Oh, (Baked) Fudge!
Experimenting with another piece of memory food
Unpacking the suitcase of my heart, I find among the clothes, shoes, diaries, trinkets, and baggies a recipe from my youth tucked into the pocket of a burgundy apron and pause as the reels of memory unspool and flicker across my brain’s screen. This particular documentary plays my first job in a professional kitchen, the people who trained me, and the food. Oh, my, the food was simply delicious.
Two recipes particularly stand out from my days at the venerable and long-gone Miss Jackson’s Tearoom. One was for a lemon or lime chess pie; someday, I might share that with you. Today? Today is about Baked Fudge.
Baked Fudge is considered Tulsa’s official dessert. As far as we are concerned, it’s been around forever, but Cleora Butler started the craze. She served it to delighted clients and restaurant customers from the time she catered her first luncheon and opened her first restaurant. It’s to her we should honor for making it so popular and, at one point in Tulsa’s restaurant history, found on every dessert menu in the city.
Cleora Butler was born in Texas in 1901, spending her childhood summers at her grandparents’ Oklahoma farm. Growing up, her days were filled with planting, cooking, and eating the food grown in her family's backyards. She came from the generation that ate what they grew, slaughtered and harvested hand-raised animals, built pantries from the ground up, and preserved to help ease hungry futures.
At their home in North Tulsa, Cleora's mamma hosted Cab Calloway, Zulme MacNeal, and Fats Waller when their tours came through town, always guaranteeing a good meal and talk around that abundant dining room table. Standing by her mother’s side, Cleora learned how to cook and bake, giving her skills that ensured that in 1923, she could pick up stakes, move to Tulsa, and secure employment. Her first job was as the Robertson Family’s cook, and, as the saying goes, the rest is history.
“When I was twelve, the time I spent in the kitchen at my mother’s side was the most precious to me. I watched as she magically mixed liquids and powders, added dashes of pepper and salt (plus assorted grains and crumbled leaves that I learned were called spices), placed them inside or atop a stove and produced marvelous concoctions that invariably tasted yummy. The apparent ease with which she cooked convinced me that turning out cookies and cakes must be a pushover.”
— CLEORA FROM HER AUTOBIOGRAPHICAL COOKBOOK CLEORA'S KITCHENS: THE MEMOIR OF A COOK & EIGHT DECADES OF GREAT AMERICAN FOOD
Although she developed her Baked Fudge recipe in the 1940s, some variations have existed for as long as someone combined butter, eggs, and flour. Her recipe differs from the one I learned; the original uses whole butter, and the one I learned uses melted butter. As I looked at her recipe from her book CLEORA’S KITCHEN, my brain started thinking about the differences, and how they affected the flavor and texture of the dish. It was time to experiment, and you benefit from it.
Note that this is NOT a brownie recipe; there is nothing dry or cakey about Baked Fudge at all. Thinking about it makes my mouth water, and my nose remembers that rich chocolate scent. It’s more akin to a molten lava cake, but even that doesn’t describe it accurately. It’s gooey silk.
Miss Jackson’s version was baked in a 9 x 13” pan. Its aromas wafted from the oven and through the dining room to the customers’ nostrils, pulling them closer to the door and asking when we might open. These elegant people didn’t openly salivate, but you could see they thought it. The two items that always sold out daily were the Baked Fudge and the Lemon Chess Pie. One waitress told the story that, when selling her house, she baked a pan of Baked Fudge, claiming she clinched the deal when she threw the pan into the bargain.
The sixteen-year-old me easily ate the entire pan, digging the spoon in and scooping out fudgy crunchiness bite after bite, swooning as it landed in my mouth and glorying in its pure decadence. It was rich, sweet, gooey, slightly crunchy and chewy, and entirely addictive. My heaven-raised eyes matched those of all patrons who devoured it. That dessert alone almost inspired me to become a pastry chef, but my teeth had different wants—such as fewer cavities and dental surgeries.
Baked Fudge’s top layer of delicate crust, all crunchy and spikey when you cut through it, exposes a layer of sugary chewiness before landing in the bottom layer of thick, densely fudge-like custard. It’s the perfect partnership of creamy and crunchy. Traditionally, it’s served warm with a healthy dollop of whipped cream over it, so it lands at the table with the gloriously silky fudginess surrounded by a small pool of melting cream. My mother always said the whipped cream cut through the fudge’s sweetness. If you really want to gild the lily, a scoop of vanilla ice cream will garnish the Baked Fudge just as well.
