Kraken Cake

 Happy holidays!! 

Like most families, we have a couple of food traditions that we have to carry over year after year.  My favorite, since I was a child, has been rum cake.  Now usually, I follow the standard Bacardi Rum Cake just like my mom has made for as long as I can remember.  However, this year I have discovered Kraken, a far superior rum (IMHO).  Since I decided I didn't want an extra bottle of rum hanging around, I decided to try the cake with Kraken instead of the usual Bacardi.  Add to this the crazy of the pandemic and having to go to multiple grocery stores, and I ended up picking up Trader Joe's Vanilla Cake & Baking Mix and Godiva white chocolate vanilla pudding mix instead of the usual yellow cake mix and plain vanilla pudding mix.  So this year's rum cake was going to be a bit of an experiment.  However, it turned out SO GOOD.  I don't think I will ever go back to the usual recipe.  I even ended up making a second batch for New Year's Eve!  Even Belghit is enough of a fan that he didn't say a word about me making more sweets when we still have cookies in the house.  

Since TJ's cake mix is a different size than Duncan Hine's/Betty Crocker, I had to make some other adjustments to the recipe.  Therefore, allow me to present.....

Kraken Cake

Cake Ingredients

• 1 box Trader Joe's Vanilla Bean Cake & Baking Mix
• 1 box Godiva White Chocolate Vanilla Bean pudding mix
• 3 eggs, room temperature
• 1/3 cup whole milk
• 1/3 cup vegetable oil
• 1/3 cup Kraken rum

Glaze Ingredients

• 1/3 cup butter
• 3 tablespoons water
• 3/4 cup sugar
• 1/3 cup Kraken rum

1. Preheat the oven to 350 F.  Grease and flour six mini bundt pans (or 1 normal bundt pans).
2. In a large bowl, whisk together the baking and pudding mix.  Add the remaining cake ingredients and whisk until well combined.
3. Divide the batter in the bundt pans and bake 20 - 25 minutes (45 - 50 for a large pan), until a toothpick comes out clean.  Allow to cool in the pan.
4. Make the glaze.  Begin by melting the butter in a saucepan.  Add the water and sugar, stirring to combine.
5. Bring to a boil, and boil for five minutes.
6. Remove from heat and add the rum (be careful, it will put off a lot of steam) and stir well.
7. Remove the cakes from their pans and place on a rimmed plate.  Poke holes all over the cake with a wooden skewer.  Pour the glaze over the cakes.  Roll the cakes in the extra glaze to fully coat.
8. Allow to soak in the glaze overnight.