The Free Design

A harmonic folk band of the 60s and 70s

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Bite In The Attic | Cakes Are Fun!

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Since we here at LITA are all a little food-obsessed, we’ve hatched a plan to join our love of food and our love of music.

Introducing… Bite In The Attic: A food blog within a music blog.

We’ve started asking our eclectic catalog of musicians for their favorite recipes. The plan is then to recreate them, gobble them up, and post about it here! For our first installment we turned to Sandy Dedrick of The Free Design for some recipe inspiration.

The Free Design (Sandy on the left)

For those unfamiliar, The Free Design were a late 60s/early 70s family soft-pop-psych group that released seven brilliant albums and influenced countless musicians, including Beck, Belle & Sebastian, Cornelius, and Stereolab. They were one of our earliest and most beloved reissue projects. Sandy was a singer/songwriter in the group, and when we asked her for a recipe she said, “I definitely have a favorite recipe – but haven’t made it in years: chocolate mayonnaise cake.”  She went on to tell a little Free Design story attached to the cake: 

“We were singing on Arthur Godfrey’s radio show for two weeks. Arthur was pitching Sara Lee Chocolate Cake in an ad and asked if anyone in the studio could make a better one. I said I could so he asked me to bring one in the next day, which I did. I don’t think he expected this, but he sent someone out to pick up a Sara Lee cake and then passed both cakes around the band and they voted my cake the best! Arthur, always quick on the draw said to the radio audience – ‘Well folks, if you can’t get Sandy’s cake, get Sara Lee’s!’”

Without further ado, Sandy’s better-than-Sara Lee chocolate mayonnaise cake…

INGREDIENTS

  • 2 cups all-purpose flour
  • 2/3 cup unsweetened cocoa powder (we used Hershey’s unsweetened)
  • 1 1/4 tsp. baking soda
  • 1/4 tsp. baking powder
  • 3 eggs
  • 1 2/3 cups sugar
  • 1 tsp. vanilla extract
  • 1 cup mayonnaise
  • 1 1/3 cups water

DIRECTIONS

  1. Preheat oven to 350°.
  2. Grease and flour two 9-inch round cake pans.
  3. Combine dry ingredients: flour, cocoa, baking soda, and baking powder.
  4. In a large bowl, with an electric mixer on high, beat together eggs, sugar, and vanilla for 3 minutes, or until light and fluffy.
  5. Beat in the mayonnaise at low speed until blended.
  6. Alternately beat in the dry ingredients and the water, beginning and ending with the flour mixture.
  7. Pour into cake pans and bake for 30 minutes, or until a toothpick comes out clean. 
  8. Voila – let it cool, ice it (we made a simple chocolate buttercream with the Hershey’s cocoa poweder) and eat it! 

We also made some psychedelic decorations out of marzipan dyed with food coloring gel.

This cake was really straight forward and easy to make and it turned out delicious! The crumb was moist and slightly fudgey. By strange coincidence,  chocolate mayonnaise cake already happens to be the birthday cake of choice in the household of LITA-founder Matt Sullivan, but it was new to the rest of us. The Sullivan household also highly recommends making cake shakes with the leftover cake. Perhaps that will be a later installment of Bite In The Attic.

After baking this beauty were left wondering how the cake would differ if we’d used melted down bar chocolate as opposed to powdered, so we’re hoping to make it that way too and do a little comparison. While the cake’s texture was incredible, we thought the flavor could’ve been a little bit richer. Maybe next time we’ll add a little coffee or espresso to the cake batter as well and report back.

Jingle Bell Rocks!

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We’re pleased to announce that a new documentary film featuring The Free Design song, “Close Your Mouth (It’s Christmas) will air on the Knowledge Network TV this Dec. 17th 2013 at 9:00 and on Dec. 18th 2013 at midnight.  The film, Jingle Bell Rocks, is a cinematic sleighride into the strange and sublime universe of alternative and underground Christmas music, featuring The Flaming Lips, Run-DMC, The Free Design, Low, Miles Davis & Bob Dorough, Clarence Carter, John Waters, Akim & The Teddy Vann Prod. Co., The Mighty Sparrow, A Girl Called Eddy, El Vez and many more.  Check out the site – http://jinglebellrocks.com/ for trailers, more information and festival screenings!

Here is a clip from the new Christmas Documentary film “Jingle Bell Rocks!” featuring The Free Design and an interview with Sandy Dedrick.

Merry Christmas!

Sandy Dedrick Interview with Karl Gehrke on South Dakota Public Radio

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The late 1960s were a golden age for what today is called sunshine pop. This was a time when vocal groups like the Association, the Mamas and Papas, Fifth Dimension and others hit the top of the charts with cheerful songs about riding in beautiful balloons and winsome girls handing out rainbows.

Perhaps the sunniest group of all was a quartet of siblings from rural New York who called themselves the Free Design. With arranger and songwriter Chris Dedrick at the helm, brother Bruce and sisters Sandra and Ellen created music that was lyrically happy and playful, yet also musically sophisticated and adventurous.

Unfortunately the Free Design never found much commercial success, but some 25 years after calling it quits, the group’s music was rediscovered and today has a cult following. Chris lost a battle to cancer five years ago, but Sandra Dedrick is still performing and recording. She’s just released a new album called Love You. She joined Dakota’ Midday’s Fifth Friday and discussed the Free Design’s magical music.

Listen to the interview here:

http://listen.sdpb.org/post/dakota-midday-sunny-sounds-free-design