get the good stuff / golden grand marnier cake

In The Cake Bible, Rose Levy Beranbaum writes that she used to ship the Golden Grand Marnier Cake (page 44) to her daughter for her birthday.  Several things about this statement suggested that this cake would be a hit: first, that, out of her huge cake repertoire, she chose to make this one for her daughter each year.  Second, the fact that it shipped and kept so well indicated that it must have been sufficiently moist so as not to dry out during transit.  And, seriously, how could you go wrong with Grand Marnier?

The ingredient list has a lot of tasty elements going for it--Grand Marnier (of course), the use of ground almonds in place of some of the flour, sour cream, orange zest.  I did not have orange flower water, so I substituted vanilla as suggested.  With the zest in the batter and the Grand Marnier/fresh OJ syrup, I felt that there was adequate orange flavor as it was. The recipe required the zest of 3 oranges and juice from about 1 orange.  I had only large Ghirardelli bittersweet baking chips, so I cut the chips in half to make them smaller.

I felt that I overbaked the cake a bit, even though I checked the cake at 55 minutes (the low end of the given time range). The sides were a bit overbrowned, but the crumb was still very moist.  So far, sour cream cakes have never once disappointed in terms of the crumb.  The chocolate bits were quite nice, and the amount of Grand Marnier was just right. 

I think I'd like to try this cake again in a different pan.  The book suggests baking in little bundtlette pans, which would make nice individual servings.  I would also probably go with mini chocolate chips next time, as the halved baking chips were still a bit large.  All in all, I agree that this is a fabulous recipe that I probably would request for my birthday, too.

Ratings:

Overall - 9

Crumb - 8 / very moist and soft, and not too wet, just as the book states

Flavor - 9 / terrific orange flavor, complemented nicely by the small bits of chocolate; just the right amount of liqueur

Appearance - 7 / a little overbrowned; use caution when brushing on the syrup as the cake crumbles easily

Ease of baking - 5 / some extra effort required to zest and juice the oranges and grind up almonds; more ingredients than many

Details:

Bakeware - 9-cup Bundt pan

Oven temperature - 350 degrees

Bake time - 55 minutes

Notes - slightly overbrowned at this bake time.  Half of the syrup was brushed on immediately after baking with cake in pan on rack.  Cake was then cooled 10 minutes and inverted onto serving plate and brushed with remaining syrup. Cake was served day of baking after cooling.