Some of my earliest food memories in life revolve around big (to a 5 or 6 year-old they were huge) pieces of dense, moist, perfectly textured Southern pound cake, crafted by the loving hands of my grandmother and baked in the ancient gas oven rusting away in her beach house on the mouth of Texas’ Colorado River.
We’d have fished, played on the beach, and chased fiddler crabs all day, then stuffed ourselves on Ma-Ma’s fish and crab cakes along with fried fresh fish and shrimp, but then, it was cake time.
It would be served on a paper plate, slathered in her never-have-had-any-better “lemon jelly” (lemon curd in the rest of the world), with fresh-sliced peaches, strawberries or blueberries piled high for good measure.
I can still see it, and still want a second piece every time it’s even mentioned.
This Best Damn Southern Sour Cream Pound Cake recipe is one of the first cakes my lovely wife mastered in our young marriage, and various iterations of it have travelled the Northern Rockies in the cooler of many a camping trip and river float season after season.
There are dozens of great pound cake recipes floating around out there, but you’ll be hard pressed to find one that comes close to this one. It’s simple as pie to put together, though you’ll need to have your baker follow the recipe to the letter to get optimal results.
Those strawberries and blueberries coming in now are calling this cake’s name for the weekend.
1 and 1/2 cups unsalted (sweet) butter, softened
3 cups granulated sugar
6 large eggs, room temperature
3 cups AP flour
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
8-ounce container sour cream, room temperature
1 teaspoon good lemon extract
1/4 teaspoon almond extract
Sift together the AP flour, salt and baking soda; set aside.
Grease and flour your trusty bundt (or at least a 12-cup tube) pan. Preheat the oven to 325.
Cream the butter using your stand mixer until light and creamy; gradually add the sugar until the mixture is light, well mixed, and looks fluffy.
Now beat in the eggs one at a time, mixing each one just until the yolk dissolves into the mixture.
Now add the flour mixture alternating with the sour cream (ending with the flour mixture too), beating at low speed until just mixed. Stir in the extracts and then pour into your prepared pan.
Now bake at 325 for 80-90 minutes (or until a cake tester comes out clean); cool for 10-15 minutes then turn out and cool completely if you can wait that long.
Serve with a pile of fresh fruit and lemon jelly (curd).
Enjoy.
