Italian Rum Cake...old skool style!

How proud am I of my rum cake? From the top of my head to the tips of my toes, I still tingle when I think of my rum cake.

When I get an idea stuck in my head, there's no shaking it. My idea was to make an old-school Italian cake. Chalk it up to a nostalgic feeling anytime a celebration rolls around. We had some rum cake at my brother-in-law's graduation. It was okay. So-so. It wasn't mind-blowing. Just "meh". Somehow, rum cake in the 70's & 80's always tasted divine and I decided to make it my mission to recreate the perfect cake.

I didn't appreciate it when I was a 7 yr-old & all the other kids had their cherry Duncan Hines cakes topped with fluffy vanilla frosting & multicoloured sprinkles. It embarrassed me to have agigantic, ethnic delicacy... sprinkled with slivered nuts & spun sugar from Uniti Bakery in Etobicoke (needless to say, Uniti is long gone...so sad). Let's face it, anyone under 15 will not appreciate a cake loaded with rum. But that's the way it was back then for a young Italian kid. Rum cake. Take it or leave it.

How I miss Uniti Bakery rum cake.

So I took bits and pieces of recipes I found on the internet & in my mom's recipe box. See, a rum cake can't be divine unless it is made with the perfect "pan di spagna" (that's a sponge cake) and my mom's pan di spagna is out of this world! There's a story behind it as well...but I'll save that for another time. End result, the cake was delish! Oh so so so good! I had it for breakfast, lunch, dinner & dessert. I'm going to have to refrain from posting the recipe, however. Nope, it's not quite ready yet. I still have to work out a slight kink in the chocolate custard portion of the recipe. I promise to post it later. Cross my heart.