Lemon-Thyme Olive Oil Cake with Balsamic Whipped Cream Frosting

About a month ago I ran into Kathleen at Target when we both happened to be visiting our families in Abilene. Having not seen each other in years and realizing we were both now in Dallas we planned to hang out. She's a busy lady though, so I promised her cake as a means of tempting her to venture downtown to see me. I ended up making several mini-cake (no, not cupcake) versions of this recipe for lemon-thyme cupcakes. After my defeat with the cornmeal and rosemary...

Rosemary cornmeal cake with rosemary balsamic syrup

As some may know, I'll put rosemary in just about anything. When I found this recipe I thought it would be right up my alley. Nope. Cornmeal does not a perfect cake make. The flavor is akin to sweetened cornbread (which is essentially all it is). The texture was pretty good. Nice and dense and spongy. The balsamic syrup just made it taste like an appetizer from Macaroni Grill.

Here is the cake in the pan after I cut out a couple slices. The balsamic syrup is in the carafe to the left.

Here is the plated version dusted with powdered sugar.

While I enjoyed the rosemary, which was very prominent, the rest of the cake was a mismatch of flavors that I wouldn't want to serve at the end of a meal. Dusted with enough powdered sugar it's not terrible, but I won't be making this again. I should have known better than to trust Giada de Laurentis.