In my mind a perfect pound cake like Grandma's, is moist, tender, light, fluffy, creamy, and buttery, all at the same time. Shown here with my skillet peaches.
Grandma Mac's Perfect Southern Pound Cake
Was it wrong to have pound cake for breakfast? If there are peaches involved?? Or strawberries with real whipped cream. If it is, I don't care.
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My grandma was known for her pound cakes. If there was an occasion, she made a pound cake for it. If we were coming for dinner to her house, she made a pound cake. If she came to your house for dinner, she brought a pound cake. And they always came on a pretty plate that she did not ever expect you to return. In fact, if you did happen to return it, she might be likely to bake you another cake!
Grandma lived to be almost 98, and actually lived on her own up until those last couple of years. By the time Grandma died, my Daddy {her son} and my Mama {her surrogate daughter} had also both passed and in those last months of her life she had been taken to live in north Alabama with an aunt on my father's side.
She gave her old house to one of my cousins who helped her around the house a lot, and I have no idea what happened with all her things, but I sure would have loved to have had Grandma's old bundt cake pan.
I think Miss Edie, a longtime family friend, may have gotten it, but if so, she was a deserving recipient. Her family once lived right by Grandma, and even after they moved into another home not too far away, she made regular stops to visit and check on Grandma, up until she moved away. I'm still hoping that maybe one day that pan will show up at my house.
Like most everybody else, Grandma's original pound cake evolved a bit over time. I can tell you that three different family members have given me three different recipes that they all say were Grandma Mac's recipes and that they each got directly from her. Seems Grandma, like most other cooks, went about changing up the recipe over the years.
I relied on the recipe that one of her sons, my Uncle Jim, gave me, who until his passing, took over the roll of the bearer of pound cakes at every family event.
Here's what you'll need to make my Grandma Mac's Perfect Southern Pound Cake:
- 3 cups all-purpose flour
- 1/2 teaspoon baking powder
- 1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
- 1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, softened at room temperature
- 1/2 cup vegetable shortening or (1 stick) margarine, softened at room temperature
- 3 cups granulated sugar
- 5 large eggs, at room temperature
- 1 cup whole milk or half and half
- 2-1/2 teaspoons vanilla or almond extract
- 2-1/2 teaspoons lemon extract
Easy to make too - here's how!
Whisk flour in the container or bag to loosen before measuring.
Add the baking powder and salt in a bowl to the flour and whisk; set aside.
Add butter and shortening or margarine to a mixer bowl. I'm using two sticks of unsalted butter with a 1/2 cup of shortening.
Beat the butter and margarine on medium speed until creamy.
Add the sugar 1/2 cup at a time and continue beating on medium until mixture becomes fluffy. Reminder: Southern pound cakes are notoriously sweet and really need a day to settle! I'm not a big sweets person - much more on the savory side - so pound cakes give me a definite sugar rush. If you slice off a piece right after it cools, you will have a rush too... just sayin' y'all...
You can potentially reduce the granulated sugar to 2-1/2 cups without affecting the integrity of the recipe, but if you do bump the salt up slightly to 3/4 teaspoon for balance.
Add eggs, one a time, blending each egg in completely before adding the next.
Until fully blended.
Reduce speed to low and begin to alternately add the flour mixture and the milk into the creamed butter, starting and ending with the flour, until all is fully incorporated.
Add the extracts.
Completely blend them in.
Pour the batter into the prepared pan and spread out the top evenly.
Bake at 325 degrees F for about 1 hour and 10 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean. Keep in mind that all ovens are different!
Place the pan onto a cooling rack and cool the cake in the pan for 15 minutes before turning it out onto the rack to cool completely, about 1-2 hours to fully allow the flavors to develop and the sweetness to settle. If you can stand to leave it alone, an overnight rest is even better. It allows all that sweetness to mellow!
In my mind a perfect pound cake like Grandma's is moist, tender, light, fluffy, creamy, and buttery, all at the same time. You just cannot get that out of a box.
This recipe meets all of that criteria.
I've included my skillet peach recipe, shown above, but if you want to add some strawberries instead, it's very easy. Just slice and mix 'em up with a goodly bit of sugar in a glass bowl, cover and then set them aside in the fridge to macerate, giving them a good stir every once in awhile. By the time you bake and cool your pound cake, they'll be good and ready. A nice custard sauce is excellent too.
Y'all a southern pound cake is just so dang good - I sure hope ya try this version someday!!
For more of my favorite cakes, check out the collection on my Pinterest page!
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