The Perfect Pound Cake Recipe
This pound cake recipe is not only deliciously moist and tender, thanks to the addition of sour cream, it’s a breeze to whip up!
The start of a new year is always busy, with a lot of to-dos and new resolutions and goals. I’m hoping one of your goals this year is to bake more cake! And to help you achieve that goal, I’ll do my best to offer you a big selection of easy cake recipes to get you feeling confident in the kitchen.
Sour Cream Pound Cake
A pound cake is the perfect easy cake recipe to start with. It’s a one-bowl batter, a one-pan cake, and there’s no fancy decorating required.
I love how easily pound cake can be paired with so many flavors. The base of this cake is quite simple:
Ingredients You Need for Pound Cake
- Cake flour
- Salt
- Unsalted butter
- Sour cream
- Granulated sugar
- Eggs
- Vanilla bean paste (you can also use extract)
- Zest of an orange, tangerine, lemon, or lime (optional)
- Decorating sugar (optional)
With just seven ingredients, this is basically a one-bowl, dump cake. In fact, it’s a lot like an old fashion lazy day cake (which is what inspired my Cherry Almond Cake. It’s the kind of cake you make when you want cake, but you’re feeling lazy 🙂
It’s a breeze to whip up, but does take a bit of time to bake. Plan for about an hour.
Can I Substitute the Sour Cream?
I used sour cream in my pound cake recipe to create a denser, more flavorful crumb. But don’t worry, the sour cream isn’t a super strong flavor. It just adds a hint of tang and creates a ton of moisture.
If you don’t have sour cream on hand or just don’t like it, you can substitute the sour cream with cream cheese or plain greek yogurt. Use the same amount of these ingredients as you would the sour cream.
What Bread Pan Should I Use?
Make sure to use a large bread pan for this pound cake recipe. I suggest this 9-inch x 5-inch Fat Daddio pan. If you don’t have a pan this large, you can split the recipe between two smaller cake pans.
And don’t forget to add that decorating sugar in the pan before your pour the batter in! It adds an awesome texture to the edge of each slice.
Can I Make Pound Cake in a Bundt Pan?
If you want to make a larger version of this cake, grab a 10-cup bundt pan and double the recipe below. Baking time will be about the same.
Other Easy Cake Recipes You’ll Love
- Chocolate Sour Cream Cake
- Best Ever Chocolate Bundt Cake
- Chocolate Spice Cake
- Citrus Olive Oil Cake
- Banana Biscoff Bread
The Perfect Pound Cake
Ingredients
- 3/4 cup (169.5 g) unsalted butter, room temperature
- 1 1/2 cups (300 g) granulated sugar
- 3 large eggs room temperature
- 2 teaspoons vanilla bean paste, or extract
- 1 teaspoon orange zest, or zest of another citrus (optional)
- 1 1/2 cups (180 g) cake flour
- 1/2 teaspoon (3 g) salt
- 1/2 cup (120 g) sour cream, room temperature
- Decorating sugar, optional
Instructions
- Preheat your oven to 325 degrees F. Spray your bread pan with nonstick spray and then cover the sides and bottom of the pan with the decorating (coarse) sugar. Set aside.
- In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, beat the butter and sugar together on medium-high for about 2 to 3 minutes.
- Add the eggs, vanilla, and zest and beat for another 2 to 3 minutes on medium-high. You're looking for the mixture to become smooth, fluffy, and lighter in color.
- With the mixer on low speed, stir in the salt and flour.
- Fold in the sour cream.
- Pour the batter into the prepared loaf pan and bake for 60 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted in the center of the cake comes out with a few moist crumbs.
- Allow the cake to cool completely before serving.
With what can I substitute Cake flour? I can’t find cake flour where I live!
You can make your own! I tell you how right here! https://cakebycourtney.com/everything-you-need-to-know-about-cake-flour/
Just made this yesterday. I didn’t have cake flour but I found on your site how to substitute with corn starch. It turned out great. Loved the taste. Didn’t have decorated sugar but I will get some for the next time I make! Easy and not many ingredients, perfect!
Excellent recipe
Made this today for my family!! I doubled the recipe to bake in a Bundt pan as instructed in the notes. It was easy, delicious, and my kids and husband loved it!!! What a treat!!
Yay! I love an easy bundt.
Just made this and it is perfect! Made one with orange zest and the other with just the vanilla bean paste. Both were great!
Yum!!
are you not adding baking powder or any rising agent or is it self-raising cake flour that ur using.
Nope! Just cake flour
As per usual of all your recipes, this is delicious! A customer asked me for a layered pound cake with cream cheese buttercream frosting, so I doubled the batch and cooked in a 9×2 pan, indivually and frosted with your cream cheese frosting recipe. Girl!!! Another happy customer. 🙂
I made this with orange zest and it was amazing! It had a fantastic texture and baked up beautifully! For an extra punch I did add some True Orange Ginger. Everyone loved it a lot!! Thank you for a great recipe.
Hi! Wondering…could this recipe be bake in regular cake pans? To be used as a layer cake as well? TIA!! Love ALL your recipes!!
Yes! I would double the recipe for three 8-inch cake layers and plan on bake time closer to 30 to 35 minutes.