One of my earliest pound cake memories involves my mother, my favorite uncle Bob and a chocolate pound cake. No, I didn’t eat the pound cake. Sadly. Or in this case, thankfully. But every so often someone would mention a chocolate pound cake that my mother sent to her youngest brother when he was serving in Vietnam. All I would hear was “pound cake”, “Vietnam”, “Ann” and then giggles and “mold”.
Now I knew the pound cake involved was Aunt Allie’s Chocolate Pound Cake, because that pound cake is my favorite uncle Bob’s favorite. I finally asked Bob about it, and this is what he wrote (he had to write it so the story wouldn’t be lost in a fit of giggles.):
Your Mom sent me one (yes “one”) chocolate pound cake during my 365 days in Vietnam. I remember it came in a small cardboard box secured with a lot of tape and when I finally got the box opened, the cake was wrapped in at least three layers of clear plastic wrap. OK, I dug thru that only to find my long awaited chocolate pound cake with a layer of mold on about 1/3 of it. With friends and roommate gathered around, we scraped the mold off and I’ll say the cake lasted about 10 minutes. In Ann’s defense, UPS and FEDEX didn’t exist back then, everything was sent by snail mail.
Clearly soldiers will eat just about anything that isn’t mess food. That said, the family still debates who made the best pound cake: Mama or Aunt Allie. Nana maintained Aunt Allie made the best chocolate one and Mama the best almond.
Aunt Allie’s Chocolate Pound Cake
3 sticks unsalted butter/margarine
3 cups sugar
3 cups cake flour – sift twice
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
5 tablespoons cocoa
1 tablespoon vanilla
5 eggs
1 cup milk
“Get” butter to room temperature; beat butter til fluffy; add sugar gradually and cream til light and fluffy; add eggs one at a time and dry ingredients alternately with milk (Begin and end with dry ingredients.). Grease and flour tube pan. Bake one hour at 350 degrees.