Una Merkel's Golden Brown Waffles & Glenda Farrell's Devil's Food Cake

Karie Bible
Sep 22
3 min read

Updated: Oct 1

We took another dive into Pre-Code films with experts Kim Luperi and Danny Reid.

From 1930 until mid 1934 Hollywood ran wild mostly ignoring the production code that they helped to write. For a brief, but glorious time women were sexually liberated, outfits were skimpy and rules were out the window. It was an era of gangster films, crime dramas, risque musicals and mature thought.

Una Merkel and Glenda Farrell starred in numerous films from this era.

Merkel began her screen career in the silent era and was a stand out in supporting roles in numerous pre-code classics including Red-Headed Woman, Man Wanted, They Call It Sin, 42nd Street, Beauty for Sale and Bombshell. She later received an Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actress for the film Summer and Smoke (1962). Merkel worked steadily in film and television until her final appearance in 1968.

Farrell's screen career launched at the dawn of sound and she co-starred in several pre-code classics as well including Little Caesar, I Am A Fugitive From A Chain Gang, Mystery of the Wax Museum and Mary Stevens, M.D. She was in several post-code Warner Bros. musicals including Gold Diggers of 1935, Gold Diggers of 1937 and Hollywood Hotel. In 1963 she won the Emmy Award for Best Supporting Actress for the TV series Ben Casey. Farrell may be best remembered for lead role in the Torchy Blane films and worked until her final film in 1970.

Recipe

The Una Merkel recipe is from Hollywood Magazine from June 1941.

This recipe for Glenda Farrell is from the book "Famous Stars Favorite Foods", which was published in 1938 and edited by Fannie Sniff.

Special Guests

Kim Luperi wrote her undergraduate thesis on the censorship battle of Baby Face (1933) and never looked back. Currently, she curates the @precodedotcom Instagram account and is a freelance writer for TCM. She’s written for AFI Fest, the American Cinematheque, and MovieMaker Magazine and covers classic film screenings at ISeeADarkTheater.com .

Danny Reid has been writing about pre-Code Hollywood (1930-34) for over a decade at pre-Code.com. He is also the editor of Thoughts on the Thin Man and the author of Murder on Celluloid. He lives in Germany with his wife, his kids, and his very barky dogs.

Video

Final Result

Kim's said the Glenda Farrell Devil's Food Cake turned out really well.

I learned many things while making these waffles. First off, sour milk is not buttermilk as I had originally assumed. In order to get sour milk, you add lemon juice or white vinegar to the regular milk. It all turns very lumpy. I chose to add about 1/4 of a squeezed lemon.

The recipe also called for soda. I assumed this meant baking soda, but Danny told me it meant using either tonic water or sparkling water. I had some Topo Chico on hand, so I put 1 tsp of it in the mixture. It actually worked and added some air to the batter and made it fluffy!

I also dramatically scaled down the recipe, as the original one makes 8 to 10 waffles and I'm just cooking for one. I pretty much just eyeballed it, but it all worked out very well. Una Merkel did not let me down and the waffles were delicious.