Pound Cake Lab462 recipes

Pound Cake Lab · Calculator

Design your own pound cake

The sliders start at the typical cake: the median of 462 recipes for each ingredient, in grams per 100 g of flour. Move any of them within the range that 90% of recipes use (the 5th to the 95th percentile) and the grams update, with where your choice sits among the recipes and what that ingredient does.

This scales ratios; it is not a tested recipe. Each ingredient moves on its own against the flour, and a combination no recipe uses may not bake the way you expect. For the method, pan and oven, follow the real recipes nearest your numbers.

Flour

380 g, about 3 cups, makes one typical cake.

Start from a recipe

Grams per 100 g of flour

  1. 345 g · 91%about 1 1/2 cups

    In the middle: 46% of recipes use more, 53% less.

    The original recipe was a pound each of butter, sugar, eggs and flour: 100% here. Most modern recipes use less.

  2. 455 g · 120%about 2 1/4 cups

    In the middle: 48% of recipes use more, 49% less.

    Sugar creamed into the butter is most of the rise in a cake with little or no leavening.

  3. 305 g · 80%about 6 large eggs

    In the middle: 41% of recipes use more, 40% less.

    Eggs set the fine, dense crumb; the classic ratio matches the flour's weight.

  4. 180 g · 47%about 3/4 cup

    In the middle: 49% of recipes use more, 50% less.

    Sour cream, cream cheese or milk: not in the original, now in most recipes, for a moister cake.

  5. 6 g · 1.6%

    In the middle: 49% of recipes use more, 48% less.

    Traditional pound cake uses none; a little baking powder is common insurance.

  6. 2.5 g · 0.7%

    In the middle: 49% of recipes use more, 47% less.

    Salt balances the butter and sugar.

Your pound cake

Your pound cake in grams, with approximate volumes
IngredientGrams
Flour380 gabout 3 cups
Butterbutter, oil and shortening345 gabout 1 1/2 cups
Sugarwhite sugar, brown sugar, honey and syrups455 gabout 2 1/4 cups
Eggwhole eggs, yolks and whites305 gabout 6 large eggs
Dairymilk, buttermilk, yogurt, cream and water180 gabout 3/4 cup
Leaveningbaking soda and baking powder6 g
Salt2.5 g
Total1,674 g

1,674 g in all from 380 g of flour, counting only the groups above.

Closest real recipe: Coconut Lime Pound Cake (lecremedelacrumb.com).

BakeThe median of 411 recipes is 350°F (175°C), most for 45 to 68 minutes at their own size. A bigger or smaller batch, or a different pan, changes the time.

The 3 real recipes nearest your numbers

Measured on butter, sugar, egg, dairy, leavening and salt at once. These are published, tested recipes: follow one for its method, pan and timing, or load its percentages and adjust from there.

  1. 1

    Coconut Lime Pound Cake · lecremedelacrumb.com

    butter 91% · sugar 120% · egg 80% · dairy 46% · leavening 0.9% · salt 0.6%

  2. 2

    Pound Cake · bromabakery.com

    butter 91% · sugar 107% · egg 80% · dairy 47% · leavening 0.9% · salt 1.2%

  3. 3

    Almond Amaretto Pound Cake · bakerbynature.com

    butter 103% · sugar 120% · egg 76% · dairy 69% · leavening 1.8% · salt 0.9%

How the calculator works

Every recipe is reduced to baker's percentages: grams of each ingredient group per 100 g of flour. The starting point is the median of all 462 recipes for each group separately, so no single recipe is exactly the starting cake. Grams are your flour weight times each percentage, rounded to the nearest 5 g above 50 g and the nearest gram or half gram below.

“More than 80% of recipes” counts the recipes with strictly less of that ingredient per gram of flour. The nearest recipes are measured on every ingredient at once, each scaled by how much recipes vary on it, so a wide-ranging ingredient does not outweigh a narrow one.

Only the groups listed are counted. Vanilla, spices, mix-ins and toppings are left out unless they have their own slider. Volumes are approximate: flour at 125 g a cup, sugar 200 g, butter or oil 225 g, milk and other liquids 240 g, a large egg 50 g.