In Episode 424 Jeff Belanger and Ray Auger head to Hartford, Connecticut, for their Thanksgiving dessert. Hartford Election Cake is a massive confection that dates back to 1796 when America was holding its first contested presidential election. Voting used to be a big event with parties and banquets and a HUGE cake as a reward. The people of Hartford made an 80-pound cake following the recipe of Amelia Simmons. Over time, election day became less of an event, but Thanksgiving got bigger. So the people of Connecticut moved their favorite cake over to Thanksgiving. Enjoy!
Smaller Election Cake recipe: https://www.tastinghistory.com/recipes/electioncake
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CREDITS:
Produced and hosted by: Jeff Belanger and Ray Auger
Edited by: Ray Auger
Voice Actor: Lisa Strykowski
Theme Music by: John Judd
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EPISODE TRANSCRIPT:
*A note on the text: Please forgive punctuation, spelling, and grammar mistakes. Like us, the transcripts ain’t perfect.
[LIGHT MURMER OF PEOPLE IN THE BACKGROUND]
JEFF: Ray, that was delicious!
RAY: Jeff, I look forward to Thanksgiving dinner all year. The turkey, the stuffing, the mashed potatoes, cranberry sauce. I can’t get enough!
JEFF: I purposely have almost nothing for breakfast each Thanksgiving morning.
RAY: Me too. It’s such a great feast with family and friends.
JEFF: As full as we are, you think we should move on to dessert?
RAY: Absolutely!
JEFF: Then hop in the car, Ray, and call all of your friends to join us. We’re heading to Connecticut to eat an eighty-pound dessert called Hartford Election Cake.
[CAR DOORS SHUT]
[CAR SPEEDS OFF]
[INTRO]
JEFF: I’m Jeff Belanger and welcome to Episode 424 – our Thanksgiving special.
RAY: And I’m Ray Auger. Happy Thanksgiving all of you legendarians!
JEFF: We released this episode early so you can listen to it as you drive to grandmother’s house for your own holiday feast.
RAY: We’re thankful that you’re riding along with us. This podcast is part of a large community of legend seekers who are always looking for the weird and unusual in New England. We can’t do what we do without you! So please be sure to subscribe to our podcast wherever you get your podcasts. It’s free, and then you won’t miss a thing. We’d also be grateful if you’d tell your friends about our show and post a review for us.
JEFF: We’ll go looking for Hartford Election Cake right after this word from our sponsor.
SPONSOR
[DRIVING IN CAR]
RAY: Okay, Jeff. We’re heading to Hartford, Connecticut, to eat an 80-pound cake?
JEFF: We are! To be fair, we’re not expected to eat it all ourselves. There’s plenty for everyone. AND… for those of you who live too far away to join us, we’ll be sure to share the recipe so you can make it yourself. Stay tuned for that. (BEAT) Okay, Ray, make a right up here on Central Row.
[BLINKAH]
RAY: Okay.
JEFF: And park anywhere here in front of the old State House.
RAY: Got it.
[CAR STOPS]
[DOORS OPEN/CLOSE]
RAY: The Old Connecticut State House is a gorgeous building here in downtown Hartford.
JEFF: It is! This historic building was home to all three branches of Connecticut government from 1796 until 1878.
RAY: It’s a three-story building made of brownstone and brick. On top is a white cupola that was added in 1827. On top of the cupola is a golden statue of justice.
JEFF: Though it’s not used for state business anymore, it’s now a museum and national landmark. But it’s the perfect place to have our Thanksgiving Hartford Election Cake dessert.
RAY: If it’s Thanksgiving, why are we eating Election cake? I mean, election day is in early November. And what IS election cake?
JEFF: Election cake is half cake, half bread – which basically means it has yeast in it, and you need to let it rise before baking. It’s loaded with fruits, spices, and booze too. To figure out how an election day tradition became a Thanksgiving tradition, let’s head back to the year 1796.
[TRANSITION]
RAY: It’s November of 1796. It’s a big year for American politics. This month marks the very first contested presidential election. Incumbent vice president John Adams of the Federalist party is running against the former secretary of state Thomas Jefferson of the Democratic-Republican party.
JEFF: Voting will be held from November 4th to December 7th, so people have about a month to cast their ballot. This is a very big deal! For most people, this is the first time in their lives that they get to use their voice and vote for leadership. So many people have lived under a king for most of their lives. It’s a time to celebrate!
[CROWD NOISE BUILDING]
RAY: Here in Hartford, folks are gathering to vote. And to lure Connecticut residents to the city, Hartford is throwing massive balls, galas, and banquets. The atmosphere is festive! It’s like a big party all over the city. People feel so empowered to be coming to the state capital to cast their vote.
JEFF: Since voting doesn’t take very long to do, people want to stay and be part of the big parties. Bashes and banquets are happening all over town. The main event of the feasting is a massive cake. Election Cake, they call it. They’ve followed the recipe of Amelia Simmons.
RAY: Earlier this year, Amelia Simmons published her book: American Cookery. Published by Hudson and Goodwin based right here in Hartford. This is the first cookbook authored by a European American to be published in the United States.
