Piece of Cake, A True Story
Erick Sahler • September 15, 2020
“Mr. Shaler, let me tell you one thing,” the female caller snapped. “The MEN on Tangier Island cook better than the WOMEN on Smith Island.”
Clikkup.
A few seconds later my phone chirped again.
“Newsroom. This is Erick.”
“Is this Erick Shaler?”
“Umm — this is Erick Sahler.”
“Mr. Shaler, I want to warn you,” a man said. “There’s a pack a ladies gettin’ on the mailboat. They’re mad as hornets and they’re headed your way.”
So began my morning on Monday, Oct. 4, 2004. The day before, the Salisbury newspaper published the 74th of 159 editorial cartoons I drew from 2003 to 2006.
But this story actually starts more than a decade earlier. And it’s really more about my wife than me.
Tracy was writing food features when we began dating in 1990. She had moved here from Colorado and I encouraged her indoctrination into Eastern Shore cuisine. We spent our free time wandering the backroads and eating what the locals ate, including chicken barbecue, stewed muskrat, and lots and lots of seafood.
For our first Christmas together, I presented her a copy of Mrs. Kitching’s Smith Island Cookbook, originally published in 1981 and still available in its seventh printing today.
An island native, Frances Kitching had grown famous for her down-home Eastern Shore feasts, thanks to stories by food writers from the New York Times, Philadelphia Inquirer, and Washington Post. Her meals included crab loaf, oyster puffs, pan-browned wild duck, baked rockfish, and crispy crab cakes. The actor Sylvester Stallone, arriving by helicopter with a party of 12, had once dined at her table, as had Washington’s NFL football team.
Mrs. Kitching’s granddaughter, Joanne, who worked with us at the newspaper, secretly shuttled the cookbook to Smith Island to be signed.
“To Tracy. God bless. From my kitchen to yours. Frances Kitching 12/25/90” is inscribed on the title page in blue ball-point ink.
Several years later, Mrs. Kitching agreed to be featured in a story about Smith Island cake that Tracy was writing for the Baltimore Sun.
Smith Island cake is made of 10 thin layers—traditionally yellow cake — with a delicate coating of icing in-between—usually chocolate. Making one is labor intensive, but the result is a sweet rich moist cake. Eating a slice is an unforgettably sensual experience.
Back then, the cakes were not well known. Even on Smith Island, pies were the preferred dessert. In fact, Mrs. Kitching didn’t include a Smith Island cake recipe in the first five printings of her cookbook.
So Tracy gathered the prescribed ingredients and sailed on the mailboat to Smith Island. Over the next three hours she recorded the from-scratch instructions as Mrs. Kitching worked in her kitchen. The famous cook had never written down the recipe.
It became Tracy’s most far-reaching food story, and she republished Mrs. Kitching’s Smith Island Cake recipe in her food column in the Salisbury paper for years as readers continued to request it.
Over the next decade, the popularity of the Smith Island Cake exploded.
Tidewater Publishers printed a sixth edition of Mrs. Kitching’s Smith Island Cookbook, replacing a full-page black-and-white photo of a crab shanty on page 110 with the exact Smith Island Cake recipe Tracy wrote for the Baltimore Sun. A large gold sticker on the cover proclaimed “Smith Island Ten-Layer Cake Recipe Added.”
Smith Island Cake popped up on restaurant dessert menus across the mid-Atlantic region.
Businesses were launched in Crisfield and Salisbury to sell Smith Island Cakes, which were available for shipping all around the globe.
At the statehouse in Annapolis, it was declared Maryland’s official state dessert.
And so it was, I was chatting with a group of fellas at a birthday party in the summer of 2004, where not one, not two, but three(!) different varieties of Smith Island Cake were served.
“Ten years ago, nobody’d ever heard of Smith Island Cake, now they’re everywhere,” I said. “You suppose there’s a Tangier Island cake, too? What would that be?”
“A box a Tastykakes!” one fella shot back.
We roared!
A few weeks later, after I had turned that snippet of conversation into an editorial cartoon for the Salisbury newspaper, the folks on Tangier Island were not amused. In fact, they were downright ornery and they let me know it. I received threatening phone calls and letters for days.
Now they say there’s a little truth in every joke. But to be honest, I know nothing about the ability of the cooks on Tangier Island. We ate a fried seafood meal while taking my in-laws there on a day trip once. It was sufficient. I don’t remember dessert.
So to those on Tangier Island who were offended by the juvenile sense of humor in my cartoon, I apologize in full.
It wasn’t personal. I was just trying to be funny.
There. It’s done.
Piece of cake.
Erick Sahler is an artist and writer. He has exhibited his serigraph prints across the Eastern Shore and they are available in shops throughout the region. Erick holds a B.A. in Visual Arts from UMBC and is a member of the Society of Illustrators in NYC.
Common Sense for the Eastern Shore
Right now, Congress is working on a fast-track bill that would make historic cuts to basic needs programs in order to finance another round of tax breaks for the wealthy and big corporations.
The House Agriculture Committee recently voted, along party lines, to advance legislation that would cut as much as $300 million from the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program. SNAP is the nation’s most important anti-hunger program, helping more than 41 million people in the U.S. pay for food. With potential cuts this large, it helps to know who benefits from this program in Maryland, and who would lose this assistance. The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities compiled data on SNAP beneficiaries by congressional district, cited below, and produced the Maryland state datasheet , shown below. In Maryland, in 2023-24, 1 in 9 people lived in a household with SNAP benefits. In Maryland’s First Congressional District, in 2023-24: Almost 34,000 households used SNAP benefits. Of those households, 43% had at least one senior (over age 60). 29% of SNAP recipients were people of color. 15% were Black, non-Hispanic, higher than 11.8% nationally. 6% were Hispanic (19.4% nationally). There were 24,700 total veterans (ages 18-64). Of those, 2,200 lived in households that used SNAP benefits (9%). The CBPP SNAP datasheet for Maryland is below. See data from all the states and download factsheets here.
