Butter Rum Sheet Cake

Butter Rum Sheet Cake. This light and fluffy homemade yellow cake has rum baked in and is drenched in a butter rum sauce. Even though this cake is sized down it still has full sized flavor! 

It’s the start of the Christmas baking season. So I’m bringing you this Butter Rum Sheet Cake. I guess it’s more of a small batch sheet cake, if that’s even a thing? One thing I can’t stand is wasting food. And as much as I love cake, and all the kids love cake, we just can’t ever seem to finish a cake.

Typically Butter Rum cake is made as a bundt cake. And even then, we just never eat it all. So I decided to make a sheet cake, smaller sized. I used an 8×8 pan, the typical size of a brownie pan. Which is the perfect amount of cake! 

This cake is made completely from scratch. Getting a yellow cake to taste like a box mix is not the easiest thing in the world. So I turned to America’s Test Kitchen and their Yellow Cake recipe. They developed a method of adding the egg yolks to the batter and whipping the whites separately and folding into the batter to create the light and fluffy cake that we have come to expect from a box mix.

It is an extra step. But it is well worth it. You can of course skip it if you dare, but don’t expect the light and fluffy cake of your dreams.

The best part of the cake is the butter rum sauce that is drizzled on top. It’s basically just butter, rum and sugar. You want to pour it over the cake while the cake is still warm to allow the sauce to soak into it. It will leave a wonderful glazed top to the cake too.

Just a warning if you try to eat a piece as soon as you pour the warm sauce over the cake you may get hit with a super strong hit of rum flavoring. But it will mellow out as the sauce cools. Since we boil the alcohol and bake it in the cake, the alcohol will be removed. But the flavoring remains.

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Butter Rum Sheet Cake

4.50 from 2 votes

Prep: 10 minutes mins

Cook: 28 minutes mins

Servings: 8

Author: Serene

Butter Rum Sheet Cake. This light and fluffy homemade yellow cake has rum baked in and is drenched in a butter rum sauce. Even though this cake is sized down it still has full sized flavor! 

Ingredients  

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Yellow Cake

• ▢ 1½ cup cake flour
• ▢ ¾ tsp baking powder
• ▢ ⅛ tsp baking soda
• ▢ ½ tsp salt
• ▢ 1 cup white sugar divided
• ▢ 5 tbsp unsalted butter melted
• ▢ ⅓ cup buttermilk
• ▢ ⅓ cup rum
• ▢ 1 tbsp vegetable oil
• ▢ 1½ tsp vanilla extract
• ▢ 4 large egg yolks
• ▢ 2 egg whites

Butter Rum Sauce

• ▢ ¼ cup butter
• ▢ ½ cup white sugar
• ▢ 2 tbsp rum
• ▢ 2 tbsp water

Instructions 

Yellow Cake

• Preheat oven to 350°F. Spray an 8×8 baking pan with non stick baking spray. Set aside.
• In a large bowl combine the cake flour, baking powder, baking soda, and 3/4 cup of white sugar. Stir together with a  fork to mix.
• In another medium size mixing bowl combine the melted butter, buttermilk, rum, oil, vanilla extract and egg yolks. Stir to combine.
• In a small separate bowl add the 2 egg whites. (you can discard or keep the other 2 remaining egg whites for another recipe, or an egg white omelet.) Beat the egg whites with a hand mixer until soft peaks start to form. Add the remaining 1/4 cup white sugar and continue to beat on high until peaks are stiff and shiny.
• Add the wet ingredients to the dry, stir until combined. Then fold in the egg whites gently.
• Pour the batter into the prepared cake pan.
• Bake at 350 for about 25-28 minutes or until the cake is cooked through. A toothpick inserted in the cake will come out clean, no batter.

Butter Rum Sauce

• Heat a small saucepan over medium heat. Add the butter and sugar. Allow the butter to melt and stir together with the sugar. Stir in the water and allow the mixture to come to a simmer, then remove from heat. Pour in the rum and stir together, the rum will make the mixture bubble.
• Allow to cool slightly.
• Using a toothpick poke holes into the top of the cake, then pour the butter rum sauce over the top of the still warm cake.
• Allow the cake to sit and cool for a few more minutes prior to serving.

Notes

If you don’t have cake flour you can substitute with all purpose flour and cornstarch. Measure out 1 and 1/2 cups all purpose flour, remove 3 tablespoons of the flour and add in 3 tablespoons of cornstarch. Sift together and use in place of the cake flour.

If you don’t have buttermilk you can substitute with regular milk and vinegar. Measure out the 1/3 cup of milk, remove about a teaspoon of milk and add a teaspoon of vinegar. Allow to sit out for a few minutes, the milk will thicken and become chunky. Then use in place of the buttermilk.

Nutrition

Calories: 432kcal | Carbohydrates: 56g | Protein: 6g | Fat: 18g | Saturated Fat: 11g | Cholesterol: 133mg | Sodium: 291mg | Potassium: 59mg | Fiber: 1g | Sugar: 38g | Vitamin A: 545IU | Calcium: 56mg | Iron: 1mg

Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.

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