JEFF: We don’t know a lot about Amelia Simmons. She was an orphan, a modest woman. But her cookbook is considered ground-breaking. British cookbooks fail to understand the differences in culture, styles, and ingredients in America. Plus, Simmons wrote recipes for tight budgets as well as big budgets. There’s really something for everyone in her book. Meats, fish, poultry, vegetables, puffs, pies, pudding, custards, preserves, and all kinds of cakes.
RAY: In honor of America’s first election, Simmons introduced Hartford and then the world to election cake. A confection sweet enough, big enough, and bold enough to fit the occasion. Making this cake is a BIG undertaking. Here’s Amelia Simmons original recipe.
AMELIA: Election cake.
Thirty quarts flour, ten pounds butter, fourteen pounds sugar, twelve pounds raisins, three dozen eggs, one pint wine, one quart brandy, four ounces cinnamon, four ounces fine colander seed, three ounces ground allspice; wet the flour with the milk to the consistency of bread over night, adding one quart yeast, the next morning work the butter and sugar together for half an hour, which will render the cake much lighter and whiter; when it has risen light, work in every other ingredient except the plumbs, which work in when going into the oven. Amelia Simmons
JEFF: Soooooo Hartford Election Cake has over 50 pounds of ingredients.
RAY: That’s a lot of cake.
JEFF: A lot of cake. Ahhhh here it comes.
[LOUD THUD]
JEFF: A lot of cake.
RAY: A LOT of cake.
JEFF: Let’s dig in.
RAY: Okay… here’s a piece for you… And here’s a piece for me.
JEFF: Happy Election, Ray! This is a sweet reward for doing our civic duty.
RAY: To you too, Jeff!
JEFF: Mmmm. There’s a lot of flavors going on here.
RAY: It’s spicy. I can taste a bit of the bite from the booze. Lot’s of fruit too.
JEFF: Yeah, tons of raisins. Kind of like a spicy raisin bread meets a cake.
RAY: It’s different than what I’m used to. But I like it!
JEFF: There’s definitely going to be leftovers.
RAY: Definitely.
JEFF: So seven years ago, President George Washington decreed that Thursday, November 26th, 1789 would be a national day of Thanksgiving for the new nation. That quickly turned into an annual celebration for most states.
RAY: And it falls in the middle of election season.
JEFF: It does! So I guess we’ll have some leftover Election Cake for Thanksgiving too.
RAY: Hartford Election Cake becomes as much a part of voting as… well… voting. It’s something people look forward to every year. Thanks to Simmons’s cookbook, the recipe spreads to other states as well. And that brings us back to today.
[TRANSITION]
RAY: So besides having leftovers around, how did Hartford Election Cake get connected to Thanksgiving?
JEFF: In 1844, the Morse electric telegraph was taking the nation by storm. Now you could send messages across state lines instantaneously. Congress was concerned that voting information from one state could influence another. So in 1845, Congress mandated that the first Tuesday after the first Monday in November would be election day. And instead of 34 days to vote, American voters would now have one week. Plus, after decades of elections, voting just didn’t seem to have the same appeal as it used to. It was commonplace. The parties got smaller and smaller until people didn’t think the day was all that significant anymore.
RAY: That’s a shame. But you’re right. Once a couple of generations had grown up knowing they could always vote, it doesn’t seem as special.
JEFF: As technology advanced, the time to vote grew more narrow for Americans. Election Day just wasn’t a big thing anymore. But Thanksgiving was getting bigger and bigger as a national day of feasting and being thankful, no matter your race, religion, color, or creed.
RAY: And folks in Connecticut didn’t want to give up their Election Cake.
JEFF: No they did not.
RAY: So they moved that special cake to Thanksgiving.
JEFF: Exactly. It wasn’t a stretch of the imagination considering they were already eating this special cake in November. So though it’s called Election Cake, it’s arguably spent more time being a Thanksgiving dessert at this point. The thing about holiday traditions is that they all had to start somewhere. And you’re allowed to introduce new traditions, or bring back old ones anytime you like. No matter what foods you include today, please know Ray and I are thankful to have you riding along with us. Happy Thanksgiving!
RAY: Happy Thanksgiving!
[OUTTRO]
RAY: And that takes us to After the Legend where we let this week’s story cook a little longer, and sometimes we get distracted.
JEFF: After the Legend is brought to you by our patreon patrons! We are most grateful to our patreon patrons who fund this podcast. They help us with our hosting and production costs, marketing, travel, and all of the other expenses it takes to bring you two podcasts each week. We’d love to have more of you join us on our special patreon page where you’ll get early ad-free access to new episodes plus bonus episodes and content that no one else gets to hear. Just head over to patreon.com/newenglandlegends to sign up.
To see some pictures related to this week’s story AND to get a link to a scaled down version of the Hartford Election Cake recipe so you don’t have to cook 80 pounds of it, click on the link in our episode description, or go to our website and click on Episode 424
Thank you, legendarians, for all of your support over the years. We appreciate every listen, email, review, and recommendation. Thank you for your story ideas, and for coming out to support everything we do. Please keep that coming throughout the holiday season and we’ll keep finding weird legends to share with you each week.
We’d like to thank Lisa Strykowski for lending her voice acting talent this week. You can find Lisa on a new horror-hosted comedy show called Professor Manslaughter and Friends. You can find it on YouTube. We’d like to than our patreon patrons, thank you to our sponsors, and our theme music is by John Judd.
Until next time… stay legendary