... and Capt Jack says " more rum.... (cake)!"

I look forward to Manila sojourns because:

• i get to go to the mall and do some window shopping;
• i get to spend endless amount of time at FULLY BOOKED;
• i get to go to groceries and peruse aisle and aisle of goodies totally alien to CSI, National, etc.;
• I GET TO DO SOMETHING I LOVE- BAKE

There was a time when rhum cakes were all the rage. Almost all cafes carried it and I don't blame them. Sometimes I love having my cake and my liquor too.

With HBO showing reruns of Pirates of the Caribbean, I woke up early two weeks ago and baked a batch of rum cake.

I tried to document everything by taking snaps of the process using my cellphone Yes, I don't own a digital camera. (I'm that cheap eeep haha! but that's another story).

I began by preheating my oven to 300F and i kept my fingers crossed the whole time because the last time i used my oven I couldn't get the temperature right and the heat up.

After what seemed like eternity (30 minutes),the thermometer read 300F. Yey!

I began the process of measuring the ingredients and dumping the ingredients into the bowl of my kitchenaid (making sure that I follow the procedure while taking pictures). I slid my mini cake pans in the oven and waited 50 minutes.

While the cake was doing its magic inside the oven, I worked on the rum syrup. Took out my saucepan and added sugar, water and butter. When the butter was melted, I added the rum that I poured into a measuring cup but the image of Capt Jack Sparrow kept flashing in my mind so I added an extra splash of rum, then another before letting the rum syrup cool.

Fifty five minutes later (an extra five minutes in the pan to cool), I coaxed the soft, tender, yellow cakes out of the pans and doused them with the rum syrup. It was only after i excitedly wrapped them in cling wrap and foil and placed them in the fridge did it hit me that I failed to take some more pictures.

These [pics] will suffice for now. Who knows, I might be able to buy a decent digital camera by then.