This cake is as delicious as it sounds. It’s one of my all time favourites. It’s a pound cake. There’s a lot of butter in it, but please don’t stop reading. A thin slice of this cake is worth the calorie splurge.
It’s really easy to make. You can’t mess it up. The last time I made it, I forgot to add the buttermilk and I didn’t realize it until I had already added the dry ingredients. I cursed a little when I realized what I had done, but eventually I pulled pulled myself together, added the buttermilk to the batter, got it into the oven and hoped for the best. It still turned out perfectly. I brought it in to work for a Christmas luncheon and everybody loved it. This one is a crowd pleaser for sure.
Ingredients:
1 cup butter
1 3/4 cups sugar
4 eggs
2 tsp vanilla
1 cup buttermilk
2 3/4 cups flour
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
1 tsp salt
Butter Bourbon Sauce
2 tbsp sugar
2 tbsp butter
2 tbsp hot water
1 tbsp bourbon (or dark rum)
Preheat oven to 325 degrees. Grease the pan (with butter) and then flour the pan. Cream the butter and then add the sugar gradually. Blend until light and fluffy. Add the eggs one at a time. If you’re using a stand mixer, I would remove the bowl at this point in time and scrape the bottom the bowl with a spatula to ensure that the butter isn’t stuck to the bottom of the bowl.
Add half of the buttermilk and the vanilla. Add half of the dry ingredients. Add the rest of the buttermilk. Add the remaining dry ingredients.
Mix all of the ingredients on low speed until mostly incorporated and then at medium speed. Pour the batter into the prepared pan.
I like to put my greased pan in the fridge for a couple of minutes so that it sets solid. This is a good thing to do if the cake batter is thick. The refrigeration will solidify the butter so that it doesn’t get disturbed when you pour the batter into the pan.
Bake the cake at 325 degrees for 60 to 65 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean.
Prick the surface of what will be the bottom of the cake with a toothpick while it’s still warm. You want to have lots of little holes for the butter bourbon sauce to fall into. Space the holes about an inch apart.
To make the sauce, heat the sugar, butter and hot water. When it’s all nicely incorporated, take the pan off the heat. Add a tablespoon of bourbon and give it a quick stir. Pour the warm butter sauce over the warm cake. You need to do this while the cake is relatively warm because it’s a dense cake and if you wait until it’s cool, the sauce won’t be able to penetrate into the cake very well. You can double or triple the amount of butter sauce if you want a more decadent cake. The original recipe called for a lot more sauce, but because I like to glaze the cake on top as well, I thought that it was a bit too decadent.
Allow the cake to cool 10 to 15 minutes before removing it from the pan onto a serving plate.
It you want to glaze the cake, whisk 2 tbsp milk and 1/2 cup icing sugar and pour over the cake or just sprinkle some icing sugar on top.
This cake can serve up to 20 people. The texture allows for thin slices.
Enjoy!