Pound Cake

Total Time: 1 hr 20 mins Preparation Time: 20 mins Cook Time: 1 hr

Ingredients

• 1 lb butter, softened
• 3 cups sugar
• 6 eggs
• 4 cups flour
• 1 tablespoon baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1 cup milk
• 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
• butter, for greasing the pan
• flour, for dusting the pan

Recipe

• 1 preheat the oven to 350.
• 2 butter and flour the bottom and sides of a 10-inch tube pan or a bundt pan.
• 3 in a large bowl, cream together the butter and sugar until they are light and fluffy.
• 4 add eggs, one at a time, beating well after each. set aside.
• 5 sift together the flour, baking powder, and salt in a separate bowl.
• 6 mix the milk together with the vanilla in another separate bowl.
• 7 add the flour mixture and milk mixture to the creamed butter/sugar alternating dry and wet. start and end with dry. do not overmix. mix by hand, just enough to blend.
• 8 spread the batter into the prepared pan. bake 50 to 60 minutes, or until a sharp knife inserted all the way down comes out clean. allow to cool in the pan for 10 minutes, then turn it out onto a plate.
• 9 allow to cool completely before slicing. if desired, dust with sifted powdered sugar, or drizzel with a glaze made from powdered sugar and milk or water.
• 10 variations follow. the above is the plain poundcake recipe. below is lemon poundcake, blueberry poundcake, or mocha-swirl poundcake.
• 11 lemon poundcake: replace the vanilla above with lemon extract. also add 1/4 cup fresh lemon juice and 1 tsp freshly grated lemon zest.
• 12 blueberry poundcake: make the lemon poundcake variation above and gently fold in 2 cups of fresh blueberries with the last addition of dry ingredients.
• 13 mocha-swirl poundcake: replace milk in the standard recipe with 1 cup strong black coffee. after mixing up the batter, take about 1/3 of the batter and add 1 oz of melted, unsweetened chocolate (1 square). spread the plain batter into the pan. spoon the chocolate batter on top in clumps and then use a knife to swirl the dark and light batters together.