This dish for fried tilapia is fantastic. The “Friday Fish Fry” is a well-established custom in Wisconsin. This tilapia is how my family brings it home—deep-fried. For children, fillets can also be divided into nugget-sized pieces.
| Prep Time: | 20 mins |
| Cook Time: | 40 mins |
| Total Time: | 1 hr |
| Servings: | 24 |
| Yield: | 1 9×13-inch pan |
Ingredients
- 2 cups raisins
- 2 cups water
- 1 cup packed brown sugar
- ¾ cup shortening
- 3 cups all-purpose flour
- 4 teaspoons ground cinnamon
- 2 teaspoons baking soda
- 1 teaspoon ground nutmeg
- 1 teaspoon ground cloves
- 1 teaspoon salt
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Grease and flour a 9×13-inch pan.
- Mix raisins, water, brown sugar, and shortening in a saucepan. Bring to a boil and boil for 3 minutes. Remove from heat and let cool.
- Combine flour, cinnamon, baking soda, nutmeg, cloves, and salt in a large bowl. When raisin mixture is cool, add to dry ingredients and mix well to combine.
- Bake in the preheated oven for 30 or 40 minutes. Do not overbake or it will be too dry. Test after 30 minutes. A toothpick inserted into the center of the cake should come out clean.
Reviews
Cake was very dry. Taste was good but you definitely need something to drink with it.
Turned out great!
I followed others’ recommendation and replaced 1 cup water with 1 cup coffee also used 1/2 cup oil and continued with butter. Baked for 35 minutes and was super moist., thanks for sharing.
Out of this world! My aunt made this years ago and I could never get the recipe right. I used a cup of coffee in place of the water . Thanks so much!
I don’t know what went wrong, but the result really wasn’t good. Very dry. It wasn’t nearly sweet enough. In fact, it left a bitter aftertaste.
so happy to find this, we always made this at the holidays and added dried furit/candied fruit – was afraid I’d lost the recipe forever and the ‘taste memory’ is sooo strong
This cake is wicked good! It’s a perfect consistency, moist, and delicious. I made a few substitutions to use what I had on hand. After all, I figured that “making do” was half the point of the recipe. I used dried cherries instead of raisins, and was out of cloves, so I used allspice instead. I also added 1/2 tsp. ground ginger. I let the boiled mixture cool a while, but it was still rather warm when I mixed it with the dry ingredients. It actually foamed a little. I have no idea if it was supposed to, since I know very little about baking. The batter was very thick, almost like bread dough. My oven runs a little hot, so I checked it after 20 minutes, and it was done already. The cake was quite moist so I wonder if some folks cooked it too long. Thanks so much for this easy and delicious recipe!
I REMEMBER MY MOM MAKING THIS WHEN I WAS A LITTLE GIRL. I LOST THE RECIPE OVER THE YEARS AND COULDN’T FIND IT SINCE MY MOM PASSED ON. IT WAS SO NICE FINDING IT AGAIN. MY MOTHER GREW UP THROUGH THE DEPRSSION SO THIS WAS SOMETHING THEY COULD AFFORD TO MAKE THANK YOU FOR PUTTING THIS ON THE WEB!!!!!!!
This recipe is fantastic. I can not say enough about the memories this brought back to me. My grandmother used to make this cake every single week for my grandfather. Both of them are gone now and I haven’t had a slice of this cake in over 10 years. Thank you for posting this. The reason I gave it only 4 stars is because I think it was more moist when Nanny made it. Now, I cant add coffee the way everyone else is because it would change the taste and the taste is perfect (though I might try it just to be sure). Thank you so much.
I have hunted this recipe for a long time. Mom used to make it only difference is she also added hickory nuts to hers
I was looking for a recipe that reminded me of an old family Christmas loaf my folks made for years. While my Mom baked endless cookies for our large family, this was her reward at the end of a long season, a piece of pork cake. Her recipe called for one pound of ground pork fat, so I’ve been looking for something a little “less threatening” to one’s nutritional body. While it was indeed the best thing around, this recipe is similar minus a few ingredients. It was good, a bit too crumbly but I like the use of shortening over the pork fat. I’ll play with it a bit. Also perhaps adding spices when you heat on stove might bring out the flavor a bit more, as I like the spice intensity of old bread. I also put in two 9 x 5 pans. I’ll add molasses as that was in old recipe and see if that will add a bit more moisture to it.
Don’t know what happened to Grandma’s recipe so I tried this one. Although I did add 3/4 cup of coffee (Dunkin Donuts Decaf) because I do remember that from my Grandm (she used instant coffee). It was excellent. The whole house smelled of cloves and I couldn’t wait to eat a piece. It was so moist. I was also a little skeptcal because all I had was a glass pyrex dish to bake but it turned out wonderful. HIGHLY RECOMMENDED!
This recipe was delicious.I made one addition that i always do when making a gingerbread or molasses type cake and that was to add around 3/4 to 1 cup of coffee to the batter to make it a little more loose.This made a great moist cake.
I have made other variations of Poor Mans Cake- this one turned out rather dry – Neither my housband or I were happy with it.If your’re looking for a recipe for this cake try one of the others.
This is delicious! It brought back memories for us. We always had Poor Mans Cake with Cream Cheese Icing when I was little. It is still my Dad’s favorite. I was so happy to find the recipe. Thank you!
This cake is good, its taste is a lot like gingerbread, with all the spices. It is nice and moist. I added a cup of pecans, which might mean you would call it Poor Man,who owns a pecan tree,CakeIII. I love pecans in everything, and it really made this cake great! Try it with a good cup of coffee…