A simple, easy and delicious old school cream cheese pound cake with a crunchy top.
This is one of my all time favorite church cookbook recipes. No, it is my favorite.
It’s an old school pound cake from my Aunt Mah-tha’s Washington Street United Methodist Church’s Bicentennial Cookbook.
This cake is a hit wherever served . You can serve it at many occasions from Baptists picnics to Bar Mitzvahs.
It’s very dense and tasty with delightfully crunchy top (which comes from starting it in a cold oven). Plus you want believe how easy and simple it is to whip up with only 7 ingredients.
For you pound cake purist, it is great by itself, but is also very tasty glazed (I use cream cheese glaze),
Warning!!! it’s so scrumptious, you might not want to stop indulging after one serving. In that case, remember, this cake might be easy to whip up, but your jeans want be able to zip up.
Ingredients In This Pound Cake
- Cream Cheese – Full fat cream cheese at room temperature for best results
- Butter – Real butter at room temperature for best results
- Sugar
- Eggs – At room temperature for best results
- All Purpose Flour – I recommend sifting your flour
- Salt
- Almond or Vanilla Flavoring – It’s delicious with either. I think the almond is delightfully unique.
How To Make Crunchy Top Cream Cheese Pound Cake
- Do not preheat oven. You will start the cake in a cold oven. This gives it the crunchy top.
- Cream butter and cream cheese and add sugar
- Sift flour and salt and add to mixture alternately with eggs.
- Add vanilla or almond
- Put batter in tube, bundt or 2 loaf pans. (This is a lot of batter. You may need to put some aside and make 3 to 5 cupcakes.)
- Insert cake in a cold oven and set temperature to 325.
- Depending on your oven, it will cook from 1 1/4 to 1 1/2 hours.
- Remove from oven and let cool 15 minutes and release.
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How To Cream Butter, Cream Cheese And Sugar
When baking a cake it is so important that your sugar and butter are well creamed. With this cake we need to make sure our sugar, butter and cream cheese are well mixed. Undermixing these ingredients can result in an overly dense cake.
- Your butter and cream cheese should be at room temperature
- Mix butter with stand or hand mixer for 30 seconds.
- Add cream cheese and mix until butter and cream cheese are well blended.
- Add sugar and mix on medium speed for 1 or 2 minutes. The mixture should not be gritty or have any chunks of butter or cream cheese.
Helpful Video On Creaming Butter And Sugar
Cake Toppings For This Old School Pound Cake
A great quality of this cake is it pairs and can be topped with so much. There’s not much it want go with.
- Strawberries
- Peaches
- Blueberries
- Cherries
- Ice Cream
- Chocolate, Caramel or Strawberry Syrup
- Nutella
- Whipped cream
Final Thoughts On This Heavenly, Crunchy Topped, Cream Cheese Pound Cake
This is an amazing cake. It can be served at so many different occasions, is such a simple cake that’s easy to make and has extraordinary taste. It is sure to become one of your favorites and a part of your recipe collection for year’s to come.
In case you have any queries regarding the recipe feel free to reach out via the comment section or the contact page. Also, if you have tried this recipe, I would love to hear about your experiences.
I have linked to our related recipes below and I’m sure you will love them.
Additional Old School Cake Recipes
- Easy Homemade Chocolate Pound Cake
- Easy Blueberry Cake With Lemon Glaze
- Slap Your Mama Pound Cake
- Moist Hot Milk Sponge Cake
- Easy Lemon Loaf Cake Recipe
- Lemon Buttermilk Pound Cake
Cold Oven Cream Cheese Pound Cake
Equipment
- Stand Mixer This is a thick batter, so I recommend a stand mixer
- hand mixer A hand mixer will work, but if you have a stand mixer use that.
- Bundt Pan A 12 cup bundt pan with 10 to 15 cup capacity.
Ingredients
- 8 ounces Cream cheese Room Temperature
- 1½ cups Butter Room Temperature
- 3 cups Sugar
- 6 Eggs Room Temperature
- 3 cups All purpose flour Sifted
- ¼ tsp Salt
- 1½ tsp Vanilla or Almond Live on the edge and try the almond
Instructions
- I usually start this cake in a cold oven. However, you can preheat to 325°.
- Cream butter and cream cheese until smooth, getting all the cream cheese lumps out.8 ounces Cream cheese, 1½ cups Butter
- Add sugar gradually and beat until it's light and fluffy. Gritty texture should be gone.3 cups Sugar
- Sift flour and salt.3 cups All purpose flour, ¼ tsp Salt
- Add the flour alternately with the eggs to the cream sugar mixture.6 Eggs
- Add vanilla or almond1½ tsp Vanilla or Almond
- Pour batter into a well greased and floured large tube or bundt pan. You can also use 2 large loaf pans.
- Bake at 325° for 1 hour and 30 minutes. I start checking mine at 1 hour and 15 minutes.
- Insert a sharp knife or long wooden pick in middle of cake to verify it's done.
- Let cool 10 – 15 minutes and invert
Notes
- Have ingredients at room temperature
- For the love of pound cake, don’t use low fat or no fat ingredients. Â
- Mix butter and cream cheese well with an electric mixer before incorporating sugar.
- Add sugar gradually and beat until light and fluffy. No gritty texture should remain.
- Add eggs one at a time. Beat each egg just until the yellow disappears.Â
- Sift you’re flour. Really, sift your flour. This Norpro Hand Crank Sifter gets all the lumps out.
- Don’t preheat your oven. This is a cold oven cream cheese pound cake.
- If using a bundt pan or loaf pan for this cream cheese pound cake, fill your pan or pans 2/3’s of the way full.
- If you are using a bundt pan, this might make a bit to much batter. You can make 2 to 4 cupcakes with the excess batter. If you are using a tube pan there will not be excess batter.
- Insert a long sharp knife or long wooden pick into the center of the pound cake to test for doneness. It should come out clean or with a few crumbs when done. If there’s clinging batter, it’s back in the oven.
Don’t you have to use baking powder or baking soda for the cream cheese pound cake?
Thank you.
Linda
Almost all traditional pound cakes require baking powder;however, this one does not. It makes a very delicious and dense classic pound cake with no baking soda or powder. This is one of my favorite cake recipes and it is so easy to make. Please try it and let me know what you think. Thanks
Would this work using almond & adding lemon zest
Yes, I think it would be great. Very unique. Please try it and let me know. Great thought. Thanks for the question and comment.
The cake turned out wonderfully.
Please specify for novice bakers whether to use cake flour, all-purpose, or self-rising, this is a crucial step! Thanks!
Thank you so much for this advice. This is a great point and I will make the change now.