Pound Cake

Originating in the eighteenth century, a pound cake is made with equal weights of flour, butter, eggs and sugar. Traditionally it was a pound of each, so made a very big cake. Today the pound cake has many variations, some adding lemon, brandy or spices, some separating the eggs and whisking the whites to add air to the cake, others contain no fat at all. Pound cakes are usually baked in a loaf tin.