Category: Pound Cakes

Two weeks ago Coach Mauricio pointed out that I had never made him a pound cake. The horror! I had brought in a pound cake for Coach Morgan and had completely forgotten that Mauricio would also be there. (My mother is probably so disappointed in me.)

I asked Mauricio what kind of pound cake he would like. He asked what kinds I make. Ummm, seriously? Give me a challenge.

Mauricio prefers something more streamlined. Simple. Straight forward.

With rum. Lots of rum. Something with a kick.

Being me, I could not just leave it at rum. There needed to a contrast in there somewhere, hence the hint of chocolate.

Fingers crossed that he approves.

Te Trong Pound Cake

Cake:
6 eggs
3 cups sugar
3 cups flour
1/3 cup cocoa powder (I used Ghiradelli)
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/3 cup rum (use your favorite, I opted for Appleton)
2/3 cup milk
2 sticks butter

additional 1/3 cup of rum

Preheat oven to 325. Grease and flour bundt pan.

Combine dry ingredients in a bowl. In a larger bowl, beat eggs for two minutes, slowly add sugar, then extract, then the rum. Add in the dry ingredients.

In a small saucepan, melt butter in the milk. Do not allow to boil! As soon as the butter is melted, slowly pour this into your batter and mix well.

The batter will be thin. Pour into prepared bundt pan and bake for one hour. Test the cake for doneness with a toothpick. You want to see a few moist crumbs clinging to it.

Remove cake from oven and allow to cool for ten minutes before inverting onto cake plate. Immediately after removing the cake from the oven, slowly pour 1/3 cup rum over the cake.

glaze:
1/2 cup butter
1 cup sugar
1/4 cup water
1/4 cup rum

Bring all 4 ingredients to a boil in a saucepan. Cook for 2 minutes. Pour immediately over cake.

I put the cake on a cooling rack over a baking pan when I do this to catch all the drips.  Every few minutes I pour those drips back over the cake until they are almost all absorbed.  Hey, I am not wasting any of the glaze.

Amazingly this cake does not contain bacon. My favorite singing diva and I are usually busy pondering recipes for a future tea where bacon will be prominent in each dish, but this morning Meg focused on a chocolate whiskey cake and hoped that one of her baking friends would make one so that she could taste test. Being in a baking mood, I volunteered, but only if I could make it as a pound cake. Meg decided that would be okay with her.

Then there was the discussion about which whiskey to use. Seems Meg knows nothing about whiskeys. Neither do I. LOL My husband has three bottles for me to choose from: Jameson, Dickels, and the Torran. I had thought to use the Jameson since that is what I normally use for baking, but my hand reached for the Torran instead. I am pleased with the results.

Drunken Diva Pound Cake

2 sticks butter, softened
1/2 cup Crisco or plain yogurt
3 cups sugar
6 eggs
1/4 teaspoon black pepper
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon vanilla
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/8 teaspoon cloves
1/3 cup cocoa (I used Ghiradelli’s)
3 cups flour
2/3 cup black coffee (preferably a dark roast)
1/3 cup whiskey
1 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips

 

Preheat oven to 325*F. Butter and flour a bundt pan or two loaf pans and set aside.

Beat the butter and Crisco together. Add the sugar and cocoa. Add the eggs one at a time and beat well after each addition. Add vanilla, black pepper, salt, baking powder, cloves. Add the flour in thirds to the egg mixture and alternate with the coffee and whiskey. Fold in the chocolate chips.

Pour batter into a prepared bundt pan or the two loaf pans. Bake for 1 hour and 15 minutes. Let cool for 10 minutes before inverting onto cake plate.

If you so desire, dust with confectioners sugar.

I believe it was my uncle Bob who made Crown Royal a thing for our family gatherings. It could have been Bill. I just know that between the two of them, they managed to get the rest of us to drink it. Since I like to bake, of course I had to pour it into a cake.

Chocolate is our go to flavor for dessert. We like fudge and brownies and hot cocoa and chocolate chip cookies and chocolate ice cream and… and…

So here we have combined the two and ended up with

The Billy Bob Pound Cake

1 cup butter (2 sticks), softened
1/2 cup crisco (or an additional stick of butter)
3 cups sugar
1/2 cup cocoa
6 eggs, room temperature
2 teaspoons vanilla
3 cups flour
1/2 cup chocolate syrup
1/2 cup Crown Royal or Maple Crown Royal

smoked bourbon sugar, if desired*

Preheat oven to 325*F. Butter and flour a bundt pan or two loaf pans and set aside.

