vanilla-almond rum cake

I made this cake after some significant nudges from my mother who found the recipe in Food & Wine magazine, and the recipe is a keeper. I’ve already been asked to make it again. The cake is soft and a bit nutty from the almond flour, soaked in a rum simple syrup to keep it moist and a little boozy, and topped with a vanilla bean glaze. It’s perfect for spring/summer. The recipe is slightly more involved, inspired by a bakery in Brookline, MA, but the ingredients are classic and easy to find (with the exception of vanilla bean paste). It was nice for me to get back in the kitchen though, and I liked putting the extra time into this cake. My friend assisted (i.e. photographed) the baking process, so my mishap with this cake is fully documented—you can’t tell from the final product, but the cake would not come out of the pan. Even with a generous amount of butter and flour in the pan, a chunk stayed stuck and had to be patched in. The glaze covered the mistake so it was all perfectly fine. It’s how it tastes that counts after all, right? And this cake was delicious and gone in a day.

Vanilla-Almond Rum Cake:

Ingredients:

cake:

• 1¾ cups almond flour
• ½ cup all-purpose flour, plus more for dusting
• ½ teaspoon kosher salt
• ¾ cup unsalted butter, at room temperature, plus more for greasing pan
• 1 cup granulated sugar
• 4 large eggs, at room temperature
• 2 tablespoons Myers’s Original Dark Rum

rum simple syrup:

• ¼ cup granulated sugar
• ¼ cup water
• 1 tablespoon Myers’s Original Dark Rum

vanilla bean glaze:

• 2 tablespoons whole milk
• 1 teaspoon vanilla bean paste
• 1½ cups powdered sugar

For directions, go to above link at foodandwine.com.