Lane Cake

If ever there was a true Southern ceremonial layer cake, this is it. Created in Clayton, Alabama, by Emma Rylander Lane and called simply “Prize Cake” in her hometown cookbook of 1898, Some Good Things to Eat, the cake quickly assumed her name, and its fame spread far and wide. There were no pecans or coconut in the original recipe, only raisins and “one wine glass of good whiskey or brandy,” but as t