Vanilla Mint Bundt Cake with Vanilla Grapefruit Mint Glaze

I’ve been growing all sorts of varieties of mint and basil. So far the lime basil is my favorite. I have an idea forming on how to use it but the star of today’s post is grapefruit mint.

Last year I grew all types of mint, chocolate, orange, spearmint. I added this grapefruit variety to the mix this year and so glad I did.  This unique citrus infused mint flavor adds a special something to any creation.

With the entire UN medical department about to descend upon us for a BBQ at our house in Pennsylvania on a recent Saturday, I woke up the morning of and realized in prepping for the event, I had sort of overlooked making sufficient desserts. Can you believe it.?  I blame it on my Grand Turk hangover. Even though Lemongrass and Lime Sea Salted Dark Chocolate Truffles were waiting in the freezer, it hit me they were all I had to serve to over 20 guests.

So I raided the fridge (half full jar of mint jelly) and the garden (the grapefruit mint) and quickly whipped up this cake.

At first I thought the cake was a complete fail. I was nervous enough about my impulsive use of the mint jelly. To make matters worse, in making the glaze, I mistakenly inverted the ratios of water and vanilla. My vanilla is homemade from vodka and very strong. One taste of the glaze was like having a shot. And of course in my haste I tasted the glaze after I had poured it all over the dang cake.  Grrrrr.

I chopped up some extra grapefruit mint leaves, scattered them over the top and then stashed the cake away, with no decision made to serve it or not.

This left me with a now possible dessert shortage and another more pressing problem. With several children and a possible random Muslim or two among the guests,  the only other sweet alternative were liqueur laden chocolate truffles. Yikes!  I only had drunken desserts to serve.

Toll house chocolate chip cookie recipe to the rescue! I quickly threw together a batch of everyone’s favorite cookie dough and placed it in the freezer. I find it best to refrigerate this dough overnight so I was tying to compensate.  I baked the cookies while the guests gathered round. They loved the idea of eating fresh cookies out of the oven. The Americans attendees snagged a chunk or two of the raw dough while trying to convince the international crowd raw cookie dough is an rare American delicacy.

After some egging on by the alcohol friendly guests, I hauled out the cake, cut it up and held my breath while some of them sampled it.

It was a hit taking this last minute thrown together bundt cake from possible fail to blog worthy.

Even though the cake had a strong alcohol flavor, the proportion of vanilla cake and vanilla flavor seemed to smooth everything out and the mint jelly was not as overpowering as I though it might b but I present the proper vanilla water recipe for the glaze below.

Phew!

For the Vanilla Mint Bundt Cake:

I used this recipe from Jane’s Sweets & Baking Journal  left out the rum, doubled the vanilla and used a 1/2 jar of mint jelly. I poured  half the batter in the pan, spooned the jelly in and then covered the jelly with the rest of the batter.

Directions:

For the Vanilla Grapefruit Mint Glaze:

Ingredients:

• 1 cup powdered sugar
• 1 tablespoon vanilla
• 2 tablespoons water
• 1 cup grapefruit mint leaves, torn

Directions:

• Whisk together the sugar and water.
• Take a 1/4 cup of the grapefruit mint leaves and finely chop them.
• Stir in mint to the glaze.
• Place Bundt cake on a wire rack over parchment paper.
• Slowly pour the glaze over the cake
• Sprinkle the rest of them int over the cake.
• Serve when glaze has dried.