When you think of German cuisine, you probably don’t think of coconuts. That’s a little clue that German chocolate cake has nothing to do with one of Europe’s largest (and very nontropical) countries. Indeed, the cake is actually an American invention — Texan, to be specific.  The dessert is often traced back to 1957, when a recipe for “German Sweet Chocolate Cake” appeared in The Dallas Morning News. German’s Sweet Chocolate was (and is) a specific kind of chocolate manufactured by Baker’s Chocolate and named for its inventor, Samuel German. It comes with sugar already added, unlike most dark baking chocolate.  In 1957, a homemaker identifying as “Mrs. George Clay of Dallas” submitted the recipe to the newspaper’s “Recipe of the Day” column, describing buttermilk-enriched chocolate cake layers topped with a custardy confection of coconuts and pecans. Some accounts note that a similar …Read More