My mother used to make it fairly often when I was much younger and we still use that same recipe today. We've made it in layer cake, sheet cake, Bundt cake and cupcake forms, and more recently I have made red velvet cake balls/truffles, which are divine dipped in either white or semi-sweet chocolate. I've also made a delicious red velvet cake roll ... you know, the one rolled up in a spiral with cream cheese frosting in the middle, as well as red velvet brownies and cookies, but, unfortunately, the recipes I chose for the last two did not impress.
You can imagine my excitement, then, when I learned that the most recent issue of Southern Living contained a recipe for a red velvet swirl pound cake! Pound cake is also on the top of the aforementioned cake list.
I hadn't had possession of the magazine for an hour before I eagerly jumped into the baking fray, gathering everything together, getting the mixer ready, assembling my ingredients. The magazine photo of this cake was beautiful, and it had been such a long time since I'd eaten any pound cake, so I couldn't wait to get started and taste this delightful blend of two of my favorite cakes.
So off I went.
Here is the result:
I know that I did not drizzle enough of the vanilla frosting on the cake. The frosting is thin and should have been of a much thicker consistency. I know this, but I did not care. It's pound cake! You don't need drizzled icing on a pound cake for it to be good, right?
Well, let me tell you...for this one....yeah, you do. This one needed to be completely slathered in cream cheese frosting. Even with that, I don't think it would have improved it much.
I will be the first one to say that a red velvet cake without the cream cheese frosting and pecans has a ho-hum taste. You might taste a hint of the chocolate, but the cake alone won't be terribly sweet and it really isn't very good by itself. (These observations are based on the recipe I have used for years.)
But this is a two-and-a-half-cups-of-sugar pound cake! In spite of that, this cake had very little taste to it, sweet or otherwise. The texture,while somewhat light (not like a cream cheese pound cake, for example, which is very dense), was borderline dry. I baked it for 50 minutes, and added 10 more. (The recipe called for up to 1 hour and 5 minutes.)
It looked good. It released itself perfectly from the pan. The inside swirled well, although it looks like it had a little bubbling action with the red batter going up through the middle during baking.
I have to give this one, sadly, a thumbs down. If you would like to try it yourself, here is the link: Red Velvet Swirl Pound Cake. If you have better luck with it, please let me know.
I really do enjoy pound cakes, and the swirled ones always interest me. If you would like to give your family or friends a twist on the traditional pound cake this holiday season, I highly recommend either of these two:
I love love love this one, and so does my 80+ year-old aunt, who will be getting one this Christmas.
My sister loves this one, and she will probably be getting one of these, too.
Happy baking, friends!
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