Luscious Lemon Cream Cheese Pound Cake (for National Pound Cake Day)

Lemon cream cheese pound cake. Lucy Mercer/A Cook and Her Books

I'm not sure how or why there is a National Pound Cake Day, but here it is the 4th day of March, in the holiday lull between St. Valentine's and St. Patrick's Day and I guess somebody needed an excuse to bake. Pound cake is as good an excuse as any, I suppose.

The classic pound cake requires a pound of each ingredient - butter to sugar to flour to eggs. Without leavening, this makes for a large, dense cake. Modern cakes tend to fudge on the ratio. My go-to recipe has a ratio of approximately 1.25 pounds fat (combined cream cheese and butter) : .75 pound sugar : .75 pound flour : .6 pound eggs.

Looking for a new flavor, I dug out a cookbook that has hugged my pantry shelf for at least 15 years - "The Pound Cake Cookbook" by Bibb Jordan (Longstreet Press, 1994). It's a darling little book, cover price $8.95, with nearly 40 recipes from Chocolate Cherry Pound Cake to Savory Cheese Pound Cake. My eyes locked on "Lemon Cream Cheese Pound Cake" - I'm a sucker for anything with lemon - lemon cookies, lemon curd, lemon meringue pie, lemon bars.

This recipe is surprising, first with the self-rising flour. Pound cakes are traditionally leavened only with eggs, which can make for a leaden leaven. I personally like a dense texture, but this lighter cake is a winner, too. Because of the leavening, it bakes faster, in under an hour, and has a lighter, spongier texture. It’s perfect for a spring dessert. With Easter and Mother’s Day falling within two weeks of each other, this would make an excellent cake for the holiday table. The cake is pretty with a dusting of confectioner’s sugar, but I like the puckery tart sweetness of the lemon glaze.

Lemons by Lucy Mercer/A Cook and Her Books



Lemon Cream Cheese Pound Cake with Lemon Glaze

Adapted from The Pound Cake Cookbook by Bibb Jordan (Longstreet Press, 1994)



3 medium lemons, zested and juiced

1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, at room temperature

8 ounces 1/3-less-fat (Neufchatel) cream cheese, at room temperature

2 cups sugar

6 large eggs, at room temperature

2 cups self-rising flour

1 teaspoon lemon extract

1. Preheat oven to 325. Prepare a tube or Bundt pan with baking spray or butter and flour.

2. In large mixing bowl, using an electric mixer, cream together the butter and cream cheese. Gradually add sugar. Add eggs two at a time, beating well after each addition.

3. Add flour, lemon zest, lemon extract and two tablespoons of lemon juice (reserve remainder of juice for lemon glaze), beating until flour is incorporated and batter is smooth and free of lumps.

4. Pour into prepared pan. Bake for 45 to 50 minutes at 325. Cake is done when tester comes out clean. Let cool on wire rack. While cake is cooling, prepare the Lemon Glaze.

Lemon Glaze

2 tablespoons freshly squeezed lemon juice

1 to 1 ½ cups confectioner’s sugar

1. In a medium bowl, combine lemon juice and confectioner’s sugar. Whisk until combined and lump-free. If the glaze is lumpy, whisk vigorously, then let sit for 10 minutes or so, the lumps will be absorbed.

2. Glaze lemon pound cake while still warm.

My little kitchen helper wanted to decorate the cake, and she just happened to have a box of Valentine hearts....

Lemon Pound Cake with Valentines by Lucy Mercer/A Cook and Her Books

The artist and her creation. Lucy Mercer/A Cook and Her Books



Happy National Pound Cake Day! Don't forget to leave cake for the elves!

 

Text and images copyright 2011, Lucy Mercer.

Bake a chocolate pound cake for the ones you love

Chocolate pound cake by Lucy Mercer/A Cook and Her Books

A homemade cake is a nice thing to have around the house during a long weekend, or perhaps you want to bake a gift for a friend. This chocolate pound cake fills the bill. It's not a death-by-chocolate type cake, just a pleasing cocoa taste and tender texture. With a bit of chocolate glaze, it  makes a kid-pleasing birthday cake.