Beat the butter and Crisco together. Add the sugar and cocoa. Add the eggs one at a time and beat well after each addition. Add vanilla. Add the flour in thirds to the egg mixture and alternate with the chocolate syrup and Crown Royal.

Pour batter into a prepared bundt pan or the two loaf pans. Bake for 1 hour and 15 minutes. Let cool for 10 minutes before inverting onto cake plate.

*if you wish to, you may dust the top with smoked bourbon sugar. This can be found at specialty food stores like Southern Seasons in Chapel Hill or a Fresh Market. It can also be purchased at various sites online.

My friend Ilina is raising two foodies. One really wanted a moist bundt cake of some sort. They made a lemon one and weren’t impressed.

Now I have no idea what his definition of moist is. Mine is that I can eat a slice of cake and not have to consume 12 ounces of milk or coffee in order to choke it down. His could be more along the lines of so moist it jiggles. The thought of that makes me screw up my face and say, “EWWWWW!”

But then I thought about my dad’s favorite cake – the hot milk cake, more specifically Mrs. Holloway’s hot milk cake. And then I thought about my aunt Cindy poking holes in her rum cake and pouring a rum/sugar glaze all over it. And then I realized there was a way to make the cake to suit either me or young Master Ewen.

This is the result of the second attempt. We will not discuss the first attempt other than, “EWWWWW!”

Until I know which of her sons has requested this cake, I am calling it…

“What’s the Bird Deal” Lemon Pound Cake

Cake:
6 eggs
3 cups sugar
3 cups flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/4 cup freshly squeezed lemon juice
1 tablespoon lemon zest
1 cup milk
2 sticks butter

Preheat oven to 325. Grease and flour bundt pan.

Combine dry ingredients in a bowl. In a larger bowl, beat eggs for two minutes, slowly add sugar, then extract and lemon juice. Add in the dry ingredients.

In a small saucepan, melt butter in the milk. Do not allow to boil! As soon as the butter is melted, slowly pour this into your batter and mix well.

The batter will be thin. Pour into prepared bundt pan and bake for one hour. Test the cake for doneness with a toothpick. You want to see a few moist crumbs clinging to it.

Remove cake from oven and allow to cool for ten minutes before inverting onto cake plate.

The Lemonade Glaze

1/4 cup lemon juice
1/2 cup sugar

While the cake is baking, combine the lemon juice and sugar in a small saucepan and slowly heat until the sugar is dissolved. Set aside until cake is done and has been placed on cake plate.

Using a toothpick, poke holes in top of pound cake. Slowly pour the lemonade glaze over the pound cake. Allow it to soak into the cake.

Vanilla Glaze

1 1/2 cups powdered sugar
1 tablespoon butter, melted
1 teaspoon vanilla
2-4 tablespoons hot water

Combine the first three ingredients in a small bowl. Mix in hot water one tablespoon at a time until the glaze is the consistency that you want. For example, I like to pour my glaze over a cake. Others prefer to have something a bit thicker and more on the order of a thin icing.

Pour or spread over top of pound cake.

NOTES: if you don’t want to use both glazes, I suggest using the vanilla glaze and adding 1/2 teaspoon lemon extract in order to get a lemony taste. The cake is more subtle on the lemon flavor.

I ended up not using all of the lemon glaze. One slow pass over the cake with the glaze was all I wanted to do. (mostly because I didn’t want an overly moist cake)

The cake was moist for 6 days after being made. Six days.

Do NOT cover the cake until it has cooled. Unless you like soggy cake.

The bundt pan I chose to use was very heavy. If you are using a thinner pan, please check your cake for doneness at the 45 minute mark.

Cathy, Nicole’s mom, didn’t seem too enthralled with the thought of a Bailey’s pound cake. She mentioned Kahlua. I had to go searching for my bottle of Kahlua. I dragged a chair over to the pantry, so I could stand on it and move all the bottles of wine and whiskey etc in order to get to the Kahlua.

And then the bottle was close to empty! Oy.

Cathy thinks desserts are better if they have a bit of chocolate in them too, so the dash of chocolate is for her.

Because Cathy Told Me To…

Cake:
2 sticks butter, softened
1/2 cup sour cream or 1/2 cup Crisco
3 cups sugar
6 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla
3 tablespoons cocoa
3 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup milk
1/2 cup Kahlua

Glaze:
2 cups confectioners sugar
3-4 Tablespoons Kahlua

Preheat oven to 325*F. Butter a bundt pan and then dust with cocoa. Set aside.

