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Maybe start with a basic yellow cake and just add the amount of spice you like. Some cinnamon, nutmeg, and clove to start with.

Hello, Papillon

You may want to try Emeril Lagasse's Buttermilk Spice Cake recipe (available at foodnetwork.com). I think it may be just what you're looking for, but definitely requires a bit more effort than your grandmother's boxed spice cake. The crumb for this two-layer cake is very delicate, and the spice isn't overpowering. If you want it a bit more spicy, just increase the measures a bit. The recipe features a cream cheese frosting that complements the cake perfectly. Hope this helps!

I, too, have an old recipe that's at least 50 years old and was very popular. It was served at Stouffer's restaurants and was called Plantation Cake. Each serving gets a dab of softened cream cheese and a ladle of delicious warm lemon sauce. It's pretty involved, but well-worth it. It can be found in the Gourmets and Groundhogs cookbook. I tried to post the recipe, but deleted myself! I will repost it if you think this might fit the bill.

Check out my Plantation Cake recipe. Not heavily spiced. Has a definite twist. Here goes:

Plantation Cake

(as adapted from “Gourmets and Groundhogs” cookbook, 1968 )

Cake
½ C packed brown sugar
¼ tsp. Salt
2 C sifted all-purpose flour
½ C solid shortening (Crisco)
2/3 C molasses
2/3 C boiling water
2/3 tsp. baking soda

Combine sugar, salt, and flour. Cut in shortening until mixture resembles fine crumbs. Pack 1/3 of the mixture into a greased 9 x 13 pan.
Combine molasses, boiling water and baking soda, stirring to blend. Pour half of molasses mixture over crumb layer in pan. Then sprinkle with half of remaining crumb mixture. Pour remaining molasses mixture over second layer of crumbs. Sprinkle remaining crumb mixture over top. Bake at 350 degrees for 30 – 35 minutes. Meanwhile, prepare Topping and Lemon Sauce.

Topping
3 oz. softened cream cheese
2 tsp. milk
Blend until smooth.

Fluffy Lemon Sauce
½ C sugar
2 Tbsp. cornstarch
1/8 tsp. nutmeg
1 C boiling water
1 Tbsp. butter
4 Tbsp. fresh lemon juice
1 ½ tsp. grated lemon zest
1 egg, well-beaten

Mix together sugar, cornstarch and nutmeg in saucepan. Gradually stir in boiling water. Cook over low heat until boiling, stirring constantly. Cook one minute longer, still stirring. Remove from heat. Stir in butter, lemon juice and zest. Temper by adding a small amount of hot liquid into the bowl with the beaten egg, stirring vigorously. Return to sauce, stirring until well-blended. Yield: 2 Cups.

To Serve
Cut a square of warm cake, top with a tsp. of creamed cheese mixture, and finish with 1 ½ Tbsp. lemon sauce.

Papillon:

I've obviously deleted myself. I have several recipes I'd like to pass on and one of them might solve the mystery.

Does anyone know how to import a Microsoft Word file into the comments so that I won't delete all the info by mistake?

Papillon:

Spice Cake

2 C Sugar 1/2 C Butter
3 Eggs
1 C Cream
2 1/2 C Flour 3 tsp Baking Powder
1/2 tsp each Clove, Cinnamon and Ginger (or 1 1/2 tsp Allspice)
2/3 C currants or raisins (opt)
1/2 C walnut meats, chopped (opt)

Cream butter and sugar, add eggs, one at a time. Mix 2 cups flour, baking powder and spices, adding the cream and the flour mixture alternately, add raisins and nuts rolled in rest of flour if using.

Bake in moderate oven, 350F, in well greased pan, 8 X 8 X2 inches.

This one might work. Also there are a few white cake recipes, were it me, I might try with an addition of the spices. They are after all, all that is necessary to turn the color.

If your cake was extremely moist, it might well have been an applesauce cake.

Laurel

P.S. Good Luck!

Thanks, guys, for all of your recipes and suggestions.
Here's what I'm going to do:
I have some egg whites left over from a tart I made this weekend. I'm going to start with a basic white cake, to which I will add spices.
That will give me a starting point and then I can vary/add/subtract from there.
My goal is to have the cake recipe perfected by Thanksgiving so that I can bake it for my dad -- and everyone will rave over how much it is just like Grandmother's!

I made an applesauce spice cake over the weekend that might fit the bill.

1/2 stick of butter or margarine mixed with 1 cup of sugar using a hand blender until fluffy.

Add an egg and 1 cup of unsweetened apple sauce. Stir until combined.

Add 2 and 3/4 cups flour, 1 tsp baking soda, 1 tsp cinnamon, 1/2 tsp nutmeg, 1/4 tsp cloves, 1/2 tsp salt.

Stir.

Bake in a 9x9 pan at 350 for 45 minutes or until a toothpick inserted into the middle comes out clean.

I have been looking for a recipe that sounds exactly like the one you want. It came in a box of cake flour -- Swansdown, I think, and was called "Magic Spice Cake." I won many prizes at the Umatilla Oregon County fair with this recipe, but somehow lost it. This was when they first came up with "one bowl" cakes, and was in the forties. I was about 10, probably, when I first made it. It was a pale color, very delicate, and not overly spicy. No molasses was involved. The cake was a layer cake (3 layer, I think), and used sour milk made by putting vinegar in regular milk. I usually frosted it with seafoam frosting.

I keep hoping that someone will remember this recipe. If I remember correctly, you creamed the sugar and shortening, and you alternated the flour mixture with the milk mixture, and then I think you beat in the eggs, just a total of 2 minutes. It was a breakthrough in labor saving cake making because you used only one bowl!

Sharon Toji