Appalachian Stack Cake
Wednesday, February 10, 2010 at 11:14PM 
Apple Stack Cake. Click on image for source and licensing information.One sure sign of a genuine specimen of folk cuisine is an abundance of old family recipes which are generally similar but differ in details. Stack Cake is the real thing -- you can collect as many "authentic" recipes for stack cake as you would like.
Stack Cake is made of 6 to 8 layers of cake with an apple-based filling between the layers. A common apocryphal story is that it originated as poor-folks' wedding cake, with several guests each contributing a layer. Another story holds that it was brought to Kentucky in 1774 by pioneer James Harrod; but this seems unlikely, since Stack Cake did not become known until a century later.
The emergence of Stack Cake in the second half of the 19th century seems to have followed the widespread availability of two of its important ingredients -- refined wheat flour and sorghum molasses. Along with the use of sorghum molasses in the cake, the use of dried apples to make the filling is consistent with an origin, if not in Kentucky, at least somewhere in Southern Appalachia. The ingredient list also is consistent with numerous family traditions holding that Stack Cake was made at Christmas -- a season when Backcountry families would have had plenty of flour, sorghum molasses, and dried apples, and the time to make Stack Cake, which takes some doin'.
How can you recognize one of the "genuine" Appalachian Stack Cake recipes? I suggest that the ingredients should include sorghum molasses, shortening (Crisco or lard), buttermilk, and dried apples, and should exclude anything which would not have been available in Appalachia in the late 19th century.
When you're ready to make stack cake, here are some recipes for starters:
Appalachian History, Stack Cake
Appalachian Heritage, Dried Apple Stack Cake
About.com: Southern Food, Tennessee Apple Stack Cake
Uncle Phaedrus, Kentucky Stack Cake
Cooks.com, Dried Apple Stack Cake
Suite101, Apple Butter Stack Cake
stack_cake in apples, cakes, sorghum molasses 
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Reader Comments (3)
I'll take a piece please- looks great.
i might have to try this when I have some folks to help eat it.
NEVER HEARD OF DRIED APPLE CAKE, BUT THE FAVORITE DESSERT OF MY CHILDHOOD WAS FRIED APPLE PIES. THEY WERE MADE WITH STEWED DRIED APPLE FILLING AND CAME OUT OF A SKILLET PIPING HOT. A GOOD VARIATION WAS MADE WITH DRIED PEACHES OR SWEET POTATO PIE FILLING.
WISH I HAD ONE NOW.
I NEVER HEARD OF DRIED APPLE CAKE, BUT THE FAVORITE DESSERT OF MY CHILDHOOD WAS FRIED APPLE PIES, HOT OFF THE SKILLET. A GOOD VARIATION WAS MADE WITH DRIED PEACHES OR SWEET POTATO PIE FILLING. WALKING HOME FROM SCHOOL ON A COLD WINTER DAY, WE COULD SMELL THE AROMA BY THE TIME WE GOT TO THE FIRST OAK TREE OFF THE ALLEY. WISH I HAD ONE NOW.