Chocolate Pound Cake

1/2 pound (2 sticks) unsalted butter, at room temperature

1/2 cup vegetable shortening

3 cups sugar

5 eggs

3 cups unbleached all-purpose flour

1/2 teaspoon baking powder

1/2 cup cocoa

1/2 teaspoon salt

1 cup milk

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

1. Preheat oven to 325. Grease a Bundt or tube pan with nonstick spray. In the bowl of an electric mixer, cream together butter, shortening and sugar. Add eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition. 

2. In a separate bowl, stir together dry ingredients. Add to butter mixture alternately with the milk, beginning and ending with dry ingredients. Add vanilla.

3. Pour batter into a Bundt or tube pan and place in a 325 degree oven. Bake for 1 hour and 15 minutes to 1 hour and 30 minutes. Cake is done when toothpick inserted in center is clean. Remove cake from oven and let cool on wire rack.

Look for more ideas for gifts from the kitchen like Orange Pecan Coconut Balls , Roasted Almonds and my never-the-same-way-twice Ranch Snack Mix on A Cook and Her Books. Looking for cookies? Try Scottish Shortbread and Macadamia Tassies.

Text and images copyright 2011, Lucy Mercer.

Bake a pound cake for friends, family & teachers

Cream cheese pound cake by Lucy Mercer/A Cook and Her Books

 True confession: I was the kind of kid who went off to college and baked. That's right, the only graduate of the University of Georgia who spent her Friday and Saturday nights creaming butter and sugar together and preheating the oven. I'm still not too sure why I didn't channel this enthusiasm for the never-ending possibilities of the butter-sugar-flour matrix into a food-related career, but the truth is, I spent my extra hours at college baking cakes. I tried all manner of pound cakes and baked them in loaves so that I could distribute them to friends and co-workers. I tried lemon-glazed pound cakes, sour cream pound cakes, and eventually found this recipe for a cream cheese pound cake that has been my best baking friend for two decades. It makes a lovely Bundt cake, but really shines as a loaf cake, with the typical San Andreas Fault line running through the middle. The crust is crispy and shattery, the interior is buttery and tender. 

This recipe will yield two loaves or one Bundt cake. I've made four batches of this cake in the past week, to distribute to teachers, friends and family at Christmas.

Cream Cheese Pound Cake

3 sticks (1 1/2 cups) unsalted butter, softened

3 cups granulated sugar

6 eggs

1 (8 oz.) pkg. cream cheese (neufchatel acceptable), room temperature and divided into three equal pieces

pinch salt

3 cups unbleached all-purpose flour

1 tsp. vanilla extract

1. Preheat oven to 325. Use baking spray to coat inside of Bundt pan or tube pan or 2 loaf pans.

2. In mixing bowl, cream together butter and sugar for several minutes. When fully incorporated and no longer grainy, add eggs and cream cheese alternately. This means two eggs, fully mixed in, piece of cream cheese, fully mixed in, followed by eggs and cream cheese two more times. When batter is creamy and smooth, add, on low speed, flour and pinch salt. Stir in vanilla extract.

3. Pour batter into prepared pans and smooth the top with a spatula. Cake bakes in 325 degree oven for 1 1/2 to 2 hours.The cake is ready when a narrow bamboo skewer inserted in the middle comes out clean. Let cake cool on rack for at least an hour before giving in to the luscious vanilla and butter smell and slicing generous portions for your starving family.

Look for more ideas for gifts from the kitchen like orange pecan coconut balls , roasted almonds and my never-the-same-way-twice snack mix on A Cook and Her Books. Looking for Christmas cookies? Try Scottish Shortbread and Macadamia Tassies.

Text and images copyright 2011, Lucy Mercer.