Buttery caramel drizzled over a tender vanilla cake-heaven by the slice.
Vanilla Bundt Cake with Caramel Sauce
2016-08-10 01:32:23
Makes about 12 servings
Ingredients
- 1½ cups unsalted butter, softened
- 2 cups granulated sugar
- 1 cup firmly packed dark brown sugar
- 5 large eggs
- 3 cups all-purpose flour
- 1 teaspoon baking powder
- ½ teaspoon kosher salt
- 1 cup whole milk
- 1 tablespoon vanilla extract
- 1 recipe Vanilla-Bourbon Caramel Sauce (recipe follows)
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 325°. Spray a 10- to 15-cup Bundt pan with baking spray with flour.
- In a large bowl, beat butter and sugars at medium speed with an electric mixer until fluffy, 3 to 4 minutes, stopping to scrape sides of bowl. Add eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition.
- In a medium bowl, whisk together flour, baking powder, and salt. Gradually add flour mixture to butter mixture alternately with milk, beginning and ending with flour mixture, beating just until combined after each addition. Beat in vanilla. Spoon batter into prepared pan, smoothing top. Tap pan on counter twice to release air bubbles.
- Bake until a wooden pick inserted near center comes out clean, about 1 hour and 5 minutes. Let cool in pan for 10 minutes. Remove from pan, and let cool completely on a wire rack. Place cake on a serving plate. Drizzle with Vanilla-Bourbon Caramel Sauce.
Taste of the South https://tasteofthesouthmagazine.com/
Vanilla-Bourbon Caramel Sauce
2016-08-10 01:33:29
Makes about 2 cups
Ingredients
- 2 cups sugar
- ¼ cup water
- ½ cup heavy whipping cream
- 2 tablespoons bourbon
- 1 teaspoon kosher salt
- ½ teaspoon vanilla extract
Instructions
- In a medium saucepan, place sugar and ¼ cup water, swirling to combine thoroughly. Cook, without stirring, over medium-high heat until mixture is amber colored, about 10 minutes. Remove from heat. Carefully stir in cream. Stir in bourbon, salt, and vanilla. Let cool in pan for 10 minutes, stirring frequently. Cover and refrigerate up to 3 weeks.
Taste of the South https://tasteofthesouthmagazine.com/
I love your recipes…….
Thank you so much, Annabella!
i made the vanilla bundt cake not once but twice , however the cake did not turn out yellow and the first time i made it it spilt out of the pan However I bought a bigger pan and still the results were not like the picture the color was a caramel color and the cake was very dense. I don’t understand what I did wrong Please help
Maria, we are a little suspicious that a cake using 1 cup of brown sugar would turn out to be as yellow as this cake appears in the photo. We plan to retest it as soon as we able. (We may not have time to do it before Thanksgiving since the January/February issue of Taste of the South is shipping to the printer this week.) If you like, we can suggest another cake recipe that we are certain will give you good results.
I made this cake for the first time in November. It was great. The brown sugar causes the color to be a little brown. Otherwise it was flavorful and moist. I used a 15 cup bundt pan so I had so spillage. It was a hit with my friends whom I shared it with. I am making this cake again tonight. The first time, I did not make the sauce to go with it . Just heated the cake to get it a little warm, topped it off with some Blue Bell vanilla ice cream. Heaven!!!! This time I will make the sauce to go within. Will let you know how that turns out since I don’t have any bourbon. I will just increase the vanilla.
Making this cake for the first time. It seems to be taking a lot longer than an hour and 5 min. Has anyone else had the same issue? What did I do wrong?
Hi! Thanks for reaching out with your question. We retested this recipe with the Nordic Bundt pan 10 to 15 cup, and the cake was ready after 65 minutes. Your pan may not be big enough for the amount of batter this recipe yields. If your pan isn’t big enough, that will affect the bake time.
Made this tonight and forsure have to work out the kinks. I sprayed and floured the pan and it still stuck. The Carmel sauce also didn’t turn out. I do have a large sauce pan so maybe that is my issue but how is 1/4 water supposed to moisten 2 cups of sugar just by swirling it? I feel like I’m missing the mark here lol
Hi Nola,
I asked our test kitchen and here are some thoughts for you. Hope this helps!
You aren’t really dissolving the sugar with the water. It is just to help it melt and caramelize evenly in the pan. Some people don’t use any water and some people use more. If you use too much, you could end up with a thinner sauce. Also, it is so important to use a heavy bottom pan to also disperse the heat evenly. I personally use my 9-inch cast iron skillet.
Swirl once everything is melted so it doesn’t form crystals. I typically keep a glass of water next to the pan with a pastry brush, and wash down the sides of the pan with the water to keep crystals from forming, without adding too much water. Next time, start with 1/3 to 1/2 cup water.
The “secret” to making caramel is to control crystallization by using a heavy-bottomed pan, stirring the sugar only until it’s dissolved before it boils, and then swirling the pan instead of stirring.
For a caramel sauce, you carefully add room temp cream and butter, and once cooked, a touch of salt enhances the flavor. You could also half the salt in this recipe as well.
Here’s a couple of tips for the cake sticking: Generously spray the pan just before adding the batter. Use cooking spray made for baking. And don’t let the cake sit in the pan too long. 10 minutes in the pan, then turn out to cool the rest of the way on a rack or on a serving plate. If you let it cool too long, the crust starts to stick to the pan.