A deliciously moist cake drenched with dark rum, Bacardi rum cake is a tender cake with great crumbs. Make it from scratch (or cake mix) for a family get together, Christmas or holidays.
My other cake recipes like Vanilla Pound Cake, Gingerbread Cake, Lemon Pound Cake, and Cinnamon Apple Cake are also loved by many. Do check them out as well.
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About This Recipe
Bacardi rum cake is the most tender, moist, and mouth-watering cake that is drenched in rum flavor that balances the sweetness. The best part, this marvelous cake is completely made from scratch, interesting, right?
The use of dark rum adds a nice smoky and intense flavor to the cake, which makes it irresistible. It also makes this cake flavorful, moist, and adds a tender crumb to it.
The base of Bacardi rum cake is prepared using all-purpose flour and other basic ingredients that are used to make a cake. It is then drenched in a rum syrup, which creates the magic. The rum syrup is made using dark rum, butter, sugar syrup, and water.
Not only house parties, but this also is a delightful dessert to serve for weekly family dinners, fancy dinner parties, or Christmas/holiday celebrations. Also for birthday parties, maybe just for adults. HAHA!
You can also make this cake using a box mix. Check out this recipe.
This Bacardi Rum Cake is,
- Light
- Super moist
- Made from scratch
- Buttery
- Easy to make
- Have bold rum flavor
Ingredients
This old school sponge cake is made with regular ingredients such as,
Bacardi Dark Rum – Bacardi rum is the star ingredient, that makes this rum cake unique and different from others.
You can also use other dark rum like Meyer’s dark rum. Spiced rum-like captain morgan or coconut rum like Malibu also works well in this recipe. You can also use half malibu and half white rum or only white rum to make this cake.
Walnuts – To add a little crunch, I have added walnuts. You can also go for pecan or even pistachios or almonds. You can add some chopped nuts in the batter too for extra crunch.
Flour – The base of this cake is prepared with all-purpose flour. You can also use whole wheat flour, but the taste and texture will differ a bit.
Other Ingredients – Other than dark rum, we will need basic ingredients required for baking a cake, such as – cornstarch, baking powder, unsalted butter, granulated sugar, eggs, milk, and vanilla extract.
Baking powder helps the cake to rise. You can substitute eggs with other ingredients such as yogurt, applesauce, ground flax seeds, etc for an eggless version.
You can add orange zest or lemon zest in this cake batter, to make it extra taste and flavourful.
How to make Bacardi Rum Cake?
Preheat the oven to 350 Degrees F (180 Degrees C). Grease a 10-inch bundt pan with any neutral oil. Make sure to grease all the crevices for the cake to come out easily after baking. Dust the pan with dry flour all over and discard the excess flour. Sprinkle 1 cup crushed walnuts in the base of the pan.
Whisk ¾ cup unsalted butter and 1 and ½ cup sugar until light and fluffy. I used my stand mixer at medium speed for 5-6 minutes. Keep scraping the sides of the bowl while whisking. You can use a hand mixer to whisk the butter and sugar.
Add 4 eggs, one at a time and mix well after each addition.
Add ½ cup milk, ¾ cup Bacardi dark rum and 2 tsp vanilla extract and mix well.
Now add 2 cups of all-purpose flour, ¼ cup cornstarch, and 3 tsp baking powder to the bowl and mix until combined. Do not overmix after adding the dry ingredients. Just mix until everything comes together.
A lot of people combine the dry ingredients together before adding to the batter but I have never seen any difference in this recipe by adding these ingredients separately.
Pour the batter in the prepared pan and spread it evenly using a silicon spatula.
Put the pan in the middle rack of the oven and bake for 40-50 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center of the cake comes out clean. Remove the pan from the oven.
To make the soaking syrup, heat ½ cup unsalted butter, ½ cup sugar, ¼ cup Bacardi dark rum, and ¼ cup water in a pan until syrupy (3-4 minutes).
Pour the hot syrup over the warm cake very slowly. Let it soak the syrup for 5 minutes. Transfer the cake to a cooling rack and cool completely.
