I once made sheet cakes for a wedding and I think you can get more servings from a 10" x 15" jelly roll pan than from a 9X13 pan. The servings aren't quite as thick, but they are substantial enough, even for teenagers.

The Best Chocolate Sheet Cake ever from the Pioneer Woman blog will give you a good idea of the size.

My favorite is the Texas Sheet Cake which becomes Mexican Chocolate Cake when you add cinnamon to the cake batter - it is very yummy!

Here is the web page for the version with cinnamon:
http://www.cookiemadness.net/2010/05/texas-sheet-cake-2/

I would suggest that you do at least two cakes, maybe 3, one chocolate, one white or yellow cake with a frosting that is not chocolate, and a third that is orange or lemon cake with a thin glaze of powdered sugar and orange or lemon juice. That way you will probably have all the allergies covered - maybe leave out nuts all together?

Teresa

Here is a link that might be useful: Pioneer Woman cake

I agree, I bake cakes in my half sheet pans and can get more servings out of one.

Ashley's favorite is Texas Sheet Cake, she loves the stuff. I also have a recipe for white Texas Sheet Cake and I have successfully baked two layer cake recipes of different types in a half sheet pan, as well as a double batch of brownies.

Watch them carefully, it doesn't take them as long to bake as they are thinner.

White Texas Sheet Cake

1 stick butter, cubed
1 cup water
2 cups all-purpose flour
2 cups sugar
2 Eggland's Best Eggs, beaten
1/2 cup sour cream
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon almond extract
1/4 teaspoon baking soda

â¢FROSTING:
1/2 cup butter, cubed
1/4 cup milk
4-1/2 cups confectioners' sugar
1/2 teaspoon almond extract
1 cup chopped walnuts

In a large saucepan, bring butter and water just to a boil.
Immediately remove from the heat; stir in the flour, sugar, eggs, sour cream, salt, baking powder, extract and baking soda until smooth.

Pour into a greased 15-in. x 10-in. x 1-in. baking pan. Bake at 375ð for 18-22 minutes or until golden brown and a toothpick inserted near the center comes out clean. Cool on a wire rack for 20 minutes.
â¢For frosting, in a large saucepan, bring butter and milk just to a boil. Immediately remove from the heat; stir in confectioners' sugar and extract. Stir in walnuts; spread over warm cake. Cool completely. Yield: 20 servings.

Annie

I am seconding Teresa. I have made the Mexican chocolate cake since the early '80s, & boy, is it good. I use a 10x15 jelly roll pan & can mix, bake & frost it in 50 minutes - so easy. And, it tastes even better if made a day before. It's thin, like brownies.

This is a friend's recipe, I haven't made it yet myself, but have eaten it & thought it very good

Pineapple Sheet Cake
2 cup flour
2 cup sugar
2 eggs
2 tsp baking soda
ý tsp salt
1 tsp vanilla
1 can (20 ounces) crushed pineapple, undrained

Frosting
8 oz cream cheese, soft
ý cup butter, softened
3- & 3/4 cup confectioners' sugar
1 t vanilla
1 cup chopped nuts
Combine cake ingredients; beat until smooth. Pour into a greased 15-in. x 10-in. x 1-in. baking pan. Bake at 350 degrees for 20-25 minutes. Cool. For icing, in a small bowl, combine the cream cheese, butter, confectioners' sugar and vanilla until smooth. Spread over cake and sprinkle with nuts.

My daughter bakes for school events and finds that at least one-something gluten-free is gladly received. So, if you're making several anyway, why not make one gluten-free.... just mark it as such.

I have the large Wilton cake pan for this kind of thing.... the pan is stashed away at the moment, but it's probably 18 x 13 or very close because I always used two full cake batters to fill it. I usually made one batch of my favorite yellow cake and one batch of my favorite chocolate cake and then just randomly dropped large dollops of each batter in the pan. Most people seemed to like it that way.

Before I had the big cake pan, I'd make two 9x13 cakes, then align them on a covered board and frost as if they were one large cake. :O)

Okay--first off you can't bake a real sheet cake in a home oven. A quarter sheet is roughly 9 X 13, so you can see that a whole pan won't fit in most standard ovens.

A quarter sheet serves 12-15, so if you're serving 40+, you'd probably want at least 3 9 X 13" cakes (more if you're doing different flavors, so the last folks still have a choice).

You can put a regular 2-layer (8 or 9") recipe in a 9 X 13 pan. I often do that--it's so much simpler to frost and serve. The only thing you'll have to do is adapt the cookign time. Making one large later like that is going to take a little longer to bake. Just bake till the cake tests done.

