The Fresh Loaf

A Community of Amateur Bakers and Artisan Bread Enthusiasts.

Pound Cake

bakergal29's picture
bakergal29

Pound Cake

Hi everyone!

 

I'm new here, but I'm curious who's got a great pound cake recipe? I can't make one moist enough!

I'm not looking for lemon pound cake, or sour cream pound cake, or your great-granny's rutabaga madness pound cake-just good old pound cake.

 

tell me everything and BE SPECIFIC!

 

Thanks for your help!

gaaarp's picture
gaaarp

Here is my favorite pound cake recipe, from The New Orleans Cookbook, by Rima and Richard Collin (Knopf, 1992).  The authors claim that the secret to the lightness of this cake is in hand mixing the batter with a wooden spoon.

1 cup (2 sticks) butter                    ½ tsp. salt

2 cups sugar                                 ¼ cup milk

2 ¼ cups flour                               5 large eggs

½ tsp. baking powder                     1 tsp. vanilla extract

1. Remove eggs and butter from refrigerator the night before baking.

2. Preheat oven to 300 degrees F. Butter the inside of a tube pan or an 8-inch cake pan, then dust lightly with flour.

3. Cream butter and sugar in large mixing bowl. Sift flour, baking powder, and salt together twice and add to butter mixture.

4. Add the milk slowly while beating the mixture with a wooden spoon.

5. Add the eggs one at a time, mixing well after each one.

6. Add the vanilla and stir several times.

7. Fill the pan with the cake batter and bake in preheated oven for 1 hour and 15 minutes or a bit longer. The cake is done when the top is golden brown and a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.

8. Cool on a cake rack at room temperature before turning out of the pan.

SylviaH's picture
SylviaH

Thanks Gaaarp for the lovely recipe..we love pound cake..I have made a the same one for over 40 yrs. every holiday's..but I still try new ones..It's true about the mixing..when it's mixed in a mixer..it's not the same as when it's done by hand.  I found that out the hard way!

Sylvia

AKAlicious's picture
AKAlicious

My thanks gaaarp for posting this recipe.  I finally got around to trying it and it was just heavenly.  I used a 9x5 loaf pan and ended up giving it an extra 20 minutes to cook.  It crested out of the pan beautifully.  And the crumb was perfectly even, the top crispy and flavorful, and the inside so utterly soft it felt like the whole thing was made of butter.  I served it with a framboise dessert wine-whipped cream and fresh berries, but it's so amazing it stands just as well on its own!

Ford's picture
Ford

The old fashion pound cake does NOT contain anything EXCEPT eggs, sugar, flour, butter, and flavorings.  NO MILK! NO  ADDITIONAL LEAVENING!

I have made this cake for sixty years and I stand by it.

 

POUND CAKE

for one recipe
 
1 cup (8 oz) butter at room temperature
1 2/3 cup (11.8 oz.) granulated sugar
1 cup (8.5 oz) eggs at room temperature
1/4  tspn mace
1 tspn. pure vanilla extract
2 cup (8.5 oz.) all purpose flour
 

for one and one half recipes
 
1 1/2 cup (12 oz) butter at room temperature
2 1/2 cup (17.5 oz.) granulated sugar
1 1/2  cup (12.8 oz) eggs at room temperature
1/3  tspn mace
1 1/2 tspn. pure vanilla extract
3 cup (12.8 oz.) all purpose flour
 


for two recipes
 
2 cup (16 oz) butter at room temperature
3 1/3 cup (23.3  oz.) granulated sugar
2 cup (17 oz) eggs at room temperature
1/2  tspn mace
2 tspn. pure vanilla extract
4 cup (17 oz.) all purpose flour
 

for three recipes
 
3 cup (24 oz) butter at room temperature
5 cup (35 oz.) granulated sugar
3 cup (25.5 oz) eggs at room temperature
3/4  tspn. mace
3 tspn. pure vanilla extract
6 cup (25.5 oz.) all purpose flour
 

Notes: 1 recipe batch: 5" x 9" loaf cake (2 qt).  1 1/2 recipes: 6" x 10" loaf cake (2.3 qt), or one 10" diameter tube cake pan or one 10" diameter Bundt® cake pan.  Five large eggs is equivalent to one cup.  More than 3 recipes of butter–sugar–egg mixture in a home kitchen mixer at one time is a risky procedure.  We do not recommend trying to make more than 3 batches of dough at one blending.  The cakes are lighter and rise more evenly when only small batches are made at one mixing.

Preheat oven to 300°F.


With an electric mixer, cream the butter thoroughly.  Beat in the sugar gradually.  Beat in the mace and the vanilla.  One at a time, beat in the room temperature eggs.  Beat until the mixture is creamy.  The air that is beat in is the only leaven.  With a spoon, fold in the flour.  DO NOT BEAT!


Grease pans well with butter, then dust them with flour.  Divide the batter proportionately among the pans.  Bake until a straw, when inserted into the center of the cakes, comes out clean (internal temperature 205°F) and the cakes have started to leave the sides of the pans.  This will require about one and a half hours.  Underdone cakes will fall and be “sad”.  Overdone cakes will be dry.  When cakes are done remove from the oven and let cool in the pans for about 15-30 minutes, then turn out on to cooling racks.  When cool, the cakes may be packaged and frozen.  Cakes have excellent keeping qualities at room temperature, or in the refrigerator, if kept in tight containers or plastic bags.

AS YOU CAN SEE THIS RECIPE IS CLOSE THE THE ORIGINAL RECIPE SO NAMED BECAUSE IT HAD A POUND EACH OF EGGS, BUTTER, SUGAR, AND FLOUR.

 

FORD

jenniferw's picture
jenniferw

Ok, I know you dont want anything fancy-shmancy. But the addition of cream cheese gives it an amazing texture, almost melt in your mouth, and you dont taste anything different at all. And perfect crustiness on the outside/ top! I never use anything but butter but this is my mother in laws recipe and she says you cant substitute in this recipe. I dont mind buying it just to make this cake.

 

10" bundt, buttered and floured

1 c butter

1/2 c shortening

3 c sugar

8 oz cream cheese

3 c sifted cake flour (or 3 c regular with 6 T removed)

6 eggs, beat

1 T real vanilla or almond extract -or- combination

-Cream fats with sugar until fluffy. Add cream cheese. Alternate adding flour and eggs beginning and ending with flour. Add extracts. Bake at 325 1 1/2 hours. May need to cook longer depending on your oven, but watch it closely. Keeps and freezes very well.

avatrx1's picture
avatrx1

What's the best way to make a lemon variation on any of these?  lemon rind? lemon juice?

thanks,

-Susie

nbicomputers's picture
nbicomputers

there are several ways to make pound cake from the 1 pound of each to a more modern hi ratio method with more sugar than flour.

the old way the cakes were baked in oak lined pans bottom and sides to prevent the loaf pans from contucting a lot of heat to the sides abd bottom of the cake  that way the cake will not brown much or burn during the low temp and high amount of time the cakes were in the oven (two hours or more). the wood would also keep the cake from drying out because the wood would be wet slightly before the cakes would be placed in the pans.  also the cakes would be baked in paper liners in the wood lined pans.

To get the max amount of air the butter would be creamed with the flour till fluffy and light. the eggs and sugar would be whipted as for sponge cake and folded into the butter flour part and put into the oven as quickly as possible.