Cream together the butter, sour cream/crisco, sugar and vanilla. Add the eggs one at a time and beat thoroughly.

Sift together the cocoa, flour, baking powder and salt, then add to by thirds, alternating with the milk and Kahlua.

Pour batter into the prepared bundt pan and cook for 1 hour and 15 minutes.

When cake is done, remove from oven and cool for ten minutes before inverting onto cake plate.

Glaze: blend confectioners sugar and kahlua until smooth. Pour over the cake while the cake is still warm.

(I sprinkled chocolate chips over the cake, just because I could. lol Oh, and then I had to add a splash of Baileys because there wasn’t enough Kahlua. Oops!)

Sometimes when I want to bake and don’t know what to do, my neighbor Nicole will toss out a flavor possibility to me. Normally she says something with chocolate. Not this week. She totally threw me for a loop and asked for a cake flavored with Baileys.

The Nicole:

2 sticks butter, softened
1/2 cup Crisco (or another stick of butter)
2 cups firmly packed light brown sugar
1 cup sugar
6 large eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla
3 cups all-purpose flour
1 tsp baking powder
½ tsp salt
1/2 cup whole milk
1/2 cup Baileys Irish cream

For the Glaze:
2 cups confectioners sugar
3 tablespoons Baileys Irish cream

Preheat oven to 325*F. Butter and flour a bundt pan and set aside.

Beat the butter, Crisco and sugar together. Add the eggs one at a time and beat well after each addition. Add vanilla. Sift together the flour, baking powder and salt. Add the flour in thirds to the egg mixture and alternate with the milk and Baileys.

Pour batter into a prepared bundt pan. Bake for 1 hour and 15 minutes. Let cool for 10 minutes before inverting onto cake plate.

Glaze: Blend the confectioners sugar and Baileys until smooth. Drizzle over cake.

There. I said it. I absolutely love the stuff. Lady Grey will do in a pinch, but the Earl is my preference. Last year, my friend Stephanie asked me to come up with a pound cake flavored with tea. I had never attempted this, so there was quite a bit of messaging going on between me and another baking friend — Sunshine. We decided I had to either steep the tea in warm milk or melt the butter and steep the tea in the melted butter. I tried it both ways and found that the butter picked up the flavor better for baking. Steeping it in the milk created a lighter flavor and thus worked for the glaze.

Obviously you can use whatever your favorite tea is for this cake. But for me…. Earl Grey all the way

Earl Grey Pound Cake

2.5 sticks unsalted butter
8 Tablespoons loose Earl Grey tea (this does not mean emptying out tea bags. This is buying the loose tea)
1/2 cup shortening
3 cups sugar
6 large eggs
2 tablespoons vanilla
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
3 cups flour
1 cup milk (you can substitute soy milk)

Heat the butter until it is just melted. Turn the stove down to low and stir the loose tea into the butter. Cook for 5 minutes, stirring occasionally. Remove butter from stove and let sit for 5 minutes before pouring the mixture thru a fine sieve. You will have to press on the tea leaves to get as much butter out as possible. The goal is to end up with 1 cup of butter. Allow the butter to cool down to room temperature.

Preheat oven to 325*. Butter and flour a bundt pan and set aside.

Combine butter, shortening and sugar. Add eggs one at a time. Beat well after adding each egg. Add in vanilla.

In another bowl, sift together the salt, baking powder and flour.

Add milk in thirds, alternating with flour mixture, to the butter mixture.

Pour batter into the prepared bundt pan. Bake at 325 for 1 hour and 15 minutes. Test cake for doneness. When the cake is done, remove from oven and allow to cool for 10 minutes before inverting the cake onto a cake plate.

White Chocolate Glaze

3 bags of Earl Grey tea
1/2 cup cream, heated
4 oz white chocolate

Put tea bags into heated cream and steep until cream has cooled to room temp. Finely chop the white chocolate and place in small bowl. Remove and discard the tea bags. Reheat cream in microwave and pour over the white chocolate. Allow to sit for 5 minutes, then stir until creamy. Drizzle over warm pound cake.

My son Gavin has discovered he likes chai tea. I adore the stuff too. He suggested I make him a chai pound cake. Poor thing is away at college. I’ve been making these way too often, and he has yet to have a bite. I feel kind of guilty.

Nah.

