find in a seven to eleven or something too,
Speaker 3: like in cellophane.
Speaker 2: Wow.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's good. It's no cheesecake, no Japanese cheesecake, I'll
Speaker 3: tell you that.
Speaker 2: Nope, but it's still pretty good. Man. That was a
Speaker 2: good one. I think cakes.
Speaker 3: All right, are you done?
Speaker 2: I'm done?
Speaker 3: Okay. If you want to know more about cakes, go
Speaker 3: eat some. You're gonna love them. Yeah, there's a cake
Speaker 3: out there for you. And since I said that, it's
Speaker 3: time for listener mate.
Speaker 1: All right, I'm gonna call this a special one man
Speaker 1: administrative details shout.
Speaker 2: Oh wow, because we got.
Speaker 1: A box today from a man named Nick Pegan from.
Speaker 2: San Jose Bay area, and he sent us just a
Speaker 2: blotted stuff, like good stuff. It wasn't a box full
Speaker 2: of garbage he sent.
Speaker 3: He said that anyone ever has sent us a box
Speaker 3: full of garbage.
Speaker 2: He sent us.
Speaker 1: Framed things, sent me a framed pavement poster, which is great,
Speaker 1: and sent us CDs of music. He sent bottles of
Speaker 1: liquid stuff, most notably wine for Jerry, and then bourbon
Speaker 1: and Scotch for us.
Speaker 2: And he is a whiskey.
Speaker 1: Enthusiast that lives in the Bay Area, like big time,
Speaker 1: and just a good dude. And beyond that, he added this,
Speaker 1: he added he's a list maker, an amateur list maker,
Speaker 1: and he sent us a list, and Nick, if you're listening,
Speaker 1: please send us the word document digital version of this
Speaker 1: print out that you sent. Because he said every time
Speaker 1: he said we should do a podcast on that, he
Speaker 1: made a list alphabetically of that stuff. Nice work, Nick,
Speaker 1: and the list is so comprehensive and awesome that we
Speaker 1: need it to work from.
Speaker 2: Yes, he made a list of films that.
Speaker 1: Each of us said we need to see, which is
Speaker 1: pretty good. And then finally he sent us a list
Speaker 1: and encourage us to play a little game here, which
Speaker 1: we'll do very quickly. See if Chuck can see, if
Speaker 1: Josh can guess how many times we've done the following things?
Speaker 2: Are you ready?
Speaker 3: Why me?
Speaker 2: Well, because I have the list in my hand and
Speaker 2: you're sitting across from me, and you can't see this paper,
Speaker 2: I don't think so.
Speaker 1: How many coas? And for people that don't know it
Speaker 1: means cover our butts? How many coas have we issued
Speaker 1: over one thousand shows?
Speaker 3: I'm going to say twenty.
Speaker 2: Seven seventy five?
Speaker 3: Wow, Wow, we are really good at that. Huh.
Speaker 1: How many times have we admitted on the air that
Speaker 1: it is a take two.
Speaker 2: Yeah, you're not gonna get anything, or maybe you might.
Speaker 3: It will be total luck if I do eight seven?
Speaker 2: Oh so close rare listener mail shout.
Speaker 3: Outs, Oh, I don't know what that means.
Speaker 1: Like where we say, hey, can you say hello to
Speaker 1: my boyfriend?
Speaker 2: Oh?
Speaker 3: Yeah? Three?
Speaker 2: No, sixty two? What that's pretty rare tho out of
Speaker 2: a thousand?
Speaker 3: Yeah, but still it seems like I thought it was
Speaker 3: even rareer than that did. We used to do it
Speaker 3: more than we do now, I think so.
Speaker 2: I think that's what it was.
Speaker 1: Was a little more generous in Earth Takes. Yeah, trips
Speaker 1: in the Wayback Machine.
Speaker 3: Oh, there's a lot of those. I'm gonna say. Out
Speaker 3: of a thousand episodes.
Speaker 2: Three hundred and twenty, he says, fifty nine. So I
Speaker 2: don't know about this, Nick.
Speaker 3: I think you missed a few. Nick. You're just making
Speaker 3: up numbers, aren't you. How many can scotch at home
Speaker 3: and making up numbers?
Speaker 2: How many paper lists have you eaten? Me?
Speaker 3: Yeah? One that I know of.
Speaker 2: Yep, you nailed it.
Speaker 3: I remember the episode too. It was how geniuses work?
Speaker 3: Or what makes a genius?
Speaker 2: Huh?
Speaker 3: And I said that if this list, if the list
Speaker 3: of geniuses. If the number one genius was Einstein, I
Speaker 3: would eat the list it turned out it was Einstein.
Speaker 2: How many Glenn Danzig or Misfits references?
Speaker 3: Those would be all you seventeen four? You need to
Speaker 3: step it up.
Speaker 2: How many times has Chuck was? How many times have
Speaker 2: I done this? Wow?
Speaker 3: I think it's literally countless. If he came up with
Speaker 3: a number, it's a lie.
Speaker 2: He says, two hundred and eighty eight.
Speaker 3: That's gotta be more than.
Speaker 1: That Simpsons references. I'll just go ahead and tell you
Speaker 1: one hundred and ninety seven. Apparently we have High Does.
Speaker 3: That include the two episodes on The Simpsons?
Speaker 2: No? No, no, thinks okay, apparently we have High five once. Okay,
Speaker 2: I'm surprised we even did that.
Speaker 1: Sure a number of times Josh has done this a lot?
Speaker 3: I don't know. I think a lot just works for that.
Speaker 1: Four hundred and twenty six times almost half our episodes.
Speaker 2: It's great. Yeah, and then bonus, name all of Josh's
Speaker 2: nicknames for Chuck. I'll just go ahead and read those.
Speaker 1: You have called me chuckers, you've called me beautiful, don't
Speaker 1: remember that one? The famous Chuck tran cheech, Rusty Zonkers
Speaker 1: and the Flash. Nick is my new favorite listener. This
Speaker 1: is all gold plus.
Speaker 3: Thanks for buttering us up with the care package too, Nick.
Speaker 3: That was nice of you.
Speaker 1: Yeah so, Nick Pagan, you are now on the guest
Speaker 1: list for the San Francisco Sketch Fest show. Just hit
Speaker 1: me up with an email, send that list of shows
Speaker 1: that we need to do via digital document and you
Speaker 1: are in, Like Flynn.
Speaker 2: Cool.
Speaker 3: Thanks a lot, Nick, Well, if you want to be
Speaker 3: like Nick, you can send us an email. The Stuff
Speaker 3: podcast at Houstuffworks dot com and as always, joined us
Speaker 3: at our home on the web, stuff Youshould Know dot com.
Speaker 2: Stuff You Should Know is a production of iHeartRadio. For
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