Saturday, February 26, 2011

One-Egg Whole-Wheat Honey-Lemon Pound Cake (of yum, with strawberries... including tales of vegetable triage)

(Don't you love the titles of old books that go on for about a page? Me too. That's why the title of this blog post is so silly.)
I got my Bountiful Baskets again this week. I love it. The only (semi)problem I have is that there is so much produce all at once! Much more than I would normally ever buy at once. I have resorted to a sort of vegetable triage, where I categorize thing by how long they will last and use the perishables up first. Potatoes, sweet potatoes, winter squash? Throw them in a bin, they'll be fine for at least a month. Lettuce, asparagus, bok choy? Figure out meals that will use it up fast. So far I haven't had anything spoil before I got to it, so there must be something to my system.
I got some strawberries in my Bountiful Baskets this week, deep red, perfectly ripe, obviously a use-quick item. The instant I saw them I decided I was going to make pound cake. Nevermind that I have never made a pound cake I could eat before, I had decided, and it was to be.
Of course I started with an internet search for honey pound cake, no need to reinvent the wheel if it's already been done. I found a decent-looking recipe here, but then realized I had an egg shortage. Last summer at work I would make a one-egg lemon pound cake that seemed very good, so I found that recipe again here.
Being myself, I decided to make a mutant love-child of the two recipes for my experiment. The result is fantastically delicious, if I do say so myself. It is dense, sweet, flavorful, tender, and everything a pound cake should be, including that I can eat it! I used a mild orange honey, which I think did good things to the flavor. Use the best-tasting honey you can get ahold of and this should turn out delicious for you too.

One-Egg Whole-Wheat Honey-Lemon Pound Cake
1/2 cup butter, warm
3/4 cup honey
1 egg
1 tsp vanilla
1 tsp lemon extract
1/2 cup milk
1 cup all purpose flour
1 cup whole wheat flour
1/2 tsp salt
1 tsp baking powder

Preheat the oven to 350*, grease and flour a 4"x8" loaf pan.
Cream together the melty butter with the honey, mix in the egg, vanilla, lemon extract, and milk until smooth. Pour the flours in a heap in the middle, mix the baking powder and salt into the flour before mixing everything together until smooth. Do not overmix.
Scoop the batter out into the prepared loaf pan and smooth the top slightly. Bake for 45*, or until the center is raised and cracked and a toothpick inserted into the middle comes out dry.
Let cool in the pan a few minutes before removing to a rack to cool completely before serving.
To serve, slice into thick slices, place each slice on a plate, top with strawberries and eat with a fork as slowly as you can force yourself to eat it.
I was going to have a picture of the serving suggestion... but once I had everything plated I forgot and ate it up instead, so you'll have to make it yourselves to see what it looks like!

Notes:
-On the strawberries. If your strawberries are prefect and super sugary sweet, you can just slice them and put them on the pound cake, but if they are a little tart you can slice them in advance, pour a little agave over them. Agave dissolves at cool temperatures, unlike honey, so it's better for cold uses, since you don't want hot strawberries on your pound cake. (or maybe you do, you weirdo)
-On the flour. This being a dessert, I wouldn't use more than half whole wheat flour, to keep things light and tender. If you have whole wheat pastry flour, use that, but if you don't, don't worry about it. I didn't and still had good results. As long as your whole wheat flour has good flavor, your pound cake will be good.

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