CAKES & VEGETABLES - PART III - SWEET POTATO - Sweet Potato Bundt Cake with Bourbon and Pecans

This is the third cake that I am featuring in of my October Series called “CAKES AND VEGETABLES”. Today the chosen vegetable is the wonderful sweet potato. A root vegetable that resembles a potato, although it is not related to it. It is quite different in taste and texture. It has a pinkish-orange skin and a deep-orange, creamy-textured flesh that is much lighter and fluffier than that of the potato. As their name suggests, sweet potatoes have a slightly sweet flavor.

Sweet potatoes can be cooked in similar ways to the potatoes but cook much more quickly. You can use the sweet potato for mashing or roasting, or you can use them in vegetable soups and stews. You can also add them to risottos, pasta dishes such as ravioli and curries or make sweet potato fries and fritters. But you can also bake with them and create sweet potato pies (with or without meringue) or crème brulée or bake this fantasticly simple yet wonderful Sweet Potato Bundt Cake with Bourbon and Pecans.

Recipe for Sweet Potato Bundt Cake with Bourbon and Pecans
(as adapted from Dorothy Dalquist)

Ingredients for the Bundt

• 300 grams (1 1/2 cups) firmly packed light brown sugar 
• 75 grams (1/3 cup) unsalted butter, room temperature, plus some more for the Bundt pan
• 2 eggs (L), organic or free range
• 250 ml (1 cup) cooked and puréed sweet potato, cooled (you willl need about 1 1/2 sweet potatoes)
• 1 tsp pure vanilla extract (I used homemade vanilla sugar)
• 390 grams (2 3/4 cups) plain/AP flour, plus some more for the Bundt pan
• 200 ml (3/4 cup) milk, room temperature (I used 3.5% milk)
• 75 ml (1/3 cup) bourbon or apple juice
• 1 tbsp baking powder (I used baking powder with ground saffron)
• 1 tsp pumpkin pie spice (I mixed my own using cinnamon, nutmeg, allspice and ginger)
• one pinch of fine salt (I used fine sea salt)
• 50 grams (6 tbsp) chopped pecans (you can substitute walnuts of other nuts)
• some confectioner´s sugar for serving

Equipment

• one 10 or 12 cup Bundt or Gugelhupf baking pan 

Preparation of the Bundt

1. Lightly butter and flour a 10 or 12 cup Bundt or Gugelhupf baking pan, shaking out the excess.
2. Preheat your oven to 180 degrees Celsius (350 degrees Fahrenheit).
3. In the bowl of your electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, cream together the brown sugar, butter, and eggs until the mixture is very light and fluffy.
4. Add the cooked and puréed sweet potato than the vanilla and beat to combine.
5. In another bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder, pumpkin pie spice and salt.
5. Add the flour mixture to the butter mixture and beat until until just incorporated.
6. Switching to a rubber spatula, fold in the chopped nuts.
7. Distribute the batter in the pan and smooth the top (best done with a small offset spatula).
8. Bake until a toothpick inserted in the center of the cake comes out clean, about 50 to 60 minutes.
9. Transfer the cake to a wire rack and cool for about 10 minutes.
10. Remove the cake from the pan and turn out onto a wire rack to cool completely.
11. Dust with some confectioner´s sugar before serving.

This Bundt is a delicious and moist cake with a wonderful warm orange color, great texture and just the right amount of spicyness – make sure to use the freshest spices that you can, it will make a big difference. This is as much a great coffee cake as it is lovely for serving at a fall dinner party. Not too sweet and full of flavor, it's simply delicious. This cake keeps very well for several days

Since this time of year there is a lot of wonderful and cute marzipan creations in the stores, I picked up a bag of so-called “marzipan potatoes” (“Marzipankartoffeln”), filled mini handmade baskets with them and placed them on the table with the cake. Guests love nibbling on these marzipan treats, the little baskets add a nice decorative touch to an autumnal table.

Sources:

• light brown sugar from "Tate & Lyle" (available for example at http://www.english-shop.de)
• baking powder with saffron from "Dr. Oetker" (http://www.oetker.com)
• Gugelhupf baking pan from "Kaiser" (http://www.kaiser-backform.de)
• marzipan "potatoes" from "Niederegger (http://www.niederegger.de)
• fabric for the tablecloth called "Critter Community" from "Robert Kaufman" (http://www.robertkaufman.com)

PART IV of my CAKES AND VEGETABLES SERIES will feature the extremly versatile Pumpkin.

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CAKES & VEGETABLES - PART I - CARROT - European-Style Carrot Cake

CAKES & VEGETABLES - PART II - BEETROOT - Nigel Slater's Extremely Moist Chocolate-Beetroot Cake with Crème Fraîche and Poppy Seeds

CAKES & VEGETABLES - PART III -SWEET POTATO - Sweet Potato Bundt Cake with Bourbon and Pecans
CAKES & VEGETABLES - PART IV - PUMPKIN - Mini Pumpkin Muffins and Pumpkin Biscuits

CAKES & VEGETABLES - PART V - POTATO - Old-Fashioned Potato-Raisin Gugelhupf

CAKES & VEGETABLES - PART VI - PARSNIP - Parsnip Spice Cake

CAKES & VEGATABLES - PART VII - BEETROOT - Nigel Slater´s Beetroot Seed Cake