Apparently, some people think that the GOP’s “big beautiful bill” is a foregone conclusion, and that the struggle over the budget and Trump’s agenda is over and done. Not true. On Sunday night, the bill — given the alternate name “Big Bad Bullsh*t Bill” by the Democratic Women’s Caucus — was voted out of the House Budget Committee. The GOP plan is to pass this legislation in the House before Memorial Day. But that’s not the end of it. As Jessica Craven explained in her Chop Wood Carry Water column: “Remember, we have at least six weeks left in this process. The bill has to: Pass the House, Then head to the Senate where it will likely be rewritten almost completely, Then be passed there, Then be brought back to the House for reconciliation, And then, if the House changes that version at all, Go back to the Senate for another vote.” She adds, “Every step of that process is a place for us to kill it.” The bill is over a thousand pages long, and the American people will not get a chance to read it until it has passed the House. But, thanks to 5Calls , we know it includes:
Let's talk about our Eastern Shore Delegation, the representatives who are supposed to fight for our nine Shore counties in Annapolis, and what they actually got up to this session.
For the first time in recent memory, Virginia Democrats have candidates running in all 100 House of Delegates districts — a milestone party leaders and grassroots organizers say reflects rising momentum as President Donald Trump’s second term continues to galvanize opposition.
The 447th legislative session of the Maryland General Assembly adjourned on April 8. This End of Session Report highlights the work Shore Progress has done to fight for working families and bring real results home to the Shore. Over the 90-day session, lawmakers debated 1,901 bills and passed 878 into law. Shore Progress and members supported legislation that delivers for the Eastern Shore, protecting our environment, expanding access to housing and healthcare, strengthening workers’ rights, and more. Shore Progress Supported Legislation By The Numbers: Over 60 pieces of our backed legislation were passed. Another 15 passed in one Chamber but not the other. Legislation details are below, past the budget section. The 2026 Maryland State Budget How We Got Here: Maryland’s budget problems didn’t start overnight. They began under Governor Larry Hogan. Governor Hogan expanded the state budget yearly but blocked the legislature from moving money around or making common-sense changes. Instead of fixing the structural issues, Hogan used federal covid relief funds to hide the cracks and drained our state’s savings from $5.5 billion to $2.3 billion to boost his image before leaving office. How Trump/Musk Made It Worse: Maryland is facing a new fiscal crisis driven by the Trump–Musk administration, whose trade wars, tariff policies, and deep federal cuts have hit us harder than most, costing the state over 30,000 jobs, shuttering offices, and erasing promised investments. A University of Maryland study estimates Trump’s tariffs alone could cost us $2 billion, and those federal cuts have already added $300 million to our budget deficit. Covid aid gave us a short-term boost and even created a fake surplus under Hogan, but that money is gone, while housing, healthcare, and college prices keep rising. The Trump–Musk White House is only making things worse by slashing funding, gutting services, and eliminating research that Marylanders rely on. How The State Budget Fixes These Issues: This year, Maryland faced a $3 billion budget gap, and the General Assembly fixed it with a smart mix of cuts and fair new revenue, while protecting working families, schools, and health care. The 2025 Budget cuts $1.9 billion ($400 million less than last year) without gutting services people rely on. The General Assembly raised $1.2 billion in fair new revenue, mostly from the wealthiest Marylanders. The Budget ended with a $350 million surplus, plus $2.4 billion saved in the Rainy Day Fund (more than 9% of general fund revenue), which came in $7 million above what the Spending Affordability Committee called for. The budget protects funding for our schools, health care, transit, and public workers. The budget delivers real wins: $800 million more annually for transit and infrastructure, plus $500 million for long-term transportation needs. It invests $9.7 billion in public schools and boosts local education aid by $572.5 million, a 7% increase. If current revenue trends hold, no new taxes will be needed next session. Even better, 94% of Marylanders will see a tax cut or no change, while only the wealthiest 5% will finally pay their fair share. The tax system is smarter now. We’re: Taxing IT and data services like Texas and D.C. do; Raising taxes on cannabis and sports betting, not groceries or medicine; and Letting counties adjust income taxes. The budget also restores critical funding: $122 million for teacher planning $15 million for cancer research $11 million for crime victims $7 million for local business zones, and Continued support for public TV, the arts, and BCCC The budget invests in People with disabilities, with $181 million in services Growing private-sector jobs with $139 million in funding, including $27.5 million for quantum tech, $16 million for the Sunny Day Fund, and $10 million for infrastructure loans. Health care is protected for 1.5 million Marylanders, with $15.6 billion for Medicaid and higher provider pay. Public safety is getting a boost too, with $60 million for victim services, $5.5 million for juvenile services, and $5 million for parole and probation staffing. This budget also tackles climate change with $100 million for clean energy and solar projects, and $200 million in potential ratepayer relief. Public workers get a well-deserved raise, with $200 million in salary increases, including a 1% COLA and ~2.5% raises for union workers. The ultra-wealthy will finally chip in to pay for it: People earning over $750,000 will pay more, Millionaires will pay 6.5%, and Capital gains over $350,000 get a 2% surcharge. Deductions are capped for high earners, but working families can still deduct student loans, medical debt, and donations. This budget is bold, fair, and built to last. That’s why Shore Progress proudly supports it. Click on the arrows below for details in each section.