Cut into slices and serve.
Frequently Asked Questions
Most of the rum that goes in the batter anyways get cooked off while baking the cake. So the cake is almost alcohol-free with just the rum flavor.
However, the glaze has a lot of uncooked rum in it.
So there are two options to make it alcohol-free,
1. Don’t pour the glaze over the cake and serve it just as it is. However, the crumbs will be slightly dry.
2. Make the glaze with rum extract and skip the rum.
This cake uses about 1 cup of rum in the entire cake, which has a strong flavor. But then you are not eating the entire cake, just 1 or 2 slices, which will not make you boozy. Also, most of the alcohol gets evaporated while baking.
You can use olive oil instead of unsalted butter and any plant-based or nut milk instead of dairy milk.
To prepare it without eggs, you can use other substitutes such as apple sauce, flax seed eggs, yogurt, or silken tofu. If using sweetened apple sauce, decrease the amount of sugar, as the sauce adds enough sweetness to the batter.
The use of substitutes can give you a little different taste and texture, especially when you use ground flax seeds.
Serving Suggestions
Rum Cake tastes delicious both warm and at room temperature. You can serve it warm, right out of the oven or you can eat it right out of the refrigerator too.
This cake is not for kids, as it still has some amount of alcohol. You can serve it as a dessert for your house parties or just enjoy a slice of this Bacardi rum cake whenever the hunger strikes.
This is also a delicious birthday cake, for an adult.
Storage Suggestions
This cake freezes beautifully. Just wrap it twice in plastic wrap, then aluminum foil, and place in a freezer bag for up to 3 months.
The reason for so many layers is to avoid getting any air into the cake. The day you want to serve it, thaw in the refrigerator for at least 12 hours, or at room temperature.
Make sure you do not unwrap or take out the cake from the layers until it is completely thawed.
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Recipe Card
Bacardi Rum Cake Recipe
Equipment
Ingredients
- 1 cup chopped walnuts
- ¾ cup unsalted butter (softened)
- 1 and ½ cup white sugar
- 4 large eggs
- ½ cup milk
- ¾ cup Bacardi dark rum
- 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
- 2 cups all purpose flour
- ¼ cup cornstarch
- 3 teaspoons baking powder
For Rum Syrup
- ½ cup unsalted butter
- ½ cup white sugar
- ¼ cup Bacardi dark rum
- ¼ cup water
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350 Degrees F (180 Degrees C). Grease a 10-inch bundt pan with any neutral oil. Make sure to grease all the crevices for the cake to come out easily after baking. Dust the pan with dry flour all over and discard the excess flour. Sprinkle 1 cup crushed walnuts in the base of the pan.
- Whisk ¾ cup unsalted butter and 1 and ½ cup sugar until light and fluffy. I used my stand mixer at medium speed for 5-6 minutes. Keep scraping the sides of the bowl while whisking. You can use a hand mixer to whisk the butter and sugar.
- Add 4 eggs, one at a time and mix well after each addition.
- Add ½ cup milk, ¾ cup Bacardi dark rum and 2 tsp vanilla extract and mix well.
- Now add 2 cups of all-purpose flour, ¼ cup cornstarch, and 3 tsp baking powder to the bowl and mix until combined. Do not overmix after adding the dry ingredients. Just mix until everything comes together and then stop.
- A lot of people combine the dry ingredients together before adding to the batter but I have never seen any difference in this recipe by adding these ingredients separately.
- Pour the batter in the prepared pan and spread it evenly using a silicon spatula.
- Put the pan in the middle rack of the oven and bake for 40-50 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center of the cake comes out clean. Remove the pan from the oven.
- Heat ½ cup unsalted butter, ½ cup sugar, ¼ cup Bacardi dark rum, and ¼ cup water in a pan until syrupy (3-4 minutes).
- Pour the hot syrup over the warm cake very slowly. Let it soak the syrup for 5 minutes. Transfer the cake to a cooling rack and cool completely.
- Cut into slices and serve.
