Cranberry Cake with Butter Rum Sauce

Cranberry Cake with Butter Rum Sauce and Sugared Cranberries is a simple recipe that is easy to prepare yet so sinfully delicious your guests would never believe it!

This recipe for a Cranberry Cake with Butter Rum Sauce has been given a new lease on life. I have so many old recipes in the archives from days when this blog was just a simple website of family favorites.  I would like to think one day they’ll all have photographs and be presented beautifully but that will most likely never happen.

Luckily this one made the cut and I updated it a bit too while I was at it. This delicious cake followed me to Colorado from North Carolina where we lived when my kids were little.

It came into my life one holiday when we had Christmas dinner with an older couple that lived in the same apartment building. Alma was a great inspiration to me and I still use some of her recipes. I will NEVER forget that she made Quiche Lorraine for me for the first time and I’ve loved it ever since. I still have those two handwritten recipe cards in an old binder…they are hard to get rid of!

I had forgotten about this lovely little cake and I wonder how I did that. It is so easy, it is so pretty and seasonal and best of all? It is so damn good!!

The biggest change I made to this recipe over the years was as simple as adding rum to the butter sauce. I have another very old recipe on this blog for a Rum Cake; the only one I have yet to modify from WAY back when I had no problem using a cake mix and never even thought to make a cake from scratch.

It’s still good but it’s that butter, sugar and rum sauce that is poured into the cake that makes it amazing.

The rum makes a subtle difference but with alcohol, subtlety is a must. You do not want family or guests to keel over; you want just enough rum to elevate the flavor profile of the cake.

I don’t think I’ll forget about this one again. Certainly making the butter sauce a rum butter sauce was a good call but I think of equal importance are the sugared cranberries.

I served it first a couple of years ago at a Christmas Party I held for my neighbors; it was simple and it cut into a lot of slices. Perfect for a larger group and easy to serve too. I was surprised at the response; I swear if every dessert I make could be this easy and generate those kind of oohs and aahs, I would be a happy camper. Don’t let the simplicity fool you; it’s the perfect blend of ingredients.

Sugared Cranberries are the perfect garnish for this simple cake and serve to elevate it to a holiday dessert table. Besides, I have such an easy (and not overnight) way of making sugared cranberries I would almost call them a piece of cake! Be careful thought; they are absolutely addictive little orbs on their own.

Make the cake portion of the Cranberry Cake with Butter Rum Sauce a day or two ahead and wrap for re-warming. It’s important if you’re doing the berries to not do them more than one day prior to serving.  It’s also imperative that you do not refrigerate them, else you’ll find them in a puddle of cranberry syrup!

Give this a try; it was so well received at my holiday Christmas parties and is one dessert that has a spectacular finish without killing the cook to get there! Happy Holidays!

Love cranberries like I do? Here’s some more holidays desserts we love with them:

• Red Wine Chocolate Cake with Sugared Cranberries
• White Chocolate Cake with White Chocolate Buttercream and Sugared Cranberries
• Pumpkin Roll with Sugared Cranberries

PIN IT! ‘Cranberry Cake with Butter Rum Sauce’

Cranberry Cake with Warm Butter Sauce

Barb

A wonderfully simple yet over the top delicious cake combining a moist yellow cake with cranberries and an out of this world rum butter sauce.

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Prep Time 10 mins

Cook Time 30 mins

Total Time 40 mins

Course Cakes, Cupcakes & Cheesecake

Cuisine American

Servings 16 Servings

Calories 451 kcal

Ingredients

  

1x2x3x

For the Cake

• 2 cups all-purpose flour
• 2 tsp baking powder
• ½ teaspoon salt
• 1 cup sugar
• 3 Tbsp butter melted
• 2 eggs
• 1 cup milk
• 2 cups fresh cranberries

For the Sauce

• 1 cup butter
• 2 cups sugar
• 1 cup cream or 1 cup half-and-half
• 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
• ¼ cup rum use white to keep the sauce light

Instructions

 

• Preheat the oven to 350. Grease a 13-by-9-inch glass baking pan. Cut a piece of parchment or waxed paper to fit the bottom of the pan; put in place and lightly grease the paper.
• To Make the Cake
• Sift the flour, baking powder and salt together in a small bowl.
• Put the sugar in a large mixing bowl and add the butter; beat on medium speed until well blended.
• Add eggs one at a time, mixing well after each egg.
• Add dry ingredients and milk alternately; starting and ending with the dry ingredients. Mix well.
• Stir in cranberries and pour into baking pan; make sure the cranberries are evenly spaced in the batter.
• Bake 30 minutes or until a wooden pick inserted in the middle of the cake comes out clean.
• Let cool, remove from pan, making sure to peel off parchent paper, and arrange on a plate or stand.
• To Make the Sauce
• Combine all ingredients in saucepan over medium heat and cook until all the sugar and butter melts and everything has blended. Turn up heat and boil for one minute.
• Poor hot sauce over warmed cake.
• Top with sugared cranberries (optional)

Notes

Click Here for the Sugared Cranberries Recipe

I've also made this is a 10"x10" glass baking dish; it needed an additional 10 minutes of baking time.

Nutrition

Nutrition Facts

Cranberry Cake with Warm Butter Sauce

Serving Size

 

1

Amount per Serving

Calories

451

% Daily Value*

Fat

 

23

g

35

%

Saturated Fat

 

14

g

88

%

Trans Fat

 

1

g

Polyunsaturated Fat

 

7

g

Cholesterol

 

88

mg

29

%

Sodium

 

284

mg

12

%

Carbohydrates

 

57

g

19

%

Fiber

 

1

g

4

%

Sugar

 

42

g

47

%

Protein

 

4

g

8

%

* Percent Daily Values are based on a 2000 calorie diet.

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