Spicy Buttermilk Bundt Cakelettes

Is cakelette a word? My spell check tells me no- but that's what these are. Baby Bundts? Maybe. Anyway, this recipe came from Williams Sonoma. After consuming too much cheap chocolate Halloween candy and barrels of candy corn, I was ready for something a little less sugar-tastic with a more refined spicy flavor. This cake delivered. I'm sure it was absolutely delicious as it was but I changed the heavy cream to buttermilk. I did this partially as an experiment and mostly because I have a pretty large container of buttermilk in my fridge that I don't want to waste. The buttermilk actually gave a great balance to the spices and of course kept the cake beautifully moist. I think I might add a little nutmeg to it next time and maybe increase the ginger by a 1/4 tsp next time- but really the spice combo was really nice.


Now the glaze. I boiled my apple juice for the appointed 10 minutes but I honestly think that mine boiled down much more than was it intended to, making the glaze quite thick. For this reason it was not really something I could "brush" on as the recipe specifies. I also accidentally put a whole teaspoon of cinnamon in the glaze instead of half in the glaze half in the powdered sugar- but I am a huge cinnamon fan so I think I would make that little mistake on purpose if I make this again.
So, in a futile effort to get a picture of Helen Mae with the cakelette (since it was just her size)- I decorated her high chair and set the cake in front of her just as I was about to take the picture and as I'm sure you have already guessed... she dug her little chubby hand into it! So much for ridiculously cute food photo op.

Oh and P.S. after blowing my expectations way out of proportion for how great Halloween would be with my adorable eight month old candy corn- I'm sad to report that Helen Mae lasted approximately fifteen minutes on the trick or treat route. We decided that we ventured out too late (7:30) and that next year we'll try to leave by 5:30 or 6:00 so that she'll be ready to tackle the wide world of candy collection. I guess Derrick and I had become a little to used to the Halloweens we spent in college where the night got started at 11:00! Hard to believe that was only a year ago! Time flies!