The best dessert recipe I’ve ever made…in under two hours! You don’t have to master complicated techniques and use expensive ingredients to create a memorable and delightful dessert.

What makes the Sour Cream Pound Cake so special is that it is good enough to stand on its own, while also being a culinary canvas around which you can create a variety of delectable tastes.

This cake’s moist, tender interior is surrounded by a tempting, thick, golden crust. I have to keep an eye on the kids to keep them from breaking off pieces of it before it’s served! But if any is left over, the cake retains its beautiful texture for several days, so you’re in no hurry to savor every delicious bite.

While you can bake this cake in a variety of pans, a bundt-style pan works best. I use the one my mother gave to me. Of all my baked goods, this was one of her favorites.

Sour Cream Pound Cake

For best results, ingredients should be at room temperature

1 cup (8 oz.) of unsalted butter
3 cups sugar
6 large eggs
2 teaspoons vanilla
1 teaspoon almond extract
2 teaspoons vanilla butter nut flavoring
3 cups unbleached all-purpose flour
½ teaspoon salt
¼ teaspoon baking soda
1 cup (8 oz.) dairy sour cream

1.    Preheat oven to 325° F. Grease and flour a 12 cup bundt pan.

2.    Cream the butter and sugar together until light and fluffy. Add the flavorings.

3.    Add eggs, one a time, beating after each addition. To save time, I break all my eggs into a measuring cup and pour in one yolk at a time.

4.    In a separate bowl, whisk together the flour, salt and soda.

5.    Beginning and ending with the flour mixture, alternate adding the flour and sour cream to the creamed ingredients in several portions.

6.    Spoon batter into your prepared pan and bake for 1 hour and 15 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the middle of the cake comes out clean.

7.    If you wish to have a sauce or glaze on your cake, you can prepare it while the cake is baking.

8.    Cool for 10 minutes then turn out the cake onto a rack to finish cooling. Top as desired.

Variations:
1.    Add 1 cup of mini chocolate chips to the cake batter and top finished cake with chocolate ganache (recipe below) and serve with a scoop of your favorite ice cream.

2.    Replace the vanilla butter nut flavoring with the seeds of a vanilla bean or a teaspoon of vanilla bean paste. Serve cake with a dollop of sweetened whipped cream, sliced fresh fruit, and a dusting of powdered sugar.

3.    Replace almond and vanilla butter nut flavoring with a tablespoon of lemon extract and add the finely grated zest of one lemon, plus a tablespoon of poppy seeds. Top finished cake with a lemon glaze. (Recipe below)

Chocolate Ganache

¾ cup heavy cream
1 teaspoon instant coffee (or a splash of your favorite home brew)
8 ounces of chocolate (your choice, preferably semi-sweet or bittersweet)
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 tablespoon of your favorite liqueur, if desired

Put heavy cream and coffee into a glass bowl and heat to boiling in the microwave. Stir in the chocolate briefly, cover bowl and wait 10 minutes.

Whisk gently until all chocolate is melted. Stir in liqueur if desired. As it cools and begins to thicken, you can pour it onto the cake, or let it cool even more and spread it on.

Or heck, just get out a spoon and dig in! In the unlikely event that you have some chocolate ganache left over, let it cool completely in the fridge, form it into small balls, roll them in cocoa powder, and you have chocolate truffles.

Lemon Glaze

¼+ cup fresh lemon juice (about 2 lemons)

2 tablespoons melted unsalted butter

Zest of two lemons

1 ¾ cup powdered sugar

Mix together well, adjusting the amount of powdered sugar to get the consistency you want. If it gets too thick, just add a little more lemon juice. Pour the glaze over your cooled cake. It will crust up, as there is no corn syrup in this glaze.

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