If you’re not from St. Louis, it’s quite possible that this is your first introduction to gooey butter cake. Gooey butter cake is said to have originated during the depression when a baker in South St. Louis was trying to make a plain yellow cake. Somehow he ended up adding too much butter? or maybe sugar? perhaps shortening? Well… we don’t actually know what he added too much of, but with it being the depression, he wound up selling what he had made for the day. It resulted in this gooey, sticky, mess of a dessert that St. Louis people have happily accepted into our culture of thin crust pizza and baseball.
Now, nearly 100 years later and much more refined, gooey butter cake characteristically has a soft cookie-like crust with a custardy-creamy rich buttery filling. For those of you in the south, it is comparable to a chess pie (but better). The desert is sweet but not sickeningly so. This cake can be eaten at any meal, a favorite time for me to eat it is during breakfast. Coffee and gooey butter cake is a heaven-sent a combo that I adore. It is a dessert I believe the world needs more exposure to, so here’s my best shot at giving the world what it deserves.
When making this cake it is important to try to treat the filling like you would a cheesecake. Tent the filling if the top is getting too brown. The top of the cake sometimes creates a giant air bubble under a top layer of skin on the filling. This can be problematic, because a good way to check for it being done is to do a shake test like you would for a cheesecake. You want to make sure the middle still has some wobble to it before you take it out of the oven. To avoid the air bubble, simply poke it with a knife and let it sink back down before you attempt to check the cake for a wobble in the middle.
St. Louis Gooey Butter Cake
Ingredients
For the "Crust"
- 2½ cups All-Purpose Flour
- 1½ teaspoons Baking Powder
- ½ teaspoon Kosher Salt
- ½ cup Unsalted Butter (room temperature)
- 1¼ cup Granulated Sugar
- 2 Eggs (room temperature)
- 1 teaspoon Vanilla Extract
For the "Filling"
- 8 ounces Cream Cheese (room temperature)
- ¼ cup Unsalted Butter (room temperature)
- 3 cups Powdered Sugar (plus additional for dusting)
- 2 Eggs
- ½ teaspoon Kosher Salt
- 1 teaspoon Vanilla Extract
Instructions
For the "Crust"
- Preheat oven to 350°F and lightly coat a 9×13 inch pan with cooking spray.
- In a medium sized bowl, add the flour, baking powder and salt. Whisk together until evenly distributed.
- In a separate, larger bowl, cream together the butter and sugar until fluffy (1-2 minutes)
- Add the eggs and vanilla to the butter/sugar mixture, and beat until incorporated. Add the eggs one at a time, waiting until the first one is completely mixed in before adding the second.
- Add flour mixture, mixing slowly so the flour does not get everywhere in your kitchen. Gently press the mixture into the bottom and up the sides of the 9×13 inch prepared pan. Make sure the entire bottom is covered and build up sides about ½ around the edge. Now make the filling
For the "Filling"
- In a large bowl, beat the ream cheese and butter together until very fluffy (2-3 minutes). Make sure that at this point, your cream cheese and butter are both very soft and around room temperature or else your filling will be chunky!
- Add in the powdered sugar and salt until totally combined.
- Mix in vanilla and eggs, one at a time, until the entire mixture is homogeneous.
- Pour the filling mixture over the bottom layer in the pan and use a spatula to ensure that it is providing even coverage.
- Bake in the preheated oven for 40-45 minutes until a golden brown is reached. You will notice it becomes almost bulbous as the top layer of filling forms a sort of film over the top that fills with air bubbles… but do not fret, this is completely normal and when you take the cake out, the air will fall out of it and the cake will be perfect!
- Allow cake to cool to room temperature, then dust the entire cake with a generous sprinkling of powdered sugar. Cut and enjoy!
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