Texas · Dessert
Texas Sheet Cake
- Intermediate
- 60 min
- roughly 2 of 4 for cost
- Vegetarian
Leads with richness that coats and comforts, a floral thread lifting the aroma.
Ingredients
- FOR THE CAKE
- 250g flour
- 400g sugar
- 1 tsp baking soda
- 1/2 tsp salt
- 225g butter
- 60g cocoa
- 250ml water
- 2 eggs
- 120ml buttermilk
- 1 tsp vanilla
- FOR THE ICING
- 115g butter
- 60g cocoa
- 6 tbsp milk
- 400g icing sugar
- 1 tsp vanilla
- 100g pecans, chopped
Equipment
Sheet pan
The skills inside
Allergen screen
Found: gluten · dairy · egg · nuts
Screened for: gluten, dairy, egg, nuts, peanuts, fish, shellfish, molluscs, soy, sesame, celery, mustard, lupin, alcohol. Not screened: sulphites.
Screened by keyword from the ingredient list, not reviewed by a person; check every label for what the list cannot show.
Method
- Whisk the flour, sugar, soda, and salt.
- Boil the butter, cocoa, and water, then pour over the dry ingredients and mix. Beat in the eggs, buttermilk, and vanilla.
- Pour into a large sheet pan and bake at 175C for 20 min. 20 min
- For the icing, boil the butter, cocoa, and milk, then beat in the icing sugar, vanilla, and pecans.
- Pour the warm icing over the warm cake and let it set.
How to tell it is going right
This dish has no standard of its own yet. It is judged on the technique it exercises: checked at the pan, while there is still something to be done about it.
Icing & frosting 17 recipes
- The temperatures were chosen, not defaulted: the bake fully cool where the finish is meant to sit on top of it, or both deliberately warm where the method wants the two to fuse, and the proof either way is a finish that stayed where it was put.
- Smooth on the tongue: no grit of undissolved sugar and no lumps of anything that was never fully worked in.
- The consistency matches the job: it spreads or pours the way the method intends, then holds the edge, swirl, or drip it was given.
- The surface underneath is intact: covered rather than scrubbed, with no crumbs dragged through the finish and no torn patches showing.
- By serving it has settled into the finish the method wants (matte, glossy, or soft) and a cut comes away clean rather than pulling the top off with it.
Where it goes wrong A finish meant to sit on top went on while the bake was still warm. The layer that touched first melted, slid, and soaked in; what is left sets greasy and streaked, and no amount of chilling afterwards puts that finish back.
At the Table
- The Pour
- Banyuls or Ruby Port
- Also Right
- PX Sherry
- From the Taps
- Imperial stout
- Zero-Proof
- Espresso
Chocolate wants fortified sweetness or roast-bitter contrast: the wine must out-sweet the plate, or oppose it entirely.
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