Albemarle Road - Flatbush, Brooklyn - iPhone shot with Hipstamatic app - © Frank H. Jump
18th Avenue, Bensonhurst - © Frank H. Jump
Ebinger Baking Company, with a chain of stores across the boro, was founded in 1898 by George and Catherine Ebinger. Famous for their cakes and pies, and especially their Blackout Cake, they closed in bankruptcy on August 26, 1972.
There have been attempts to revive the bakery brand under that name, but none, so far, have been successful.
Named for wartime blackouts, their famous and beloved chocolate-pudding-filled Blackout Cake was a chocolate layer cake filled and frosted with dark fudge and dusted with chocolate cake crumbs that was so popular that other bakeries in the borough, like SeaLane, produced inferior knock-offs.
Other Ebinger favorites were a butter cream cake decorated with three small pistachio nuts in the center of the top and Chocolate hard-icing cake with a hard, bittersweet chocolate icing.
Supposedly the Ebinger family has all their original recipes under lock and key and is uninterested in releasing them, but facsimile recipes pop up once in a while. Here is a recipe for Blackout Cake from Cooks Country TV that gets very good reviews, if you’d like to try making it yourself (registration is required to see the recipe, but it’s free).
There is another version published in the Best of America’s Test Kitchen 2008 cookbook (see below for a link to it on Amazon.com).
Speaking of bakeries, another Brooklyn institution is Entenmann’s Bakery, founded by William Entenmann who came to Brooklyn from Germany in 1898. Today, the Entenmann’s brand is on over 100 different kinds of baked goods. Entenmann’s is now owned by Bimbo Bakeries USA, the American subsidiary of a gigantic Mexican/Multi-national food production corporation, which also owns brands such as Thomas’ (english muffins), Arnold (bread) and Boboli (pizza crusts). – Brooklyn dot com
Other Ebinger postings on the Internet:
- 18th Avenue – Forgotten NY
- Brooklyn dot com – What ever happened to Ebinger’s Bakery?
Great finds!
Thanks Xris! How is your summer going?
What are these Ebingers exact locations? I work for Edible Brooklyn magazine and may want to talk to you about publishing these photos.
Ebingers is no longer in business MHT. What would your angle be for publishing?
Ebungers should release the recipes !! Not fair that bakery was the best