Perfect Pound Cake
on Apr 10, 2013, Updated Oct 17, 2023
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The Perfect Pound Cake comes together easily and it feels a bit fancier than a normal cake; perfect for a holiday or special occasion.
Whole Wheat Honey Cake, Lemon Chiffon Cake, Rich and Fudgy Flourless Chocolate Cake Recipe are a few of my solid cake recipes that I know you’ll enjoy.
Perfect Pound Cake
I decided a while ago that I would make a virtual treat for my mom in this post. She’s in Kentucky and I’m in Utah so we rarely get to sit together and enjoy a meal or dessert. She’s enjoys the simple things in life, scrapes the icing off of cupcakes, always gets a vanilla cone at DQ, and Angel Food cake is consistently her Birthday cake request. When looking though the cookbook I knew that the Cold Oven Pound Cake would be a perfect treat for me to “make” for her. This pound cake recipe is slightly different in the fact that you don’t preheat the oven before putting the cake in. The extra time that the cake has to sit in the oven gives it time to develop and rise. The results were a perfectly moist and dense pound cake that wasn’t as sweet as I was expecting. Sweet yes, but not so sweet that a few strawberries and whipped cream weren’t welcome additions.
The cake comes together easily and it just feels a bit fancier than a normal cake; perfect for a holiday dedicated to spoiling your favorite ladies. It was delicious the second day too, so feel free to make it ahead of time.
ATK sent me a copy to give my mom! This is her book all wrapped up and ready for the mail. And yes, I call her Momma Lou 🙂
Tips and Tricks for making Perfect Pound Cake:
- Do NOT preheat the oven. The cake won’t turn out if you do.
- Take care to use room temperature ingredients… it matters.
- This was wonderful with sliced strawberries and fresh whipped cream.
Why is it called pound cake?
Pound Cake is a recipe that originated in the 1700s. Originally the recipe called for one pound each of flour, sugar, butter, and eggs.
How do you cool a pound cake?
Let the cake cool in the pan for ten minutes and then use a small knife and cut around the edge of the cake to make it loose. Flip the cake upside down so that it come out of the pan and let the cake cool on a wire rack for at least 2 hours before serving.
Perfect Pound Cake
- Total Time: 1 hour 25 minutes
- Yield: 12-14 1x
Description
The Perfect Pound Cake comes together easily and it feels a bit fancier than a normal cake; perfect for a holiday or special occasion.
Ingredients
- 3 cups cake flour
- 1/2 teaspoon baking powder
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 1 cup whole milk, at room temperature
- 2 teaspoons vanilla
- 2 1/2 sticks unsalted butter, softened
- 2 1/2 cups sugar
- 6 large eggs, at room temperature
Instructions
- Grease and flour a 16-cup tube pan (you might think of it as an Angel Food cake pan). In a medium bowl add the flour, baking powder, and salt. Whisk to combine. In a small bowl add the milk and vanilla.
- In a large bowl beat the butter and sugar together on medium speed (electric mixer or stand mixer) until it is very light and fluffy, 3 to 6 minutes. Beat in the eggs, one at a time, until everything is well combined.
- Turn the mixer speed to low and add 1/3 of the flour, followed by half of the milk, then another third of the flour, the second half of the milk, and then the rest of the flour. Once the last of the flour is added, mix until it is just incorporated.
- Scrape the batter into the pan that you greased and floured. Smooth the top of the batter and wipe up any batter that dripped onto the sides. Tap the pan a few times on the counter to settle the batter. Adjust the oven rack to the lower-middle position and place the cake on the rack. Shut the oven door and then turn on the oven to 325 degrees. Let the cake cook, without opening the oven door, for 70 to 80 minutes until a wooden toothpick inserted into the middle comes out with just a few moist crumbs attached.
- Let the cake cool in the pan for ten minutes and then use a small knife and cut around the edge of the cake to make it loose. Flip the cake upside down so that it come out of the pan and let the cake cool on a wire rack for at least 2 hours before serving.
Notes
Do NOT preheat the oven. The cake won’t turn out if you do.
Take care to use room temperature ingredients… it matters.
This was wonderful with sliced strawberries and fresh whipped cream.
- Prep Time: 15 minutes
- Cook Time: 70 minutes
- Category: Dessert
- Method: Bake
- Cuisine: American
Nutrition
- Serving Size: Serves 12-16
- Calories: 466
- Sugar: 39.6g
- Sodium: 223.4mg
- Fat: 20.7g
- Carbohydrates: 64.4g
- Protein: 6.3g
- Cholesterol: 134.4mg
If you like this recipe, I think you’ll love these too:
- Healthy Carrot Cake Muffins
- Rich and Fudgy Flourless Chocolate Cake Recipe
- Chocolate Molten Lava Cakes
- Whole Wheat Honey Cake
- Homemade Cake Batter Ice Cream
- Cake Mix Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Cookies
- The Best Easy Apple Cake
- Easy Healthy No-Bake Cheesecake
- Watermelon Cake with Whipped Cream
- Pumpkin Sheet Cake with Caramel Frosting
- Pink Lemonade Cupcakes
- Sweet Tooth Fairy’s VaNIElla Squared Cupcake Copycat Recipe
Enjoy the Perfect Pound Cake that comes together easily and it feels a bit fancier than a normal cake; perfect for a holiday or special occasion.
We love ATK!!!
I’ve been wanting to make pound cake so I’m going to make that happen with this recipe.
I would use this weekly! Love their show! Thank you for the recipe. I know who I’d give the other one to 🙂
Found it!! Yay!
Love it! I really like ATK. Theirs was the first cooking show I watched – gotta love PBS!
This looks so yummy! I can imagine this with iced tea, starwberries on a summer night in the back yard! Thanks for sharing.
this definately will be on my mothers day table…sounds delicious
Ohhh, I would LOVE to win this!
Bobi
This cake looks perfect for me. Ryan (and I) went off sugar a year ago… we still have treats (with sugar) occasionally, but due to limiting our sugar intake neither of us really like them super sweet anymore… This will be something I’ll be trying out really soon. 🙂
And I’m the dork that sits down and reads a cook book cover to cover when I get it… 😛
Thanks for the opportunity to enter. I love ATK, Cook’s Country and Cooks Illustrated.
I’ve seen this recipe on AMK before and have been curious about it. You’ve convinced me to make this for Mother’s Day this year. I’m having Bart’s mom and grandma from Georgia come, and they’d love this simple dessert. Thanks for the idea and hopefully I win the books to have a present for the MIL!
*ATK- can’t totally messed up the acronym!
This the best tasting cake ever!!! Except something I did wrong it did not come out yellow it was on the white side only thing l did was l forgot the vanilla extract sol mixed it with the milk. Please tell me where l went wrong. auntbea921 (From Maryland) Thank you for the recipe my husband loved it !!!
I use eggs from my free-range hens their yolks are so much more orange then normal yellow store-bought eggs. I find lots of my baked goods have a lot more color when I use my fresh eggs compared to traditional store-bought ones. I bet that was the only difference! i’m so glad you liked it!