7-up Cake Recipes

7-up Cake Recipes was featured on Cabaret Squidoo on Dec. 29, 2008.
 

This history of the 7-up Cake with recipes came from www.foodtimeline.org

1982
"Now here's a request that really fizzed. Sally Garber of Deerfield Beach asked our readers to come up with a recipe for 7-Up cake with pineapple frosting. We received 72 replies. Apparently, there are 3 versions of 7-Up cake: A pound cake, baked in a Bundt pan, that is made from scratch; a sheet cake made from a mix; and a 3-layer torte, also made from a mix.

The pineapple frosting also comes in many versions. Most readers who sent the pound cake recipe said they usually settled for a simple sprinkling of powdered sugar on this rich cake, or perhaps a light glaze. Those who sent the sheet cake or the 3-layer recipe tended to use a pineapple frosting, but some recipes called for a cooked frosting while others were for a buttercream type. Some recipes add chopped pecans along with the pineapple; most also added coconut. And while most recipes called for the frosting to be spread on a cooled cake, others specified that the frosting be spread while the cake was warm -- and one said you should poke holes into the warm sheet cake before pouring on a warm frosting.

It wasn't easy deciding which recipes to publish, so we decided to use the first three that we received. It is interesting to note that the recipes came from an amazing number of sources. Dev Steffen of Miami Springs sent a recipe that builds upon a cake mix, which she got from her husband's Aunt Eleanor. Marge Pruessman of Miami sent a recipe she found in a cookbook called What's Cooking Senora?, published in Venezuela. Fran Rives of Jupiter sent a similar recipe, courtesy of her sister in Oklahoma who assisted in the compiling of a cookbook by doctors' wives entitled Doctor's Orders. An anonymous reader sent a recipe for 7-Up pound cake, from a cookbook compiled by members of the Grand Court of Florida Order of the Amaranth. Connie McGee of Pembroke Pines found her recipe in What's Cooking in our National Parks. Mrs. William Randolph got hers from a cookbook published by a group from Brown's Methodist Church in Jackson, Tenn.

Why would a recipe call for 7-Up? Is it for the flavor? It would seem that the delicate flavor would be masked by all the other ingredients. Connie Bedell of Fort Lauderdale may have the answer. She sent us this quote, from a cookbook published by The Seven-Up Co. in 1957: "Make a cake with the contents of a packaged mix, using 7-Up instead of the liquid in the recipe. You'll be amazed at how light and airy your cake is." At any rate, here are the recipes.

LEMON TREE by ccrcats

The first is from Mary Jane Altman of West Palm Beach. "It's a little extra effort, but it's worth it," she says. Other cooks who sent similar recipes emphasized that it is important to beat the butter for a full 20 minutes. They also said the cake improves if baked a day before you plan to serve it, and keeps well frozen.

7-UP POUND CAKE
3 sticks of butter (margarine will not do)
3 cups sugar
5 eggs
3 cups flour
2 teaspoons lemon extract
3/4 cup 7-Up
Cream butter and sugar for 20 minutes. Add the eggs, one at a time. Gradually add the flour and beat well, then add lemon extract and 7-Up. Bake 1 1/4 hours at 325 degrees in a well oiled Bundt pan. Cool 8 to 10 minutes, then dust with powdered sugar. While most of the pound cake recipes didn't call for a frosting, Louise Gotti of Port St. Lucie frosts hers with this:

PINEAPPLE BUTTER FROSTING
1/2 cup butter
3 cups confectioners' sugar
1/3 cup crushed pineapple with juice
Cream butter. Add remaining ingredients and continue creaming until mixture is well blended and fluffy.
This is Steffan's recipe for 7-Up cake that begins with a packaged mix. Other similar recipes called for a yellow or a lemon cake mix in place of the pineapple, and lemon or vanilla pudding in place of the pineapple pudding. Pat Krenick of Goulds uses an orange cake mix and lemon pudding. Some cooks bake this in a 9-by-13-inch pan; others in three round pans.

AUNT ELEANOR'S TROPICAL CAKE
1 package Pineapple Supreme cake mix
4 eggs
1/3 cup oil
1 small package instant pineapple pudding
10 ounces 7-Up
Mix all ingredients together and beat at medium speed of electric mixer for two minutes. Pour into greased and floured 8- inch cake pans or 13-by-9-inch pan. Bake 25 to 30 minutes in a 350-degree oven. Note: the baking time varies greatly from recipe to recipe; some call for 40 to 45 minutes of baking.

PINEAPPLE FROSTING
1 1/2 cups granulated sugar
1/4 cup butter
2 eggs
1 small can flaked coconut
1 small can crushed pineapple
Beat together sugar, eggs and butter until smooth, then stir in coconut and pineapple. Frost on cooled cake.
This recipe for a cooked frosting comes from Krenick, who says the 7-Up cake with this frosting always is requested for family birthdays and special occasions. She got her recipe from friends in Arkansas:

PINEAPPLE FROSTING
1 1/2 cups granulated sugar
1/2 stick butter
2 tablespoons flour
2 eggs
1 small can crushed pineapple in heavy syrup
Note: some recipes call for the exact same ingredients, except a large can of pineapple.
Mix ingredients together and cook until thick and transparent. Remove from stove and add 1 cup coconut. When cool, fill and frost cake. Finally, just to be sure we've had the last word on 7-Up cake, here's a recipe from Bedell that will really top it all:

7-UP ICING
2 egg whites
3 tablespoons 7-Up
1 cup granulated sugar
1/4 tablespoon cream of tartar
Put all ingredients in the top of a double boiler over boiling water. Upper pan should not touch surface of water. Beat with rotary beater until stiff enough to stand in peaks, (about 5 minutes)."
---"AMERICA IS TURNING 7-UP CAKE," Linda Cicero, Miami Herald, August 5, 1982

