Orange Bundt Cake with Blackberry Icing
I don’t know about you, but I have been in a spring cleaning frenzy this year. Or should I say, spring “tidying” frenzy. After hearing nothing but good things about this book on the Japanese art of tidying up, I read it at a record pace and immediately put its teaching to use. I’ve been going through my belongings, inspired to keep only those things that I truly love, and discarding and donating the rest. My home has already started to feel lighter and more free. With the “tidying” part under control in most areas, it was only natural to move on to the “cleaning” portion of the event.
I’m going to be honest with you: I’m 32 years old and there’s still certain “adult” activities I have just never yet participated in. Cleaning the oven is definitely in that category. Sure, I’ve turned on the self-clean mode once every few years and hoped for the best, but does that mode really do anything? I’ve literally never noticed a difference.
After a pizza-cheese-drip disaster last week, enough was enough. Luckily, what I thought was going to be a back-breaking, time-consuming and messy activity only turned out to be one of those things. It was messy. I’m not going to sugarcoat it. I don’t want to gross you out with too many pictures, but you know that scene in The Shawshank Redemption where Andy runs through the sludge to escape? It was sort of like that. I know. I’m sorry.
On the up side, this project was NOT back-breaking or time-consuming like I thought it might be. In fact, it was almost disturbing how easy it was. I gave the entire inside of the oven a liberal spray of Easy-Off Fume Free Oven Cleaner before bed. In the morning, I grabbed a roll of paper towel and literally just wiped all the baked-on grease and food spills away. No scrubbing. No awful fumes (just a nice lemon scent!). No sweating. Just nice and easy wiping. I did need to use a razor blade to get the glass door of the oven clean, but that was really no sweat. The whole thing seriously only took 15 – 20 minutes, when I had mentally set aside at least an hour for this task.
With a clean oven and time to spare, I decided to celebrate with a cake. What better way to reward myself for all this spring cleaning than a spring-perfect orange bundt cake with blackberry icing? This cake is a breeze to mix up, and it’s perfect for any special occasion, like Mother’s Day, a spring birthday, or a day where you just cleaned the oven for the first time.
Orange Bundt Cake with Blackberry Icing
Ingredients
For the Orange Bundt Cake:
For the Blackberry Icing:
Instructions