Let me be clear…I do not have chickens in my backyard. I wish I did, but now that I can’t eat eggs I don’t see the point and Bert would prefer to not deal with chickens as pets. However, a friend who does have chickens in her backyard wondered if I would test a recipe for a baked seed cake recipe. I guess similar cakes can be purchased but she wanted a cake that would have wholesome ingredients with no extra chemicals or additives. Why not!
Here is the recipe:
My friend provided all the ingredients, which helped a lot. Many of the ingredients were unfamiliar since I don’t work with chicken feed, so I had to figure out which bag had “scratch grain” and which was “layer feed.”
The rest of the ingredients at least sounded like things I was familiar with, like sunflower seeds, whole wheat flour and cinnamon!
I measured out all the dry ingredients into a large bowl. In a smaller bowl I mixed the eggs, molasses and coconut oil. Then I poured the wet ingredients into the pile of dry ingredients.
I was able to mix it up with a big spoon. The recipe said I could do it with my hands, but the spoon worked fine.
My plan was to use my small loaf-shaped pans so I sprayed them with oil and filled them about halfway. I needed to press firmly in the corners and along the sides to pack it tightly.
I had a small cookie cutter and cut a hole to put the string through.
Once I removed the bit of packed seed, I inserted a small piece of dowel rod and packed the seeds around the stick. I left the dowel rod in while baking.
The last cake of seed dough I divided into two baking cups, making two smaller cakes. I wanted to see how those cups worked.
After baking for 30 minutes at 325 degrees, I let them cool for a few minutes. While they were still warm, I was able to twist and remove the dowel rods and run a table knife around the edges of the pans. The larger cakes popped right out of the pans. The smaller paper cups should have been sprayed but the cakes were fine.
I let the cakes cool on the racks overnight so they could harden and were not sticky. I was able to string a piece of twine through the holes and they are ready to hang in the chicken house or barn. Hope the chickens like them!
In the past I’ve also been asked to try to make a chicken coat. That was a learning experience too! Check it out at https://marykisner.com/when-does-a-chicken-need-a-coat/.
Give this cake recipe a try or share with a friend who has backyard chickens! You may be rewarded with some eggs! Please comment or email me directly at marykisner@comcast.net.