Erin’s Easy Eats

So when I was about 13 my parents cruelly abandoned my brothers and I and went on a cruise.  (I don’t really harbor resentment, it’s just funnier this way, Mom.)  And they brought back these tiny Tortuga rum cakes that I ate so happily because I was not supposed to have alcohol and I was all like “oooooh rum I’m such a rebel.”

And that is what this cake tastes like.  It is amazing.  The funny thing about it is that there is this glaze, and it dripped on EVERYTHING as my husband transported it to my parents’ house for Christmas dinner.  It was on his pants (looking suspiciously like something else, but I SWEAR it was glaze) and his coat, and my car, and my pants, and my uncle’s shirt (before he even ate any of it, who even knows how that happened…)

But anyway!  This cake is easy, and wonderful, and full of gooey rummy goodness.

Here is a link to The Pioneer Woman’s step by step instructions with photos.

• 1 box yellow cake mix
• 1 small package INSTANT vanilla pudding mix
• 4 eggs
• 1/2 cup cold water
• 1/2 cup canola oil
• 1/2 cup rum (dark or light is fine)
• 1 cup chopped pecans
• Brown sugar

Preheat oven to 325.  Spray a Bundt pan with non-stick cooking spray (or do a happy dance because you have a silicone one.)  Sprinkle nuts into top of pan, and sprinkle a little brown sugar on top of that.  Mix all remaining cake ingredients together, and smooth out top.  Bake for about an hour (mine took a little longer to have a tester come out clean.)

When your cake has roughly ten minutes left, make the glaze.  (This is the full recipe for the glaze, I could have easily halved it and still had enough left over to go all over my pants.)

• 1 1/2 sticks butter
• 1/4 c. water
• 1 1/2 c. sugar
• 3/4 c. rum

Melt butter in a small saucepan.  Add sugar and water, and bring to a boil, stirring constantly.  Let boil for 5 minutes, stirring the whole time.  Add rum (take your pan off the stove if you have a gas stove!) and let cook for another 30 seconds.

When cake comes out of the oven, pour about 1/3 of the glaze over the cake as it sits in the pan.  Let rest ten minutes, and then invert onto a serving platter.  Prick the cake with a fork (gently!) a bunch of times, then slowly (and with great patience) get as much glaze as possible in/on the cake.  Let cool to room temperature.  Eat, and dream of cruises you never took.

Tags: baking, pioneer woman, rum, sweets