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This is the only guide you will ever need to make delicious, moist, perfect classic pound cake! A comprehensive step by step recipe with all the troubleshooting tips to ensure success!

The perfect pound cake is dense but soft, rich, buttery, and moist, and is easy to make. This extensively tested, foolproof recipe will guide you to make the best pound cakes that you’ve ever made!

Pound cakes first originated in Europe. They’ve been around since as early as the 1700s, and the term traditionally referred to a cake that weighed four pounds. That’s because a classic pound cake consisted of 1 pound of each of the following FOUR ingredients,

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A classic pound cake doesn’t rely on any leavening agents (such as baking powder or baking soda) to give the cake any lift, or any extra liquid to make the cake moist. The result is a dense cake, that is also somewhat dry (especially when over-baked).

As pound cakes have become more popular throughout different parts of the world, different variations of the classic pound cake have emerged, that are lighter and more moist.

Each region (or country) has their own version of a classic pound cake, incorporating different ratios of the main ingredients, and sometimes including extra liquid and baking powder too.

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Start with good ingredients. Well, that’s a given, but it’s especially true with pound cakes. Rather than using generic ingredients, try and use brand name ingredients when possible.

Make sure to get cane sugar because it has a finer grain than other white sugars (if it doesn’t say cane sugar, then it’s probably beet sugar). If you can get your hands on pure cane caster sugar (superfine sugar) that’s even better!

Use GOOD quality butter. Not margarine, not spreadable butter, but classic butter. I prefer to use unsalted butter, but you can use salted butter as well. However, due to the higher water content in salted butter, there’s a higher chance for inconsistent results when using salted butter.

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I prefer to use eggs that are about 1 week old and here’s why. The egg whites in fresh eggs are tighter and thicker whereas in older eggs, the egg whites are thinner and looser. These older eggs mix into the cake batter more easily and readily, resulting in a pound cake that’s lighter in mouthfeel and crumb texture.

Another reason is that fresh eggs are heavier than older eggs – so 8 fresh large eggs would be way heavier than 1 lb, while 8 older large eggs would be closer to 1 lb.

But you can also use cake flour instead. This is lighter, and has less gluten than AP flour. Resulting in pound cake that rises a little more, and has a tender crumb.

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If you choose to go with pastry flour, you can substitute cake flour for AP flour at a 1:1 ratio – BY WEIGHT (not volume).

We add salt to balance the sweetness of the cake. Without salt, the cake can either taste too sweet or a little bland. A little salt goes a long way to improve the flavor of the cake.

Baking powder is a chemical leavener (read more about it in my baking powder vs baking soda article). The acid and base react in the presence of liquid and create CO2, which helps to expand the batter and rise. However, unlike other cakes, pound cakes rely on air and eggs to rise. So it’s inherently a dense cake with a close crumb.

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But baking powder can be added to make the cake rise a little more – especially if you’re not fully sure that you mixed the ingredients well. This is why baking powder is an optional ingredient.

I am a HUGE advocate for using an inexpensive kitchen scale for all your baking needs as I’ve discussed at length in my measurement conversions page. Baking needs some precision and a cheap weighing scale will ensure consistent baking results every time, which in turn will save you so much more time and money in the long run from failed recipes and wasted ingredients.

Flour than you intended. OR, if you choose to use cake flour for your classic pound cake instead – 1 cup of cake flour is lighter than AP flour, so you will end up with LESS cake flour than needed for your recipe if you use a cup to measure.

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This is why a measuring scale would be very handy. Or you could easily end up with a sickly sweet pound cake because of too much sugar.

If you do use cups however, it’s important to fluff up the flour and sugar in the container, and then scoop the flour and sugar into the measuring cup to the point of overflowing. Then, using a flat knife, level off the excess flour/sugar. It would still be difficult to guarantee consistent results this way, however.

If you’re in the US, then 1 stick of butter = 4 oz / 115 g / or 0.5 cups. But for anywhere else in the world, the best thing would be to also measure the butter using a measuring scale.

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Butter should be softened, but not too softened. Here’s a crude way of checking if your butter is at the right consistency – make an indentation in the butter with your finger. If the butter is too hard to make an indentation, then well, the butter is too hard. 🙂

But if the butter does make an indentation, but it doesn’t keep its shape, and the butter around the indentation loses shape, then the butter is too soft (the butter can also be too oily when it’s this soft).

If it’s easy to make an indentation but it also keeps its shape without distorting any of the butter in the surrounding area, then it’s at the correct consistency!

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In the winter, I remove the butter from the fridge and keep it outside overnight. But in the summer, this could make the butter too soft. So instead, in the summer, I prefer to cut the butter into tablespoon-sized pieces and then leave them out to soften for about 30 minutes or so. If the butter gets too soft, then you can simply stick it back in the fridge for about 10-15 minutes to let them chill just a little bit.

Room temperature butter creams and whips easily. This is important because the butter will incorporate air during creaming/whipping which is essential for a light pound cake. If it’s too cold/hard, or too soft/melted, then it cannot hold air while being whipped.

Eggs should also be kept outside overnight, so that they are all at room temperature. This will help the eggs retain air as well, while being mixed.

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These should also be at room temperature. I usually store flour and sugar at room temperature anyway, but if you store flour in the fridge, remember to remove it from the fridge the night before.

Each step is equally important. Make sure EACH INGREDIENT has been weighed and prepared (and sifted), BEFORE you start to make the pound cake.

Since a classic pound cake does not rely on baking powder or baking soda for the cake to rise, the process of mixing the ingredients is crucial. That’s because this classic pound cake relies heavily on the air that is being incorporated during the mixing of butter and sugar, which further gets trapped by the gluten and eggs during baking.

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I prefer to use a stand mixer over a hand mixer for convenience. You need to cream the butter and sugar together for a few minutes to incorporate the air, and trust me, your hands will thank you if you use a stand mixer instead of a hand mixer.

The butter needs to be mixed for a few minutes (about 3 – 7 minutes, depending on the room temp. and the butter temp.) by itself first.

Use the standard mixer attachment in your mixer to do this (not the whip or the dough hook), and this will ensure the incorporation of air in the butter, making it light, fluffy and creamy.

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Another mistake to avoid is running the stand mixer at high speed to speed up the process. DO NOT DO THIS! The high speed can knock the air out really fast. So run the mixer at medium speed to let the air in slowly but surely!

When the butter is fluffy, then you add the sugar. Make sure not to dump all the sugar in at once. The weight of the sugar can cause the butter to deflate, which is NOT good.

So add the sugar in a thin, steady stream, while the stand mixer is running. This will help cream the butter and sugar together, evenly, adding

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The butter and sugar are creamed together for a few minutes as well. This is for two reasons – one, to incorporate more air and two, to dissolve the sugar. This is why I prefer to use caster sugar which dissolves much faster.

The sugar may not need to be completely dissolved before the addition of the eggs, but they definitely should be completely dissolved after you add the eggs. If you’re using regular cane sugar,