Taste With The Eyes: Mojito Cake

9.12.2008

Mojito Cake

A Mojito is a Cuban cocktail made by muddling fresh mint leaves with sugar and lime, then adding ice, rum, and club soda.

My late Great Auntie Edna made the moistest Lemon Cake you have ever tasted. In the 1950's she worked in a bakery. Loved to bake. My mom says she made a mean pineapple upside-down cake, and my Great Aunt Ethel fondly remembers her Prune Cake. During the 1960's, with convenience all the rage, a lemon jello cake recipe made its way around the country. It was quick and easy, made from a box of cake mix and a box of Jello. Auntie would bring this lemon cake to all the family functions...

Several years ago my brother was coming to visit me, and I asked him, what would you like me to cook for you? Aunt Edna's Lemon Cake. I asked my mom if she had the recipe, she did, and I have been making different incarnations of it ever since. And although I did not inherit my Great Auntie's love of baking, I do have her appreciation for convenient desserts.

Here is my MOJITO CAKE Version of Lemon Jello Cake:

3 oz. Jello added to 1 box (18 oz.) white cake mix.

To get the cake the color of a mojito, I use 1 1/2 oz. each Lemon Jello and Lime Jello.

Add 4 eggs, 3/4 c. canola oil, and 3/4 c. water. Mix well, then pour into a greased Bundt pan. (I use Trader Joe's Cooking Spray with Flour). Bake at 325 for 45 minutes.

Cool slightly. Pierce lots of holes all over the cake. I use a wooden skewer, or you can use a chopstick.

Put 2 T. Rum and 1 T. Crème de Menthe (a sweet mint-flavored liqueur) in a measuring cup then add fresh squeezed lime juice to make 1/2 cup.

Combine the lime juice mixture with 2 c. powdered sugar.

Pour over the holes and let the lime sugar mixture saturate the cake. Invert the cake onto a platter, serve with limes and fresh mint. Dust with powdered sugar.

Mojito Cake: with flavors of lime, mint, rum, and sugar!

The Retro Lemon Jell-O Cake Recipe:

1 package 18 oz. classic yellow cake mix
1 small box 3 oz. Lemon Jello
4 eggs
¾ cup water
¾ cup vegetable oil

Mix well, pour into a greased 13 X 9 cake pan and bake at 325 degrees for about 45 minutes until the cake is set.

Cool slightly and then poke holes all over the cake with a fork.

2 c. powdered sugar
½ c. fresh lemon juice

Mix, then pour glaze over the cake.

Some of our other versions include:

Margarita Cake - sub Tequila and Cointreau in the Mojito recipe and garnish with salt crystals.

Pink Lemonade Cake - substitute raspberry Jello for 1/2 of the lemon Jello

Molly's Strawberry Margarita Cake - add strawberry Jello

Did your Grandma or Great Aunt make a similar cake?

Julia Child Quotes - TOUJOURS BON APPETIT!

“You should never apologize at the table. People will think, ‘Yes, it’s really not so good.'"

"In France, cooking is a serious art form and a national sport."

"It's easy to get the feeling that you know the language just because when you order a beer they don't bring you oysters." Paul Child on speaking French

"I was 32 when I started cooking; up until then, I just ate. "

"Life itself is the proper binge."

"It was a Morsel of Perfection."

"I was in pure, flavorful heaven at the Cordon Bleu."

Julia Child sees herself on TV, July 1962, she saw room for improvement, and still she can say it was fun : "There I was, in black and white, a large woman sloshing eggs too quickly here, too slowly there, gasping, looking at the wrong camera while talking too loudly and so on...But it had been fun."

She has her own opinions on kitchen equipment: "Clairborne sniffed at our use of a garlic press, 'a gadget considered in some circles to be only one cut above garlic salt or garlic powder.' I happened to like garlic presses..."

Understanding Julia's captivation by French food: "This is the kind of food that I have fallen in love with: not trendy souped-up fantasies, just something very good to eat. It was classic French cooking, where the ingredients have been carefully selected and beautifully and knowingly prepared. Or, in the words of the famous gastronome Curnonsky, 'Food that tastes of what it is.' "

"You never forget a beautiful thing that you have made. Even after you eat it, it stays with you - always." Julia's instructor, Chef Bugnard at Le Cordon Bleu

"Oh, 'crise de foie,' that French sole was so delicious!"

Julia's passion comes through loud and clear as she describes a fish dish: "La Truite's true glory was the Sole a la Normande, a poem of poached and flavored sole fillets surrounded by oysters, and mussels, and napped with a wonder-sauce of wine, cream, and butter, and topped with fluted mushrooms. 'Voluptuous' was the word. I had never imagined that fish could be taken so seriously, or taste so heavenly."

Julia's unique way with words, on Crepes Suzette: "The creature named Suzette may or may not have been the mistress of the Prince of Wales, but whoever she was, she long ago inspired a magnificent dessert that is still one of our favorites."

"I am probably one of the few people around who saw the real Caesar Cardini making his salad. I was about 9 when my parents took me to his restaurant in Tijuana. They were so excited when big jolly Caesar himself came to the table to make the salad. And it was dramatic: I remember most clearly the eggs going in, and how he tossed the leaves so it looked like a wave turning over."

"With a handsome package such as Jacques's, you can neatly cut the top open at the table with a pair of scissors..." Julia on Salmon en Papillote

"There's no reason to be intimidated by the idea of making pâté. You can just think of it as meat loaf."

From Julia's dear friend Jacques Pepin, "You are what you cook."

"Understanding egg yolks will make you a master of hollandaise sauce."

Julia encouraging us not to be intimidated: "When you know how to saute your meat so it browns rather than steams, you're cooking. What's difficult about that? You heat the pan, you dry the meat, you don't crowd it into the pan, and you're browning it. Is that difficult?"

Food Quotes

"Ask not what you can do for your country. Ask what's for lunch."

Orson Welles

"Tell me what you eat, and I will tell you what you are."
Anthelme Brillat-Savarin

"Chefs, as a whole, say yes to any project, fundraiser, or tasting because they have such a generous spirit."
Charlie Trotter

"Once you understand the foundations of cooking - whatever kind you like, whether it's French or Italian or Japanese - you really don't need a cookbook anymore. "
Thomas Keller

"I love to make people happy."
Wolfgang Puck

"Fish sauce is to Vietnamese cooking as olive oil is to Italian."

The Little Saigon Cookbook by Ann Le

"I wish, I wish lunch could last forever...waiter, bring us one more bottle of wine..."

Jimmy Buffett

"My philosophy from day one is that I can sleep better at night if I can improve an individual's knowledge about food and wine, and do it on a daily basis."
Emeril Lagasse

"Gordon Ramsay makes me laugh because he knows that I'm not a chef."
Nigella Lawson

"You know, when you get your first asparagus, or your first acorn squash, or your first really good tomato of the season, those are the moments that define the cook's year. I get more excited by that than anything else."
Mario Batali

"I always knew the importance of it, since I was three or four years old my mother used to feed me wine and water. I grew up with wine as liquid food."
Robert Mondavi

"No one who cooks, cooks alone. Even at his/her most solitary, a cook in the kitchen is surrounded by generations of cooks past, the advice and menus of cooks present, and the wisdom of cookbook writers."
Laurie Colwin

"Food is a central part of our lives. It provides the body with fuel and raw materials for maintenance, growth, and repair. It draws together family and friends, anchors celebrations and rites of passage, and sometimes soothes the soul."
Ethan Becker