Chai Pound Cake

2 sticks butter, room temperature
1/2 cup shortening
3 cups sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla
6 eggs
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
3 cups flour
1 cup Tazo’s chai latte concentrate

Cream together butter, shortening and sugar. Add vanilla extract. Add eggs, beating in one at a time. Sift together flour, salt and baking powder. Stir in 1-cup chai latte divided into thirds alternating with flour so you end with chai latte. Bake in a well-greased and floured large tube pan at 325 degrees for 1 hour and 20 minutes. Let cake stand in pan for 10 minutes before inverting.

I have all these friends who bake. It’s a lovely thing. We bounce ideas off of each other, offer to test each others recipes and give detailed feedback. We even tweak each others recipes before giving feedback sometimes — just to make sure that our advice is on the right track.

This recipe was inspired by a conversation between my friends Sunshine, Stacy (aka cowgazer) and me. Reading the recipe, you might ask yourself if maybe there are too many elements to this pound cake. I have to say no. They all blend and yet stay distinct and are able to support each other… kind of like my group of baking friends.

This is for them.

Sungazer Pound Cake

3/4 cup shelled pistachios
2 sticks butter, room temp
1/2 cup sour cream
3 cups sugar
6 eggs
2 teaspoons vanilla
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
4 cups flour
1/4 cup creme de cacao
3/4 cup milk
8 oz white chocolate, melted
2 cups raspberries

Preheat oven to 325*F. Butter and flour a large bundt pan (I also ended up with a half dozen cupcakes… just so you know)

Finely grind the pistachios and set aside.

Cream together the butter and sour cream and sugar. Add eggs one at a time. Beat well between each addition (if you don’t, your cake will be denser and the texture will be heavy.) Add the vanilla. Add the flour in thirds alternating with the creme de cacao and milk. End with the milk. Add the pistachios then the white chocolate. Stir in the raspberries.

Pour into the bundt pan. Bake for 75 to 90 minutes. Let cool on the counter for 10 to 15 minutes before inverting.

My friend Jessi posted about taking a regular fan and making it fabulous by turning it into a rainbow fan. Since it is also her birthday this weekend, I felt inspired to make her a rainbow pound cake… the flavor was left up to her. She chose amaretto.

Somehow though my mind did some weird convoluted twisting motion that took me from making her a plain old pound cake to making one with unicorn tears, that a dragon would drag back to its treasure cave and that a leprechaun would bless.

So here’s to a magically delicious (hopefully) and color intense pound cake! It’s “amarettastic”! (Love how Jessi just coined a new word.

My Little Poundcake: Amaretto is Magic

Preheat oven to 350*. (Yes, I know. Not my typical 325*, but somehow this happened and worked!. lol)

Ingredients:
4 sticks (1 pound) unsalted butter, softened
3 cups sugar
6 eggs
1/2 tablespoon almond extract
4 cups of flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 cup amaretto
3/4 cup milk

Cream together the butter and sugar. Add eggs one at a time. Beat well after each addition. Add the almond extract. Sift the baking powder together with the flour. Add the flour, milk and amaretto (add flour in thirds and 1/2 of the milk and amaretto in between the flour additions)

Pour batter into a large bundt pan that has been well-greased and floured. Bake for 75 minutes. Test for doneness.

After you have removed the pound cake from the oven and before you remove it from the pan, pierce the cake with a toothpick multiple times and the pour 3/4 cup of amaretto over the cake. Let the cake cool for 15 minutes before inverting on a cake plate.

Amaretto Glaze (as if there isn’t enough amaretto in this cake already!)

2 TBS melted butter
3-6 TBS amaretto
1 1/2 cups confectioners sugar

Combine ingredients and drizzle over the cooled cake.

The Extra Mile….

For Jessi, I am willing to go that extra mile. She was there for me when I had tons of questions. She listened. She pointed me towards different reading materials (knowing that I love to read). She’s just awesome. She’s also going to make a wonderful clinical psychologist for the LGBTQ community (and those like me who are a parent of and a friend of members of that community) Plus sometimes Jessi bakes.

Anyway… to go the extra mile and turn a bundt cake into a rainbow cake, divide the batter into 7 bowls. Put enough food coloring to get the shade you want… red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo and violet. Obviously each bowl gets a different color. Pour the batter in ROYGBIV order into the bundt pan and then bake your cake. Something magical happens as the cake bakes, so when you slice into the finished product, VOILA! you have a rainbow.