Pound cake with a twist...

Chocolate and peanut butter... there are few things in the world that seem so perfectly matched. That combo is close to, if not, my (and Jeff too!) favorite sweet combination and that is why this Chocolate Pound Cake with Peanut Butter Glaze that I made for the Weekly Wednesday Treat Day sounded way too good to pass up.

This is very much like a classic, traditional pound cake with plenty of butter, eggs (3 short of a dozen!!) and sugar to go around. However, instead of using all flour in the dry ingredients, this cake's twist comes by swapping out a portion of the flour for your best unsweetened cocoa powder to turn it chocolate. Which is handy, because all you would have to do it swap that flour back in for a regular light cake!

It is best that you have the butter and eggs used for the batter at a cool room temperature so the ingredients are well incorporated and the best volume possible can be achieved as there is no additional leavening called for. This also means you need to let the butter and sugar beat for quite some time - this recipe happens to call for a full eight minutes to get plenty of air whipped in! Once the eggs join the party, along with a splash of fragrant vanilla, the dry ingredients are added and the batter is swirled around just enough to moisten the flour. Of course you can do this with the mixer by gradually adding it, but I like using a sturdy wooden spoon so I can get a feel for the batter and prevent any overworking.

Poured into a couple large loaf pans (measure to be sure you use the correct size, otherwise you may have overflow issues!), to get any large air bubbles out of the light, voluptuous batter, don't be afraid to get a little rough and tap the pans on the countertop a few times. Now, even though these are baked in those loaf pans, don't expect they will be done quickly - they will require a fairly lengthy time in the oven to get the center of the cakes baked through. I like to make sure and check at least 5 minutes or so before the cake is scheduled to be done - a quick poke with a wooden skewer in the center will let you know if you need more time or not. You are looking for the skewer to come back out mostly clean and ideally with a few moist crumbs attached.

Taking these baked beauties over the top is a fiendish glaze consisting simply of warmed creamy peanut butter and milk, turning the peanut butter into a flowing consistency to drizzle over each dark loaf. After letting the glaze set, I hastily grabbed my knife, sliced in and found a tempting tight crumb that while dense, didn't come across as being heavy or greasy. Yeah, a fork was waiting to go on the side and a bite was in my mouth before I gave it another though!

When Jeff came in to check on the happenings, he decided not to wait for dessert to have a slice. Eye rolls were all I needed to see, letting me know he was thoroughly enjoying his piece! He then said he was a little sad that we were sending this decadent treat into the office... but, I don't mind because if we kept this around the house, I have a feeling not one dense, buttery crumb would be left in too short time of a time!

Recipes
Chocolate Pound Cake with Peanut Butter Glaze