Sour Cream Pound Cake

Today was National Pound Cake Day!  Didn't know?  Me neither.  Til I went to MSN and they had a whole article about pound cake and recipes for them.  Today's random bit of knowledge for you - pound cake is named as such because it used to have a pound of butter, a pound of sugar, and a pound of flour in the recipe.  And did I mention a pound of eggs, too?  Certainly made it easy to remember the ingredients, that's for sure!  Good for the waistline (or the heart, for that matter)?  Oh no.  But we've come a long way baby!  You can find numerous pound cake recipes all over the place for any taste palate or diet restrictions (honestly, five years ago, could you have made a gluten free pound cake?).

I've loved pound cake since I was a child.  My mother has a recipe (which I'm currently searching for) of my grandmother's pound cake.  My dad and I used to fight over who would eat the top of the pound cake!  Sound strange?  You've never had that pound cake.  The top has this wonderful crunch to it that I've never found in another pound cake.  Once mom finds and gets that recipe to me, I'll have to make it and post it here because everyone must try that pound cake.  And if a fight breaks out, I wanna know that too ;)  Anyhoo, since I did not have my favorite pound cake recipe on hand, I decided I would need to make a new one!  I could not let this "holiday" pass me by without making a pound cake.  So I went to my plethora of cookbooks (one day, I'll post pictures of my bookshelf so you can see all my cookbooks) and found a pound cake that seemed simple enough and one I had all the ingredients for.  So all the way from Savannah, Paula Deen's Grandmother Paul's Sour Cream Pound Cake!

Grandmother Paul's Sour Cream Pound Cake
(from The Lady and Sons Savannah Country Cookbook)

1 stick of Butter
1 1/2 c. Sugar
1/2 c. Sour Cream (Daisy Light)
1 1/2 c. All-Purpose Flour (King Arthur Flour)
1/4 tsp. Baking Soda
1 Egg
1/2 c. Egg Beater (I used this because of the calorie count of eggs.  No Egg Beaters?  Substitute 2 large eggs.)
1/2 tsp. Vanilla (Nielson-Massey Vanilla Bean Paste)
Cooking Spray with Flour (I use Pillsbury Baking Joy with Flour)

Preheat oven to 325.
Using a mixer, cream together butter and sugar.
Add sour cream.
In a different bowl, sift flour and baking soda togehter.
Add mixture to creamed mixture, alternating with eggs, beating well after each.  (This is important to ensure you have a light cake.)
Add vanilla.
Pour into a 9x5 pan that has been sprayed with cooking spray and bake for 1 hour and 20 minutes.

Calories - 283 for 1 serving (serves 10)

Side Note:  Want a different dessert?  Slice pound cake and throw onto a heated grill pan.  You'll get these nice looking grill marks and serve with vanilla ice cream and a yummy ice cream topping (strawberry is yummy!).