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Tomato soup cake is a spice cake that contains canned tomato soup, often with chopped nuts and a cream cheese frosting. It typically takes the forms of a layer cake, Bundt cake or cupcakes, using spices such as allspice, cinnamon, and cloves. The tomato soup adds moisture, in the same way milk of oil does in other cakes. Tomato soup cake has been known under a number of names, including Believe It or Not Cake, Halloween Cake, Love Apple Cake, Rosy Spice Cake, and You'll Be Surprised Cake.
The first recipes for tomato soup cake emerged in the 1920s, and the cake gained popularity in America during the Great Depression. It was promoted by soup makers including Campbell's and Heinz, as well as the Philadelphia Cream Cheese brand. The earliest version promoted by Campbell's came in 1940, and initially took the form of a steamed pudding, only later becoming cakey.
Recipes were published through institutional cooking manuals, cookbooks, newspapers and magazines. M. F. K. Fisher included a recipe in How to Cook a Wolf (1942), and Sylvia Plath was a fan, making the cake on the day she wrote her 1965 poem Death & Co. The popularity of the dish had lessened by the 1950s, when carrot cakes, spiced and frosted with cream cheese, took their place in American home cooking. The dish has not gone away, however, with some home cooks continuing to make tomato soup cake in 21st-century Canada.
See also List of cakes
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