I can count the number of times I’ve had pound cake on one finger. It was almost 10 years ago when my southern belle of a roommate baked up her Grannie’s famous pound cake. I remember it being incredibly moist, with a rich buttery-cream flavor that reminded me of a dense butter shortbread cookie. That first bite was heaven but I also recall becoming very bored with it after that first bite. It’s not a very exciting sort of dessert. In fact, it’s pretty damn plain, even at its best, in my opinion. It really does need to be dressed up with a glaze or some berry compote.
The butter, sugar, and vanilla smelled delicious as it was mixing.
The MSBH recipe for Classic Pound deviates from the “a pound of everything” proportions of traditional pound cake. The recipe claims this is all well and good, but I have my doubts after baking and tasting this pound cake. It had nothing of the initial charm my roommate’s pound cake had and seemed to bring out the worst in each of the main ingredients: it was greasy, far too sweet, and tasted like cooked eggs.
My loaf required an additional 45 minutes of baking beyond what the recipe advised and it was still a little underbaked in the middle.
There are a few more variations of the pound cake in MSBH that I’ll tackle sometime in the future – just not any time soon!
Hi Amber. I stumbled upon your blog while googling for Martha Stewart’s pound cake- I made this cake once a couple years ago and it came out perfect. Recent attempts though have yielded me incredibly greasy cakes, so much so the melted butter actually seeps out of the cake while it bakes. I guess I really got lucky that first time!
Anyway I completely love the concept of your blog- how fun is it? I haven’t had the chance to go through your site but if you haven’t tried the cream puffs, you absolutely have to! It’s incredibly time consuming but completely worth the effort!
Yes, the butter seeped out of my cake as well. Interesting about it working out the first time for you – I wondered if I should make the seemingly faulty recipes twice just to make sure my poor results were not due to some error on my part. But I do take tremendous care to measure everything precisely and follow the instructions, so I’m hesitant to waste all the ingredients and time if it turns out awful again!
I haven’t tried the cream puffs, or any of the pastries yet for that matter. I’ll try to tackle the cream puffs sometime soon though – good to know they have your endorsement!
I made Martha’s pound cake a long time ago. Hard to tell if it was done or not as the outside was perfect. A toothpick came out clean as the crust was done. You could not actually tell if it as done or not as the crust would clean the toothpick or knife. Anyways, I took it out and once it cooled I cut the cake and it just “threw up” all over the plate and counter.
Oh the horrors. I know exactly what you’re talking about with the crust clearing off the toothpick. If I hadn’t had that big crack in the middle, it would have been impossible to tell when it was done (and it still never got quite done).
[...] my first go at the MSBH’s recipe for Classic Pound Cake? Well, I am happy to report this pound cake recipe yields much more satisfying results, although [...]
I made this and yes it was greasy too. It took a lot longer to bake as well. The cake tester came out clean so I thought it was done. I took it out, let it cool, turned it over to get it out of the pan and the batter suddenly spilled out of a hole at the top. In the end after putting it back in the oven, the pound cake turned out okay, but too buttery. My husband liked it but next time I think I’ll find another recipe.
[...] cake recipes from the MSBH could be deemed successful. It was certainly not the first – the Classic Pound Cake, which looked okay but tasted greasy and lacked that moist density a pound cake should have. A [...]
I think there is a misprint on the amount of butter used. I f you look at the amount of butter used in the other recipes on making loaf cakes. One stick of butter is sufficient. This recipe calls for 3. That’s why it is so greasy and tasted awful because of the excess grease. This is the first recipe I tried on this book and I hope there is an update on the recipes that I can get my hands on. Any leads….. before I try another recipe.
That makes so much sense, Angela! That pound cake recipe is definitely a disaster.