National Devil’s Food Cake Day
National Devil's Food Cake Day on May 19 honors America's richest, darkest, and most defiantly named chocolate cake — a scarlet-brown layer cake so deep in cocoa it earned a name meant to provoke the angel food cake crowd. Developed in American kitchens around 1900, popularized nationwide by the 1930s, and still the benchmark for serious American chocolate cake.
Why it matters
DEVILISHLY GOOD!
It’s National Devil’s Food Cake Day. On May 19, America honors the darkest, richest, most defiantly named chocolate cake — a layer cake so deep in cocoa it earned its name to provoke the pale angel food cake crowd. A true American baking heirloom.
THE STORY
By the 1890s, American cooks had a problem. Angel food cake — the Pennsylvania Dutch invention made of beaten egg whites, sugar, and flour, baked in a tube pan to heavenly snowy heights — had become the middle-class American birthday cake. It was white. It was light. It was, according to one recipe from 1884, ‘angelic.’ Cooks with a taste for chocolate responded with a deliberate counter-cake: darker, denser, richer, and named to provoke. Devil’s food cake.
The first recorded American recipe appeared in 1902 in ‘Mrs. Rorer’s New Cook Book’ by Sarah Tyson Rorer, one of the most influential American cookbook writers of the era. By 1905, devil’s food cake was a nationwide fixture. The defining characteristic was a chemical quirk: unsweetened cocoa powder (acidic) reacted with baking soda (basic) to produce a distinctive reddish-brown color and an exceptionally tender crumb. The color was often described in period cookbooks as ‘reddish’ or ‘ruddy.’
Which brings us to red velvet. Before the 1940s, the cake modern Americans call “red velvet” was just a well-made devil’s food cake — its color came from the natural cocoa-soda reaction. Food coloring was not yet standard. When supermarket food dye became cheap in the 1940s (and cocoa processing techniques shifted to more neutral-colored Dutch-processed cocoa), recipes started adding red food coloring to preserve the “red velvet” look. Modern red velvet cake is thus a direct descendant of early American devil’s food cake — dye-assisted.
Devil’s food cake became the quintessential American birthday-party chocolate cake by the 1930s — stamped into the national consciousness by Duncan Hines (who published a best-selling cake mix in 1951), Betty Crocker, and Pillsbury, all of whom sold boxed ‘Devil’s Food Cake’ mixes as their flagship chocolate cakes. The boxed version democratized it; the scratch version survived in serious home kitchens. Either way, it has been the American chocolate-cake benchmark for 125 years and counting.
Cakes have gotten a bad rap. People equate virtue with turning down dessert.
KEYS TO A PERFECT DEVIL’S FOOD CAKE
Four technical details that separate scratch from box:
Use Natural Cocoa (Not Dutch)
For the classic reddish-brown color, use NATURAL unsweetened cocoa — Hershey’s, Ghirardelli’s natural, Scharffen Berger. Dutch-processed cocoa is alkalized; it does not react with baking soda for the color.
Bloom the Cocoa
Whisk the cocoa powder with boiling water or hot coffee before adding. This unlocks deeper chocolate flavor than adding dry cocoa to batter. A pro-level move.
Add Hot Coffee
Replace water with hot brewed coffee in the batter. Coffee doesn’t make the cake taste like coffee — it deepens the chocolate flavor dramatically. Non-negotiable for serious bakers.
Use Buttermilk or Sour Cream
The acid in buttermilk or sour cream activates baking soda and produces the signature tender crumb. Regular milk is a poor substitute.
AMERICAN CHOCOLATE CAKE TRADITIONS
Six chocolate-cake traditions in American regional cooking:
DID YOU KNOW?!
The name is 100% marketing genius.
‘Devil’s food’ vs. ‘angel food’ is pure marketing strategy — provoking, evocative, and implicitly sinful. Likely coined in a cookbook or recipe column in the 1890s-1900s (exact attribution disputed). One of the greatest American cake names in history.
Duncan Hines’ best-seller was Devil’s Food Mix.
