This Bacardi Rum Cake is a from-scratch version of the iconic cake mix dessert. It is a tender yellow cake with a generous amount of rum in the cake and in the rich buttery glaze! The crunchy pecans and coconut are baked right into the cake for the perfect bite!

When flipping through the pages of Anne Byrn’s, A New Take On Cake, I almost couldn’t choose which cake to make! But leaping off the page, as if she was in on my recent obsession with bundt cakes, was her Bacardi Rum Cake.

You’ll remember the Cake Master Anne from my Gingerbread Cake post. Anne modernizes and adds richness to the traditional recipe while staying true to the box cake mix and pudding mix base. {We even teamed up with Anne to GIVEAWAY two of her amazing cookbooks!} You know I couldn’t resist the urge to replicate the OG recipe from scratch.

Enough lead up, tell us about the Bacardi Rum Cake! {Don't mind if I do!}
This cake is epic. Particularly, the buttery boozy glaze literally changed my life. Now I have to restrain myself from soaking every single cake with a variation of the rich glaze. And developing a cake recipe that has that soft, tender crumb of yellow cake mix combined with the chewiness from the cornstarch in pudding mix led to creating my new favorite yellow cake.

Furthermore, this Bacardi Rum Cake stores and ships really well! You could also wrap really well and freeze for a later date or this tropical trifle recipe!

And what to do with the leftover rum from your Bacardi Rum Cake victory? We're no stranger to rum recipes here at CLF. My easy, no-bake Speculoos Rum Balls are incredibly easy to pull together and delightfully boozy! They have a mix of rum and Grand Marnier for that extra bit of flair.

Recipe
Bacardi Rum Cake
Ingredients
For the Cake:
- 3 ½ cups Cake Flour
- 2 tablespoons Cornstarch
- 1 tablespoon Baking Powder
- 1 ½ teaspoons Salt
- 1 cup Butter
- 2 ½ cups Sugar
- 3 Eggs
- 3 Egg Yolks
- 1 cup Sour Cream
- ½ cup Dark Rum
- 1 cup Pecans (chopped)
- ½ cup Shredded Sweetened Coconut
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 325°F convection.
Prep your Pan:
- I sprayed my pan with cooking spray and then floured it. Tap the flour around until every inch is covered. Tap out the extra flour onto a piece of parchment on the counter. You should be left with a perfectly floured pan.
- Sprinkle the pecans and coconut around the bottom of the pan.
To make the cake:
- Sift together cake flour, cornstarch, salt and baking powder. Set aside.
- In a small bowl whisk together rum and sour cream. Set aside
- In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, beat butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Beat in the eggs one at a time followed by egg yolks, scraping down the sides of the bowl after every two eggs or so.
- Switch the mixer to low and then alternately add the flour mixture and sour cream. I don’t wait until all the flour has incorporated until I add the next batch. I just keep adding with two hands. Pro-style. I do stop the mixer to add the last of the sour cream because I like to scrape it all out with a rubber spatula.
- Pour into prepared pan and smooth the top.
- Bake in preheated oven until a cake tester comes out with a few clinging crumbs. This will take about 60-85 minutes depending on your oven and the size of your bundt pan. Mine baked for 70 minutes. If you overbake it will be dry. Even that much butter, sugar and sour cream can’t over compensate for overbaking. Just sayin’.
- Let her COOL 20 minutes and then loosen the edges with a paring knife and then turn it out onto a rack. Allow to cool completely. Prick the cake all over with a cake tester or skewer.
To make the glaze:
- Melt the butter in a pot. Stir in the water and sugar and boil for 5 minutes. Remove from the heat and stir in the rum.
- With the cake on a wire rack sent over a baking sheet or rimmed plate, slowly pour the glaze over the cake, allowing it to sink in. I did two rounds of soaking with the glaze. I poured the excess glaze back into the pot and then poured it over the cake again.
Notes
Yield: 10-12 cup bundt Cake


Leave a Comment!