There is another alternative, though. If you have a good bakery in your town, you should be able to buy a whole sheet cake from them (uniced). They'll put it on the appropriate cake board for you, and you can then frost and decorate as you want. They'd probably even do 2 flavors, if you want (Vanilla at one end, Chocolate at the other).

Azzalea is correct, you cannot get a whole sheet cake into a home oven. However, I have a small/cheap stove, and I can easily fit the "half sheet" pans in there. I have both the 15x10 jelly roll type sheet pan and regular baking half sheet pans, which are deeper.

I use the jelly roll type sheet pan when making things like Texas Sheet Cake and can get 24 pieces from one pan of cake and they are pretty good sized pieces.

Annie

We often do the 'Texas Sheet Cake' for ease in transport, larger desserts here - but it's always been called Brownie Bar Cake in my family circle ;) A spoonful of instant espresso or coffee added with the dry ingredients makes for a very dark chocolate cake.

Another that everyone likes, done in the same type jelly roll pan that runs a close race for popularity, serves as many, is Paul's Pumpkin Bars. I don't know who Paul is, but we've been making them for decades.

Recipe is online many places, here is one -

Here is a link that might be useful: Pauls Pumpkin Bars

We made this recently - it was very easy and very good.

Carrot Sheet Cake With Frosting
Ingredients
⢠4 eggs
⢠1 cup vegetable oil
⢠2 cups sugar
⢠2 cups all-purpose flour
⢠2 teaspoons baking soda
⢠1/4 teaspoon baking powder
⢠2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
⢠1/2 teaspoon salt
⢠3 cups carrots, shredded
⢠2/3 cup walnuts, chopped
FROSTING
⢠1 (8 ounce) package cream cheese, softened
⢠1/2 cup butter or 1/2 cup margarine, softened
⢠1 teaspoon vanilla extract
⢠4 cups icing sugar
⢠2/3 cup walnuts, chopped, for garnish
Directions:
Preheat oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit.
Grease a 15" x 10" x 1" baking pan (I use Pan Release Pan Release, Professional Pan Coating (Better Than Pam Spray!)).

In a mixing bowl, beat eggs, oil and sugar until smooth.
Combine flour, baking soda, baking powder, cinnamon and salt; add to egg mixture and beat well.
Stir in carrots and walnuts.
Pour into prepared baking pan.
Bake in preheated 350 degree fahrenheit oven for 35 minutes or until a toothpick inserted near the center comes out clean.
Cool on a wire rack.

FROSTING:
Beat cream cheese, butter and vanilla in a mixing bowl until smooth.
Beat in icing sugar.
Spread over cake.
Sprinkle with chopped nuts.

Here is a link that might be useful: Carrot Sheet Cake

Thanks, LKZZ, for that recipe. I have a carrot cake recipe that I like a lot but it takes a long time to bake in a regular 9x13 pan. I'll bet I could turn it into a sheet cake without trouble.

Annie

Wow, these recipes sound great! I'm looking forward to this little project!

Annie, your recipe calls for Eggland's Best eggs -- I am assuming I can sub eggs from my hens? Or is there something about them that will make a difference?

I will post photos. The event is December 3 so I'll be cooking on Monday evening and will take photos. I might make one on one of my jelly-roll size pans, and 2 in my vintage 9x13 aluminum pans. Now, to decide which ones! I am sure my students will gobble them all right up.

Thanks for all the lovely ideas.

So about those cakes.... I made them for today, and they were a big hit. I ended up making the vanilla and chocolate versions of the Texas sheet cakes, and a pan of the spice cake I had for my wedding cake. I made vanilla bean buttermilk buttercream frosting for the chocolate and vanilla cakes, and browned butter frosting for the spice cake. (I was almost out of homemade vanilla so I scraped the seeds from the beans and used them in cake & frosting).

Co-workers brought in fresh fruit and and a fresh fruit punch, and our students really enjoyed some home-cooked treats. Thanks for the recipes and the advice!

mabel, I'm sorry I didn't see this before your event.

I copied and pasted that recipe from a website, I think Allrecipes, some time ago. I didn't bother changing the egg notation because I knew I'd use eggs from my own hens anyway.

So, I'm sure you did use the eggs you had on hand and it turned out fine, LOL.

Annie

Annie, I used eggs from my own hens, and relished the site of my slightly deeper yellow cake. I couldn't imagine why you would use Eggland's Best, but....

Thanks!