Culinary Escapade

My sister just came back from a week long trip to Jamaica. She brought back some Tortuga rum cakes and was raving about how moist and delicious they were. Her biggest complaint was the fact that you could only get them in the Carribean and that they were tiny.

Up until she told me about these rum cakes the only ones I ever tasted were the black cakes that my friends gave me at Christmas or at weddings. I made a modified version of the black cake last Christmas. You can check out the recipe here.

Needless to say that after listening to her describe said cake, I was hankering for some myself. Out the window went my diet, but it was well worth it. Most recipes I found online used instant vanilla pudding and cake mixes. I avoided using either. Cake mixes are evil in my opinion. You have much better control over your ingredients if you go from scratch. I also omitted the vanilla pudding and replaced it with vanilla extract (use the real stuff not the fake please!).

When baking cakes, all the recipes I have come across use unsalted butter. I always like to go against the grain so I used half-salt butter. I like the taste better.

The cake came out moist and delicious. It was not too sweet, had a nice rum flavor and a hint of vanilla. I totally recommend making this cake if you are a rum fan.

Carribean Rum Cake

3 cups all-purpose flour
2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
a pinch of salt
1 1/2 cup unsalted butter, softened
1 1/2 cup granulated sugar
1 tsp pure vanilla extract
4 eggs
1 tbsp grated lime zest
1 cup heavy cream (35%)
3/4 cup dark rum (Tortuga if you can get it, if not any good dark rum will do)

Method:
- Preheat oven to 350F.

- Sift together and set aside the flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt.

- Cream butter and sugar until it is light and fluffy. Stir in vanilla and eggs, mix well.

- Add the lime zest and rum. Stir well to combine.

- Gradually add the dry ingredients, alternating with the heavy cream and ending with the dry ingredients. Mix between additions until well combined.

- Grease a bundt cake pan with some butter. Pour batter into the pan and bake for approximately an hour or until a toothpick inserted into the cake comes out clean.

- Carefully turn out and cool on a wire rack. Dust with some powdered sugar if desired. You can also sprinkle on some more rum too. Slice and serve when cool.