History of Red Velvet in America

Red velvet cake. Loved by many especially in the United States, but who really knows where it came from, or frankly any history behind the red spongy goodness? Red velvet cake actually started as a marketing ploy. After the Great Depression, and after the Food, Drug, and Cosmetic (FDC) Act was passed in 1938, John A. Adams, owner of the Adams Extract Company, decided he would create “Adams Red Velvet Cake” recipe to better market his newly launched food coloring. The original tag line for the cake was “The cake of a wife time.” Because men were in control of just about everything (including freedom of speech subliminally) during this time, men overpowered women and created this slogan.

During World War II, red velvet cake was actually colored with beets. Due to limited supply and rationing during the war, bakers used beet juice to enhance the color of their cakes. The beet juice also happened to help the cake retain moisture. Not only did the beets enhance color and moisture, it also was a healthy option for the soldiers consuming the cakes. Red velvet cake was also originally topped with a light and fluffy butter roux icing also known as ermine until the mid twentieth century, however as time passed, manufactures calculated the profit and thought the butter roux had a much higher cost along with a much longer process to produce. At that point, people began to use substitute cream cheese and buttercream frosting instead.  Red velvet is further popularized especially after the 1989 film “Steel Magnolias” where an infamous armadillo-shaped wedding cake was in the flavor of red velvet, thus leading to the continuous high demand in red velvet cake throught the twenty first century.

*Quick fact: of the 120,000 people who like “red velvet cake” on Facebook, 80% of those likers hail from the United States.