When Nebraska Consolidated Mills launched Duncan Hines Devil’s Food cake mix in 1951, it outsold Duncan Hines’ other flagship cake mixes (yellow and white) within 12 months. The box has changed logos dozens of times but has been continuously sold for 75 years.
German chocolate cake is not German.
‘German chocolate cake’ (not devil’s food, but related) was named after Samuel GERMAN, an Englishman who developed a baking chocolate for Baker’s Chocolate Company in 1852. The cake was first published in 1957 in a Dallas newspaper. An American invention with a misleading name.
The 2023 Presidential Cake Contest put devil’s food in the White House.
At Joe Biden’s 2023 state dinner for the Kenyan President, pastry chef Susie Morrison served a riff on American devil’s food cake with Kenyan cocoa beans. One of several official White House endorsements of America’s classic chocolate cake over the decades.
BAKE & READ
The Cake Bible
Rose Levy Beranbaum · 1988 (30th anniv. ed. 2018)
The definitive American cake-baking book. Beranbaum’s devil’s food cake recipe (‘All-American Chocolate Butter Cake’) is rigorously tested and exceptionally good. Winner of multiple James Beard awards. The textbook on American cake.
BraveTart: Iconic American Desserts
Stella Parks · 2017
Parks, a Serious Eats pastry editor, researches American dessert history in depth and publishes meticulously tested recipes. Her devil’s food cake (and her exceptional essay on the chocolate-cake-vs-red-velvet question) is unmatched. James Beard Book of the Year.
Baking with Dorie
Dorie Greenspan · 2021
Greenspan’s clear, forgiving recipes are perfect for intermediate home bakers. Her chocolate cake chapter includes a devil’s food layer cake that has become a contemporary standard. Beautifully photographed.
PAIR IT WITH
Cold whole milk. The universal devil’s-food-cake pairing. Never out of fashion.
A dark roast, freshly brewed. The chocolate-coffee combination is one of the great complementary pairings in American baking.
A small pour of Ruby or Tawny port. Elevated evening pairing for adults; the wine’s sweetness matches the cake’s richness.
‘The Great British Bake Off’ (any season) — the cake episodes. American equivalent: ‘Zumbo’s Just Desserts.’ Baking shows + chocolate cake = perfect combination.
Slice It. Love It.
Tag us @celebrationnation with #DevilsFoodCakeDay. Scratch-baked or box-mix — show us your cake. We accept every version.
How to celebrate
Bake the richest cake in America:
- 🎂 Bake from scratch. Two 9-inch rounds, rich cocoa batter, chocolate buttercream or ganache. 90 minutes. Exponentially better than a box.
- 🍫 Splurge on good cocoa. Valrhona, Guittard, or Callebaut Dutch-processed cocoa makes a dramatic difference. $15 for a can; lasts months.
- 📚 Use a trusted recipe. Rose Levy Beranbaum, Dorie Greenspan, or Stella Parks (BraveTart) all have exceptional devil's food cake recipes.
- 🎉 Throw a chocolate tasting. Same cake, different frostings — chocolate ganache, coffee buttercream, cream cheese, caramel. Pick a favorite.
- 🥛 Pair with cold milk. Or coffee. Or a glass of port. Devil's food cake is versatile.
Celebration ideas by audience
For families
Birthday cake classic. Let the kids help layer and frost — forgiving technique; beautiful even when imperfect.
For kids
Have them crack the eggs and measure the cocoa. The chocolate batter is one of the most kid-satisfying things to make.
For couples
Small 6-inch round pan, a Friday night, two forks. Date-night perfection.
At the office
Cake for a birthday celebration at work. Devil's food cake with chocolate buttercream is a universally beloved office birthday cake.
At school
Chemistry lesson: WHY does cocoa + baking soda turn reddish-brown? A real acid-base reaction with visible color change.
In your community
Classic church-supper, potluck, or block-party dessert. Always the first cake to go.
On your own
Bake a 6-inch layer cake. Eat a slice a day for a week. Unapologetic chocolate therapy.
More to celebrate
National Brown-Bag-It Day
National Brown-Bag-It Day is a small but real reason to pause, notice, and celebrate — together if we can.