St Louis Gooey Butter Cake by Wayne Williams

By Wayne Williams

Proverbs 24, verses 13-14- ¹³ My child, eat honey, for it is good, and the drippings of the honeycomb are sweet to your taste. ¹⁴ Know that wisdom is such to your soul; if you find it, you will find a future, and your hope will not be cut off.

Appreciating what God has provided in this life is not a sin. This verse and the one which follows combine to link appreciation of something physical with the need to appreciate something spiritual. Honey, itself, is a “good thing.” It is appropriate to take pleasure in properly experiencing something the way God intended. The following verse connects this value and appreciation to wisdom: a person ought to value godly truth with at least as much pleasure as they do delicious foods.

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St. Louis Gooey Butter Cake

This morning “coffee cake” (or mealtime dessert) features a slightly dry base that is more than compensated for by the deliciously gooey topping. It is a St. Louis specialty that other parts of the world seem not to have heard of or enjoyed. This is difficult for generations of St. Louisans to believe. Gooey butter cakes are available daily at most St. Louis bakeries and supermarkets, but homemade from scratch is hard to beat. Here’s how to make your own.

Note: St. Louis Gooey Butter Cakes keep for quite a while if wrapped tightly in plastic wrap or placed in an air-tight container before freezing. I recommend pre-slicing before freezing which helps to remove only the desired amount when ready to eat. They warm well – and are so yummy – with a short burst in the microwave.

Yield: 2, 4, 6, or 8 gooey butter cakes – see ingredient tables below

Time: about 3 hours for 2 and about 4 hours for 8 gooey butter cakes

Ingredients for sweet dough:

2 gooey butter cakes	4 gooey butter cakes	6 gooey butter cakes	8 gooey butter cakes	Ingredient
¼ cup	½ cup	¾ cup	1 cup	granulated sugar
¼ cup	½ cup	¾ cup	1 cup	hydrogenated vegetable shortening
¼ teaspoon	½ teaspoon	¾ teaspoon	1 teaspoon	salt
1	2	3	4	egg(s)
1 cake	2 cakes	3 cakes	4 cakes	1 cake = 0.6 oz. compressed yeast (found in supermarket dairy section)
½ cup	1 cup	1 ½ cups	2 cups	warm milk (either dairy or plant-based such as almond milk)
2 ½ cups	5 cups	7 ½ cups	10 cups	all-purpose flour
1 tablespoon	2 tablespoons	3 tablespoons	4 tablespoons	vanilla

Prepare sweet dough:

• Mix sugar with shortening and salt in a suitably sized bowl (based on number of cakes desired: 2/4/6/8 – and see Note below)
• Add egg and beat with electric mixer for 1 minute until well blended
• Crumble and stir to dissolve yeast in warm milk
• Add flour, the yeast-milk mixture, and vanilla
• Mix 3 minutes with dough hooks (or if no mixer with dough hooks used, stir thoroughly by hand)
• Turn dough out on clean floured surface and knead for 1 minute
• Place dough in lightly greased, suitably sized bowl, cover with a towel or waxed paper, and set in a warm place to rise for 1 hour (Note: dough roughly doubles in size after rising)

Ingredients for gooey butter filling:

2 gooey butter cakes	4 gooey butter cakes	6 gooey butter cakes	8 gooey butter cakes	Ingredient
2 ½ cups	5 cups	7 ½ cups	10 cups	granulated sugar
1 cup	2 cups	3 cups	4 cups	butter, softened
1 dash	2 dashes	3 dashes	4 dashes	salt
1	2	3	4	egg(s)
1/3 cup	2/3 cup	1 cup	1 1/3 cups	white corn syrup
2 ¼ cups	4 ½ cups	6 ¾ cup	9 cups	all-purpose flour
¼ cup	½ cup	¾ cup	1 cup	water
1 tablespoon	2 tablespoons	3 tablespoons	4 tablespoons	vanilla
sprinkling after baking	sprinkling after baking	sprinkling after baking	sprinkling after baking	confectioner’s sugar

Prepare gooey butter filling:

• In suitably sized bowl (based on number of desired cakes: 2/4/6/8), combine sugar, butter, and salt until mixture is smooth
• Add egg and corn syrup
• Mix enough to incorporate
• Add flour, water, and vanilla and stir until creamy (if needed, add small amounts/drops of water while mixing until filling is creamy)

Line pans with dough:

• Knead / punch down to deflate raised dough (approximately size prior to being raised)
• Divide raised dough into equal (2, 4, 6, or 8) parts
• Place into (2, 4, 6, or 8) well-greased 9” x 9” x 2” pans
• Spread dough evenly into bottom of pans and crimp edges halfway up sides of pan so gooey butter will not run out underneath
• After dough is spread out, punch holes into dough (both bottom and sides) with a fork to keep dough from bubbling when baking

Add gooey butter filling atop dough:

• Pre-heat oven to 375° F
• Divide gooey butter into equal parts (2, 4, 6, or 8)
• Spread and level over dough in each pan
• Let cakes stand for 20 minutes before baking
• Then bake in oven for 30 minutes (recommend 2 cakes at a time either on same or different shelves unless you have a very large oven)
• DO NOT OVER BAKE!! The batter will not be gooey if cakes are over baked. ☹
• After removal from oven allow cakes to cool, and then sprinkle tops with confectioner’s sugar.

(I often remove mine a bit early from the oven before the dough becomes too dark.)

Submitted by: Wayne and Linda Williams