1986
"Seven-Up Pound Cake
3 sticks butter
3 c. sugar
5 eggs
3 c. sifted cake flour
3/4 c. 7-Up
1 tsp. lemon flavor, Grease a tube pan; dust with flour. Cream butter until smooth and shiny. Add sugar and continue to beat until smooth and fluffy. Add flavor, then eggs, one at a time. Beat thoroughly after each. Add flour; mix well. Add 7-Up and mix well. Pour batter into pan and bake at 350 degrees F."
---Food For My Household: Recipes by Members of Ebenezer Baptist Church, Atlanta GA [Cookbook Publishers:Lenexa KS] 1986 (p. 46)

This unusual recipe dates back to 1959:
"In the following recipe, dried apricots are cooked in the nationally known beverage, 7-Up, for the brown sugar sauce. The natural lemon-lime flavor of 7-Up is used as the liquid ingredient.

Apricot Up-Side Down Cake
Sauce
1 7-oz bottle 7-Up
1 cup dried apricots
1/2 cup butter
1 cup brown sugar
Simmer 7-Up with apricots 20 minutes. Stir in butter and brown sugar and continue cooking to melt butter. Spread sauce over the bottom of a 9 by 12 by 2 inch baking pan.

Cake batter
1/2 cup butter
1 cup sugar
2 1/4 cups sifted cake flour
2 12 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 7-ounce bottle 7-Up
3 egg whites
Cream buter and sugar until fluffy. Sift flour, baking powder and alt together and stir in alternately with 7-Up. Fold in stiffly beaten egg whites. Pour batter over sauce in baking pan. Bake at 350 degrees Fahrenheit, 45 minutes. Invert and serve up-side down."
---"Please Your Family This Week With An Apricot Up-Side Down Cake," Daily Defender (Chicago), February 17, 1959 (p. 40)

Lemons Poster by imperfectiomism

Citrus Poster by imperfectiomism

This is the recipe that we used in both north and south Louisiana. I found copies of it in Pots, Pans, and Pioneers III, Councils of Louisiana Chapter #24 Telephone Pioneers of America Cookbook and also New Orleans Public Service Middle South Utilities System Newsletter.

7-Up Pound Cake

1 1/2 cup butter
3 cup sugar
5 eggs
3 cups flour
2 Tablespoon lemon extract
3/4 cup 7-Up

Cream sugar and butter together; beat until light and fluffy. Add eggs, one at a time, beating well. Add flour. Add lemon extract and 7-Up. Pour batter into well greased and floured bundt pan. Bake at 325 degrees F for 1 to 1 1/4 hours. (Mattie M. Johnson, Ouachita Council, Monroe, LA; Betty Beatty, Caddo Council, Minden, LA)

Here is another version of the delicious 7-up Cake, but with an orange sauce instead of the traditional lemon.

7 UP CAKE
1 c. butter, softened
1/2 c. shortening
3 c. sugar
5 eggs (at room temperature)
3 c. flour, sifted 3 times
3/4 c. 7 Up
1 tsp. vanilla extract
1/2 tsp. butternut flavoring

Preheat oven to 325 degrees.

Cream butter, shortening, and sugar together. Add eggs, one at a time, and beat well. Add sifted flour and 7 Up (alternately), beating well. Add vanilla extract and butternut flavoring. Mix well. Pour into greased bundt pan or angel food tube pan and bake for 1 hour and 15 minutes, or until toothpick inserted in center of cake comes out clean.

Let the cake completely cool before serving.

ORANGE SAUCE
2 c. powdered sugar
1/4 c. orange juice (more or less)

Put powdered sugar in a saucepan. Add enough orange juice to make a paste. Heat the mixture until the powdered sugar dissolves and the paste becomes more of a sauce. Add a little more orange juice, if needed.

Pour a tablespoon or so of warm Orange Sauce over each slice of cake right before serving or put the orange sauce in a heat resistant pitcher and let everyone pour the sauce over their slice of cake themselves.

Recipe from: Fun Vista

The History of 7up
Charles Leiper Grigg
By Mary Bellis

Charles Leiper Grigg was born in 1868 in Price's Branch, Missouri. As an adult, Grigg moved to St. Louis and started working in advertising and sales, where he was introduced to the carbonated beverage business.

By 1919, Charles Leiper Grigg was working for a manufacturing company owned by Vess Jones. It was there that Grigg invented and marketed his first soft drink called "Whistle".

After a dispute with management, Charles Leiper Grigg quit his job (giving away "Whistle") and started working for the Warner Jenkinson Company, developing flavoring agents for soft drinks. Grigg invented then his second soft drink called called "Howdy". When he eventually moved on from Warner Jenkinson Co., he took his soft drink "Howdy" with him.

Together with financier Edmund G. Ridgway, Grigg went on to form the Howdy Company. So far, Grigg had invented two orange-flavored soft drinks. But his soft drinks struggled against the king of all orange pop drinks, "Orange Crush". "Orange Crush" grew to dominate the market for orange sodas.

Charles Leiper Grigg decided to focus on lemon-lime flavors and and by in October of 1929 he had invented a new drink called, "Bib-Label Lithiated Lemon-Lime Sodas".

The name was quickly changed to " 7 Up Lithiated Lemon-Lime" and then again quickly changed to just plain 7up.

7up merged with "Dr Pepper" in 1986.

FIRST PLACE - Home for the Holidays Contest in the Holiday Cooking category, December, 2008.