Tastes Like Vintage: 7-Up Bundt Cake

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Vintage harvest Nordic Ware Bundt pan by stockintrade

Etsy sellers do love their Bundt pans in all kinds of ways that don't involve flour. Bundt pan as kitchen sconce. Bundt pan as base for kitchen tier. Bundt pan filled with balls of yarn or spools of thread. While all these are entirely noble and splendidly creative uses, it does seem that sometimes it's good to step away from the upcycling and use that pan in the way nature intended--to make a luscious cake that is so pretty it would be a crime to do more than delicately dust it with confectionery sugar or drizzle it with icing.

A Bundt is a cast aluminum ring pan with a fancy pattern. According to Wikipedia, it entered the American cooking oeuvre in the 1950s when a group of Hadassah Society members asked the co-founder of Nordic Ware if he could make a metal version of the traditional ceramic European Gugelhupf pan used for making festive holiday yeast breads. It was not exactly a red hot seller...until 1966. Pillsbury Bake Off. Tunnel of Fudge. The rest is history. Tunnel of Fudge is singularly to thank for the massive number of harvest gold, tangerine and avocado green vintage pans we all come across on our thrifting missions. Think Chocolate Lava Cake with nuts.

1951 7-Up bottle by Jill Hannah

While chocolate would be appropriate for the day before Valentine's Day, the Unusual Old World and American Recipes cookbooklet from Nordic Ware (1972) itself has a far more interesting suggestion, the 7-Up Bundt Cake. Interestingly, the 7-Up appears to be both the part of the flavoring and part of the leavening. It seems only fitting that the cake pan most likely to be upcycled should be filled with batter leavened by an upcycled soft drink.

Vintage GE hand mixer by The Wrinkly Elephant

7-Up Bundt Cake

1 1/2 cups butter
3 cups sugar
5 eggs
3 cups flour
2 tbsp lemon extract
3/4 cup 7-up

Cream sugar and butter together and beat until light and fluffy. Add eggs, one at a time, and beat well. Add flour. Beat in lemon extract and 7-Up. Pour batter into well greased and floured Jumbo Fluted Mold (this appears to be the 12 cup size). Bake at 325 degrees for 1-1 1/4 hours.

Respectfully submitted by Recent History