Olive Oil Bundt Cake With Beet Swirl

Great recipe! I like the delicate beet and olive oil flavors, lemon balanced out the earthiness. While pouring the batter in, I thought the swirls couldn’t possibly come out as expected, but they did! It’s easier than it looks. One note: I used store-bought, pre-cooked beets (1 lb), and found it yielded too much beet purée and had to omit some, or I would have overfilled my 10 inch bundt. Maybe try 3/4 lb next time if you’re not starting with beets that need peeling and trimming?

I love olive oil lemon cakes but the beets actually degrade the flavor here. The beet flavor isn’t that strong but it does not work well with the cake. Check out Melissa Clark’s lemon poppy seed pound cake which is much more delicious. The beets make the cake really pretty through. I want to try this with macerated raspberries instead

A family member made this beautiful cake and brought it to our house for a get together. We were all excited to try the cake thinking it must be a raspberry swirl not beet. Cake rated on looks is a 10 and rated on taste a zero, and the zero is generous.

We did not like this cake at all. Whipped cream helped it a little, but my husband almost spit it out. He said “there is something in this cake that doesn’t belong in cake!” It also takes a long time to make, I would not make it again or recommend it.

Haven’t tried this yet - but beets and orange are divine together (have been making beets with orange sauce for fall and winter holiday dinners for years) so plan to use orange, rather than lemon, zest. And wondering what the reason is for using curdled milk rather than buttermilk (which milk curdled with lemon juice or vinegar is a hack).

This is good, but it could be better. I have followed the recipe and I find that the beets could use some spices to enhance the lemon combination. For my palate, the lemon flavor is overwhelmed by the beet flavor. I think next time I'll make the batter with oranges, season the beets with a little cardamon, and drizzle with dark chocolate ganache. It certainly is a beautiful cake.

I assume it's to mimic buttermilk. Something about the combination of fat (milk) acid (lemon) base (baking soda) is supposed to help make a tender cake. Not too sure about the science, but I know it's a common substitute!

1 1/2 cups of olive oil seems like an awful tot for one cake. That would be like three sicks of butter! Has anyone found that cake too oily?

This cake came out beautifully when made just as directed. I would suggest a slightly different method for cooking the beets, however, as I found that by the time the beets were soft enough from roasting some were a bit crunchy and that affected the texture of the puree. Instead I would clean the beets, rub with olive oil, wrap in foil and roast in the 400 degree oven until soft. Even the kids loved this cake!

Although I cooked the cake for an hour, it was pretty soggy in the middle, looking underdone, especially the beets. Any idea what the internal temperature should be when it is cooked through? Using a cake tester is not a really accurate measure of doneness. And it would be nice to have a metric weight measure for the eggs, too.

For best unpanning, start with a baking spray WITH flour just prior to filling the pan. Cool for exactly 15" in your sink, setting the pan into in a warm, wet towel wrapped into a circle. Gently loosen the edges before flipping onto plate. (I don't go to all of the trouble in this helpful link, but there are some great tips for ensuring unpanning success: https://www.kingarthurflour.com/blog/2017/10/10/stuck-bundt)

As far as taste goes, it was fine. Not good, but fine. The presentation is stunning. But there were several things I would change if I made it again: 1) The taste and texture screamed *oil*. I would reduce the oil and increase the citrus. (I used the juice and zest of 1 orange and 1 lemon.) 2) There was way too much batter for a 10 cup bundt pan. 3) There were too many beets and not enough moisture to puree them. Add citrus juice or olive oil to the beets to puree smoother.

I had double the amount of beetroot batter this cake required. I roasted the beets whole, wrapped in foil, trimmed them to get 500 g. I would halve the amount of beets. The beetroot batter is quite heavy. Otherwise delicious cake, I enjoyed the lemon layer against the denser beetroot. I made a bundt cake, I suspect my pan was a slender bundt. I made a small 3" x 6" loaf and three beet red velvet cupcakes with the extra batter.