St. Louis Gooey Butter Cake

I lived with my parents in a St. Louis suburb for my last years of elementary school.  We had a wonderful time eating Midwestern foods, but by far our favorite treat was Gooey Butter Cake.  It was sold at almost all of the local bakeries and we tried them all.  This cake, made almost solely in the St. Louis area, has a yeasty bottom layer topped with a gooey, sweet, buttery filling.  My mom found a recipe that sort of copied the confection, but I was never happy with it.  Recently, I did a thorough search on in the internet for a better recipe.

I found this recipe from a gal that grew up close to where I lived in the St. Louis suburbs.  I think it is practically perfect in every way.

Gooey Butter Cake:  (from recipezaar)
Bottom Layer:
1/4 cup sugar
1/4 cup butter
1/2 tsp salt
1 egg
2 1/2 tsp yeast (1 envelope)
1/2 cup warm milk
2 1/2 cups flour
1 Tbsp vanilla

Filling:
2 cups sugar
1 cup butter, softened
1/8 tsp salt
1 egg
1/4 cup light corn syrup
2 cups flour
1/4 cup water
1 Tbsp vanilla

In a large bowl, cream sugar, butter and salt until fluffy.  Add egg and beat well.  Dissolve the yeast in the warm milk.  Add the flour to the butter mixture and then the yeast and vanilla.  Mix with a dough hook for 5 minutes.  Place in a lightly greased bowl, cover and let rise for 1 hour.  Divide the dough into 2 equal pieces.  Pat each half into a circle.  Transfer to two greased 9 inch cake pans and pat up the sides.  Prick a few times with a fork to keep from bubbling up during baking.

For the filling, in a large bowl, combine sugar, butter and salt.  Add egg and corny syrup.  Mix well.  Add the flour, water and vanilla.  Beat until smooth.  Divide into the two cake pans.  Spread over the dough and let stand 20 minutes.  During this time, preheat oven to 375 degrees.  Bake for 20-25 minutes.  Put a pan underneath just in case the filling overflows the edges of the pan.  Do not over bake.  The filling will be gooey.   It needs to cool completely before it sets up.  Go ahead and put it in the fridge if you want to hurry up the process.  The leftovers should be stored there, too.

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