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Recipe Swap - Pounders: This cake has many versions

By Michael Hastings

JOURNAL FOOD EDITOR

Published: April 1, 2009

Requests for pound cakes always get a good response in the Recipe Swap column, and a recent request for sour-cream pound cake was no exception.

I received about a dozen recipes. The bulk of them had the same proportions of main ingredients: 3 cups flour to 3 cups sugar, 6 eggs, 1 cup butter, 1 cup sour cream and ¼ teaspoon baking soda.

A couple of recipes followed the formula but cut the sugar down to 2½ or 2¾ cups.

The example below was sent in by Frances Murphy.

One difference with a lot of the recipes is the kind of extract used. Feel free to substitute vanilla extract in the recipe below, or to use ½ teaspoon each of vanilla and lemon extracts. Some cooks like a little almond extract, too. But I recommend using only about 1/4 teaspoon of that, because it's easy to overwhelm the cake with an artificial almond flavor.

The recipe below uses the standard technique of creaming the butter and sugar, adding eggs one at a time, then alternating a flour mixture and the sour cream. Ruth Shouse sent in an interesting variation. She creams the butter and sugar, then alternates additions of flour mixture and eggs before adding the sour cream last.

Betty Smith, who sent in a recipe similar to the one below, also offered a tip. "Caution: Do not open oven door until time is up or cake will fall."

Murphy bakes her cake at 300 degrees. If baking at 325, plan on shortening the time to about 1 hour and 15 minutes.

Sour Cream Pound Cake

Submitted by Frances Murphy.

1 cup butter (two sticks), softened

3 cups sugar

6 large eggs (room temperature)

3 cups all-purpose flour

¼ teaspoon baking soda

¼ teaspoon salt

1 8-ounce container sour cream

1 teaspoon lemon extract

1. Heat oven to 300 degrees. Grease and flour a tube or Bundt pan.

2. Cream butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Add eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition.

3. In a bowl, sift together the flour, baking soda and salt. Alternately add portions of flour mixture and sour cream, beginning and ending with flour. Stir in extract.

4. Pour batter into prepared pan and bake about 1½ hours, or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. Cool on a wire rack before slicing.

Help

□ Recipe Swap would like a recipe for split-pea soup.

■ Send requests or recipes to Recipe Swap, c/o Michael Hastings, Food Editor, Winston-Salem Journal, P.O. Box 3159, Winston-Salem, NC 27102; or e-mail to mhastings@wsjournal.com. Please include name, address and a daytime telephone number. Previously published recipes are available in the Recipe Database at www.journalnow.com/swap.