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A couple weeks ago as I was perusing the cookbook aisle at Barnes & Noble a new book caught my eye -Warren Brown’s first book, Cake Love. After skimming the pages I knew I had to buy it! I took it home and read it page by page. Warren Brown’s specialty is pound cake and this books highlights over 15 different variations of it…think Triple Lime-Chocolate Pound Cake or Espresso Pound Cake. But before trying the variations on his basic pound cake, I thought it would be good to start with his staples: Vanilla and Chocolate Pound Cake.

As I began to read his ingredient list, I came across a couple ingredients that you don’t typically find in pound cake, like lots of booze and potato starch. He says that alcohol gives the cake a nice complex flavor and the potato starch is his secret ingredient - “it tastes clean, absorbs twice as much moisture as wheat flour, cooks at a lower temperature than cornstarch and is softer than grain-based starches.”

Well after trying these two recipes and using his “secret ingredients” I was definitely won over. These were the best tasting pound cakes I have ever had! It even got better day by day as I kept them in the refrigerator and ate slice by slice. So here they are…enjoy!

Vanilla Pound Cake

adapted from Cake Love

“Dry Ingredients”

• Unbleached all-purpose flour 2 1/2 cups + 3 T. (13 1/2 oz.)
• Potato starch 1 T.
• Vanilla powder 1 1/2 t.
• Salt 1/2 t.
• Baking soda 1/4 t.

“Liquid Ingredients”

• Sour cream 8 oz. (1 cup)
• Heavy cream 2 T.
• Brandy 1/4 cup
• Amaretto 1 T.
• Rum 1 T.
• Vanilla extract 1 1/2 t.
• Whiskey 1 1/2 t.

“Creaming Ingredients”

• Unsalted butter, at room temp, 8 oz
• Sugar 24 oz (3 cups)
• Large eggs, 5
• Yolks, 1
• Vanilla bean, 1

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Combine all the dry ingredients and whisk to incorporate. In a separate bowl combine all the liquid ingredients and whisk to combine.

In a bowl of a standing mixer all the butter and sugar and cream together on the lowest speed for 2-3 minutes. Add the vanilla beans to the mixture. With the mixer on the lowest speed, add the eggs one at a time followed by the yolk, fully incorporating after each addition. Scrape down the sides of the bowl.

Add the dry ingredients alternatively with the liquid mixture in 3-5 additions, beginning and ending with the dry mixture. Move swiftly to avoid over mixing the batter. Scrape down the bowl and then mix for 20 seconds to fully incorporate.

Spray your pan (loaf, bundt,etc) with nonstick spray and then fill 3/4 of the way up with the batter.

Bake a 12 cup bundt cake for 50-55 minutes and smaller muffin size loafs for 15 minutes.

Chocolate Pound Cake

adapted from Cake Love

“Dry Ingredients”

• Unbleached all-purpose flour 10 oz (2 cups)
• Unsweetened cocoa powder 2 oz (1/2 cup + 2 t.)
• Turbinado sugar 2 T.
• Potato starch 1 t.
• Vanilla powder 1/4 t.
• Salt 3/4 t.

“Liquid Ingredients”

• Sour cream 4 oz.
• Whole milk 3/4 cup
• Brandy 2 T. *I substituted Godiva Chocolate Liqueur because I ran out of brandy
• Vanilla extract 1 t.

“Creaming Ingredients”

• Unsalted butter, at room temp, 8 oz
• Sugar 24 oz (3 cups)
• Large eggs, 4
• Yolks, 3

(The directions are the same as the recipe above)

I would love to hear what your favorite kind of pound cake is!