nutella pound cake

Do you watch CreateTV on PBS?
Cooks Country show is on there (where this recipe comes from).
That is the show that is like America's Test Kitchen but just has a different name.
Wait is there another show just like ATK?  Wasn't there three of them?
There is Cooks Country, America's Test Kitchen from Cook's Illustrated and....?
CreateTV recently added Martha's Cooking School. I get so envious of Martha' kitchen on there; she has every pot and pan imaginable; an All Clad lovers dream to say the least!

Whatever happened to GlobeTrekker? Do they still make new episodes? I loved that show.
Watching it truly made me want to drop everything, check out of life, and just travel.
This pound cake recipe is from America's Test Kitchen. To me, it really is the best pound cake recipe I've ever come across. The use of cake flour in the pound cake truly lends itself to a nice softer pound cake, not as hard and dense.
Of course it's great on its own, but I had a craving, a yearning to put a little nutella in there as well as some crunch. Keep this recipe handy for the summer, as this pound cake (plain) is fabulous with marinated strawberries or blueberries, and freshly whipped cream.
In the recipe they say to place cake in cold oven, I didn't do this, just plum forgot, and it came out fine.
A little puffy and uneven on the top, but with poundcake in a bundt pan you never see the top since it's inverted.
I added a nice layer of nutella to the middle along with some pecans. You can skip the nuts if you want to, but I used them to help keep the nutella from sinking.

At this point, I know it would induce a sugar coma, but I was tempted to get a spoon and dig in.


Even if you don't want to use the nutella, save the pound cake base recipe for future uses, it's a really good recipe.  The cake flour makes all the difference in texture-taste wise.

nutella pound cake
pound cake base from Cook's Country
print recipe

3 cups cake flour
1/2 ts baking powder
1 ts salt
1 cup whole milk
2 ts pure vanilla extract
20 TB (2 1/2 sticks) unsalted butter, softened
2 1/2 cups sugar
6 large eggs

nutella filling:
about ½ cup nutella
couple handfuls of chopped pecans (or walnuts)

glaze:
½  cup powdered sugar
1 TB +/- whole milk or buttermilk

Adjust oven rack to lower-middle position. Grease and flour 16-cup tube pan. Combine flour, baking powder, and salt in bowl. Whisk milk and vanilla in measuring cup.
With electric mixer on medium speed, beat butter and sugar until fluffy, about 2 minutes. Beat in eggs, one at a time, until combined.
Reduce speed to low and add flour mixture in 3 additions, alternating with 2 additions of milk mixture. Mix on low until smooth, about 30 seconds. Use rubber spatula to give batter final stir.
Pour half the batter into prepared pan and smooth top.
Sprinkle on a handful or two or chopped pecans, then using two spoons, place a layer of nutella around the entire middle.  Make sure not to let nutella go to the edges as it will leak onto the outside.
(I placed this in a preheated oven, 325 degrees and baked it for about 60-75 minutes.  They say to place in cold oven, then heat to 325 degrees; I forgot this step.)
Place cake in cold oven. Adjust oven temperature to 325 degrees and bake, without opening oven door, until cake is golden brown and toothpick inserted in center comes out clean, 65 to 80 minutes.
Cool cake in pan for 20 minutes, then finish cooling on a wire rack.
Cool completely, about 2 hours.
If you want a glaze: just mix about ½ cup of powdered sugar with 1 TB of whole milk or buttermilk; whisk until smooth, and pour over bundt.