Kentucky Butter (Rum) Cake

Last weekend we had an impromptu afternoon play date with some friends and their daughter.  We scheduled the date for 4:00 PM so that there was enough time for the kiddies to play, go to bed and for the adults to have dinner.

I said impromptu, because it was scheduled only hours before.

Dinner was not the problem - we made pizzas.  Dessert, on the other hand, we did not have figured out.  And at our house, if we have company there is something sweet on the counter.  The Wife fundamentally believes that Southern Living and Martha Stewart would both cancel her magazine subscriptions if word got back we hosted dinner guests without a homemade dessert.  But The Wife was otherwise obligated; running errands and dealing with The Baby.

I began my search, knowing I wanted to do some kind of bundt cake - they're easy to bake and easy to glaze, and this is the perfect recipe, because it is self glazing.

The cake was perfectly buttery, dense and moist - and the glaze provided the right amount of sweetness and a semi-hard sugary shell, kind of like Krispy Kreme donut icing, but with rum.

The only change I made to the recipe was replacing the water in the glaze with rum.  It worked nicely with the butter and vanilla, and gave it an adult depth that really put this over the top.
Ingredients:

Cake:
3 Cups All Purpose Flour
1 Teaspoon Baking Powder
1 Teaspoon Salt
1/2 Teaspoon Baking Soda
1 Cup Unsalted Butter (2 Sticks)
2 Cups Sugar
4 Eggs
1 Cup Buttermilk (if you don't have butter milk you can always pour 1 tablespoon of vinegar or lemon juice into 1 cup of milk - let it curdle for a minute and you have a great substitution)
2 Teaspoons Vanilla Extract
Butter-Rum Glaze:
1 Cup Sugar
1/4 Cup Rum
1/2 Cup Butter (1 stick)
1 Teaspoon Vanilla Extract

Directions:

Cake:

Preheat your oven to 350 degrees.

Grease and flour the bundt pan.  Sift together the flour, baking powder, salt and baking soda in a bowl.

In your stand mixer, cream together the butter and sugar.  Add your eggs.  Add the vanilla to the buttermilk and alternate adding the flour mixture and buttermilk to the butter/sugar/egg, beating each time to combine.
When it's all blended together, pour into your bundt pan and bake for one hour (but start checking after 45 minutes).  The cake is done when a toothpick inserted into it comes out clean.

Remove the cake from the oven and make your glaze.
Butter-Rum Glaze:

In a sauce pan, combine the sugar, rum and butter over medium-high heat.  Continue to stir mixture until sugar dissolves, then stir in your vanilla.
The Coming Together:

Using a butter knife, poke holes/slits into your bundt cake while it is still in the pan.  Pour the rum glaze over the cake, letting it soak in until it is all absorbed.  When it's all absorbed, let the cake cool for about 5 minutes before flipping.

The glaze will begin to harden as the cake cools, but I bet you'll be taking a bite before that happens.

Enjoy!