My idea was simply to see the differences between Cleora’s and Miss Jackson’s Tearoom recipes and to experiment a bit on my own. The first recipe follows hers to the letter. The second uses the melted butter method I learned, and the last one exchanged the melted butter for melted browned butter and used a little less sugar. I considered substituting the Dutch cocoa with Black Onyx cocoa but thought it would be too intense. Instead, I used two teaspoons of Dutch cocoa and one teaspoon of Black Onyx cocoa.
Each version came out the way I remembered. Cleora’s custard was a bit grainier than Miss Jackson’s. As far as mine went, the Black Onyx helped soften the aggressively-sweet dessert with a more pronounced chocolate taste, and the browned butter added a richness that cut through the sugar too.
You won’t go wrong with any of the versions. Simply be forewarned that all three versions are sugar bombs, even the one I made with less sugar.
BAKED FUDGE, THREE STYLES
These recipes have been reduced to a quarter of their original size, making them good for two to three people to consume. If you need to, you can easily scale these up.
CLEORA BUTLER’S BAKED FUDGE
INGREDIENTS
1 egg
½ cup white sugar
¼ cup unsalted butter, softened
¼ cup pecans, broken into large pieces (optional)
1 heaping tablespoon of cocoa
1 rounded tablespoon flour (all-purpose or gluten-free works fine)
¼ teaspoon salt
½ teaspoon vanilla
GARNISH
Unsweetened whipped cream or a scoop of vanilla ice cream
METHOD
Preheat oven to 325°F.
Beat the eggs well.
Add the sugar and butter to the eggs and beat well again.
Sift the cocoa, flour, and salt together.
Add the broken pecan pieces to the flour.
Fold the flour mixture into the egg and sugar mixture.
Add the vanilla.
Pour into three ramekins or canning jars.
Set the ramekins into a high-sided pan.
Pour enough hot water into the pan to create a water bath. The water should reach about halfway up the sides of the ramekin.
Bake in the oven for 30 minutes.
Cool for at least 30 minutes before serving.
Fudge will have the consistency of a firm custard and will be crusty on top.
Serve with a dollop of whipped cream or a scoop of vanilla ice cream on top.
MISS JACKSON’S TEAROOM BAKED FUDGE
INGREDIENTS
1 egg
½ teaspoon vanilla
½ cup white sugar
1 heaping tablespoon of cocoa
1 rounded tablespoon flour (all purpose or gluten-free works fine)
¼ teaspoon salt
¼ cup unsalted butter, melted
Garnish
Unsweetened whipped cream or a scoop of vanilla ice cream
Pecans, broken into large pieces (optional)
METHOD
Preheat oven to 325°F.
In the bowl of a blender, blend the egg and vanilla well.
Sift the cocoa and flour together.
In another bowl, combine the sugar, cocoa, and flour.
Stir the eggs into the flour mixture.
Stir in the melted butter into the flour mixture.
Pour into three ramekins or canning jars.
Set the ramekins into a high-sided pan.
Pour enough hot water into the pan to create a water bath. The water should reach about halfway up the sides of the ramekin.
Bake in the oven for 30 minutes.
Cool for at least 30 minutes before serving.
Fudge will have the consistency of a firm custard and will be crusty on top.
Serve with a dollop of whipped cream on top and pecans, if using.
ATELIER RORSCHACH’S BAKED FUDGE
INGREDIENTS
½ cup unsalted butter (This will make less than a ½ cup of browned butter; you’ll only use ¼ cup of it.)
1 egg
½ teaspoon vanilla
⅓ cup natural organic sugar
2 heaping teaspoons Dutch cocoa
1 heaping teaspoon Black Onyx cocoa
1 rounded tablespoon of flour (all-purpose or gluten-free flour)
¼ teaspoon salt
Garnish
Pecans, broken into large pieces (optional)
Unsweetened whipped cream or a scoop of vanilla ice cream
METHOD
BROWN BUTTER
Add the butter to a pan and melt.
You will see foaming. When it subsides, the butter solids will begin to brown.
Keep your eye on the pan and remove once these solids are golden brown.
Transfer the butter and browned solids to a heat-proof jar and allow the browned butter to cool to room temperature.
BAKED FUDGE
Preheat oven to 325°F.
In one bowl, whip the egg to frothy.
In a second bowl, cream the butter and sugar together.
Stir in the egg and vanilla into the butter and sugar.
In a third bowl, combine cocoa powders, flour, and salt.
Fold the cocoa mixture into the egg mixture.
Pour into three ramekins or canning jars.
Set the ramekins into a high-sided pan.
Pour enough hot water into the pan to create a water bath. The water should reach about halfway up the sides of the ramekin.
I have never heard of baked fudge! These all sound decadent.
Next time my mother says she needs a bite of sweet... I'll show her!
For decades I've made Cleora Butler's version. People take a bite and swoon every time. Everyone wants the recipe because nothing else is quite like it. Or ever will be.