Baumkuchen

Baumkuchen (pronounced baun-kooch-en)

A kind of layered cake, traditionally baked on a spit, in which the layers resemble concentric tree rings.

Circa mid-1800s: From the Modern German baumkuchen (literally “tree cake”).  The construct was Baum (tree) +‎ kuchen (cake), so-named because the concentric-ring layers resemble tree rings.  The genitive was saumkuchens, the plural baumkuchen.

The tree cake

Although the word baumkuchen appears not to have been used before being noted in Bavarian menus and newspapers in the mid-nineteenth century, similar cakes were documented as early as 1581.  Both Germans and Hungarians have long claimed to have created the baumkuchen, the latter suggesting it a variation of a traditional Hungarian wedding cake, the pastry kürtőskalács (chimney cake).  In retaliation, the Germans cite the recipe in Max Rumpolt’s Ein new Kochbuch (A New Cookbook) (1581).  However, it may be a moot point because the method was already known in Antiquity, records for similar constructions found in the texts from both Ancient Greece and Rome.

Labour-intensive and thus costly, baumkuchen is made on a spit by assembling cakes of alternating sizes which are brushed evenly with thin layers of batter, the spit then rotated over heat, traditionally a wood fire.  Each layer must dry before another is poured so when the cake is sliced, each layer is divided from the next by a golden line, resembling the growth rings of a tree.  Modern baumkuchen may have only a few layers but the traditional method called for twenty or more, the most lavish of which could weigh over one hundred pounds (45+kg) and be 3-4 feet (1-1.25m) high.  Popular in Japan, as bāmukūhen (バームクーヘン), it’s often served to wedding guests because, when sliced, it recalls the shape of a ring.

Baumkuche, Horcher, Madrid.

Apart from the visual impact, a baumkuchen is an experience of intense taste and texture.  As bakers know, it’s the thin caramelized layer sticking to the bottom of the pan that is the best tasting part of a cake because that’s where the fats and sugars accumulate and a baumkuchen is a cake made wholly of layer upon layer of this richly flavored delicacy.  While it’s true a conventionally shaped cake can somewhat emulate this if baked in layers, the finer product is the cylindrical baumkuchen which can be made only on the rotating spit used usually for broiling roasts.  However, that very intensity of taste is because of density and for that reason, should be served in smaller slices than most cakes.  Famously, it's a signature offering at Horcher in Madrid.

Sliced baumkuche, Horcher, Madrid.

Horcher was opened in Berlin in 1904 by wine merchant Gustav Horcher (1873-1931), ownership passing to his son Otto after his death.  It began as a small, intimate restaurant offering simple, traditional dishes (notably game) but later evolved to cater to the upper end of the market.  Otto Horcher offered a good table and maintained connections with the Nazi hierarchy, the Horcher a favourite of Hermann Göring (1893-1946) and many Luftwaffe generals.  Those connections paid off.  After the Anschluss (the annexing of Austria by the German Reich in 1938), Otto Horcher acquired The Three Hussars in Vienna and, after the occupation of France in 1940, he took over Maxim's in Paris.

Horcher, Madrid.

Closure was forced on Horcher and many other restaurants in 1943 after the Nazi's propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels (1897-1945) attempted to shock the economy into total-war production.  Typically, this was opposed by Göring who retaliated by threatening to have Horcher re-opened as a Luftwaffe club but his star within the regime had long been waning and Goebbels ultimately prevailed.  Instead, he assisted Horcher to move to Madrid where it remains to this day, still in family ownership.  During the war, allied intelligence agencies identified as Horcher as a meeting point for German spies and overseas agents but it was one of many in both Madrid and Lisbon, both sides maintaining espionage operations in neutral nations.  After the war, the linkage continued, sometimes openly as Horcher remained popular with many former notables of the Third Reich but reports indicated it was also a place with at least passive involvement in activities such as arranging the escape of those wanted for war crimes and other matters, usually to more sympathetic régimes in South America.