Bake yourself a ‘Sock It To Me Cake’

One of life’s great little pleasures is a big ol’ slice of “Sock It To Me Cake,” a Southern delicacy.

Jocelyn Delk Adams got the original Bundt cake recipe from her grandmother, Maggie Mae Small of Winona, Miss. Affectionately known as “Big Mama,” Maggie Mae called her precious little Joceyln “Grandbaby Cakes,” as the story goes.

 

About 5,000 people live in Winona, located off Interstate 55 near “middle Mississippi.” The town is about midway between Memphis, Tenn., and Jackson, Miss. Traveling south, if you get to Possumneck, you’ve gone a tad too far.

“Big Mama always baked a gorgeous centerpiece cake – no matter the occasion,” Adams said. She used Winona tree-picked fruit, eggs from Winona farm-raised chickens and fresh-churned butter, thanks to Big Mama’s Winona-based cow, Betsy.”

“Watching Big Mama make these recipes – and learning how to make them myself – taught me so many lessons about baking and life,” Adams said.

 

“I learned forgiveness, because things don’t always turn out perfectly. I picked up patience, which is especially necessary when baking cakes. I also learned a lot from Big Mama’s baking intuition. Her instincts were always spot on. She never required a timer; just a whiff of a cake’s fragrance in the air was enough for her to know it was ready.”

Adams, who lives in Chicago, now uses “Grandbaby Cakes” as her brand for kitchen creations and has written a cookbook with that title.

“I didn’t realize I had the ‘baking gene,’ as my family calls it, until my 20s.” Now in her early 40s, she says: “I can’t stop baking! In my kitchen, I sing, I dance and I eat my way through so that each moment of the day is truly a moment for myself.”

“This Southern ‘Sock It To Me Cake’ recipe pairs a moist and buttery cake texture with a cinnamon-brown sugar-pecan swirl that is to die for! The vanilla glaze brings it all together perfectly. If you love buttery flavorful cakes, you will love this one even more. Simple, decadent and downright irresistible!”

“This retro cake was very popular in the 1970s, especially in the South, because of its funky name,” Adams said.

Indeed, “Sock it to me” was popularized first within the music industry, as background vocalist repeated the phrased hurriedly during Aretha Franklin’s 1967 recording of the Otis Redding song “Respect.”

 

“In 1968, after hearing Franklin’s ‘Respect’ on the car radio, television producer George Schlatter was convinced by his wife to use ‘sock it to me’ in his new, hip comedy show ‘Rowan & Martin’s Laugh-In.’” wrote Tom Maxwell of New Bern, N.C., a contributor to the Daily Meal.

“The phrase was made famous by its star Judy Carne, who would utter it before enduring some visual calamity, like being dunked in water or falling through a trapdoor,” Maxwell said.

 

About the same time, Mitch Ryder and the Detroit Wheels sang a whole rowdy song about “Sock It to Me-Baby,” one that created quite a stir, causing the tune to be banned by a number of radio stations.

 

Back to her cake, Adams said, “Housewives everywhere loved this cake because it was a simple recipe, convenient and delicious. It’s sweet, nutty, light and full of spice. Absolutely perfect.”

“Start with a golden, buttery yellow cake mix. You will also need sour cream, vegetable oil, white sugar, eggs, a little water, pecans, brown sugar, cinnamon and nutmeg. Use milk and confectioners’ sugar for the glaze.”

Sock it to the calories and fat and boost the protein by using yogurt in place of sour cream.