Flawed + Chocolate Chip Pound Cake
Book: Flawed by Cecelia Ahern from the incredible Owl Crate, April Dystopian Box
(yes, the same Cecelia Ahern of PS I Love You)
Recipe: Chocolate Chunk Pound Cake
Flawed is a dystopian book - one of my favorites. I love crazy fictional societies. This one is an Us vs Them/Outcasts (Flawed) where the Flawed are literally branded a la The Scarlet Letter and then there's some Hitler going on with the F armbands. The Guild decides who is Flawed and although they're supposedly governed by the Government it's not a legal process but a moral process. When the moral process is being decided by an incredibly immoral person it's time to dismantle the system. *cue montage of awesome people*
Celestine is a logical, mathematical, black and white girl. Almost literally as she's biracial as well. She's the perfect girl, with the perfect family, and the perfect boyfriend. Then one day on the bus she makes a decision that changes everything. There are 2 seats for the Flawed on the bus and 2 unFlawed are sitting in those seats. An old Flawed gentleman boards the bus and must stand even though there are available seats because the two Flawed seats are taken. He begins to cough and the unFlawed ignore him as it's considered a Flaw to aid a Flawed. Celestine can't stand it and guides him to an unFlawed seat out of compassion as he reminded her of her grandfather. The Guild decides in this case that compassion is a flaw as it was aiding a Flawed. The Us think they're 100% moral and pure but it's our faults that help us learn and grow and so therefore those with no faults are unfit to lead.
Very excited for the sequel in 2017!
I love pound cake. LOVE pound cake. Plus you bake it in a cold oven which makes me super happy because I always forget to preheat and have to sit around and watch the oven slowly warm up. Or I preheat too early and my kitchen is hotter than Hades while I rush to get the batter made up. There is no in between for me!
I decided on chocolate chip pound cake as a play on the black and white views of their society and as Celestine is biracial. Yum.
The mixing theory is pretty basic creaming method except for the fact that the wet and dry mix are added very quickly instead of in multiple stages. The long beat time for creaming the sugar and butter and the long beat time at the end produce a thick wonderful batter.
Great simple ingredients for a perfect pound cake:
Beat the butter and sugar at a medium high speed for 5 full minutes. I stop and scrape at least once, sometimes twice.
Add the eggs one at a time, beat well and then Sns after each addition. This will thin out the batter a LOT! Add in your vanilla bean paste. I really stress VBP in this recipe instead of regular vanilla extract because it adds so much more flavor which is incredibly important in a basic cake like this.
Whisk together your cake flour and salt (or all purpose flour and cornstarch, I'll provide a substitution formula with the recipe) Now is where is gets a little weird. Usually we'd divide this up into 4 parts or so but we're going to do it fast. Half of the flour mix then ALL of the heavy cream, then the rest of the flour mix. After the last flour addition beat on medium to medium high speed for 5 minutes. While that's beating chop your chocolate if you haven't already done so. Stir in the chocolate reserving a handful to sprinkle on top of your loaves.
I use my handy 2oz scoop again for these mini loaves! They're off to our new neighbors. Fun thing about living in a new development is we get new neighbors every week!
I did 4 partially rounded scoops per mini loaf and then a full size loaf for our house!
Welcome to The Guild, y'all.
Chocolate Chunk Pound Cake
6 - 6"x3.5" loaves
Or
2 - 9"x5" loaves
8oz Butter, Unsalted and Softened
21oz Granulated Sugar
7 Large Eggs, room temperature
2 teaspoons Vanilla Bean Paste (or extract)
12oz Cake Flour (or subtract 6 tablespoons from 12oz of All Purpose Flour and add 6 tablespoons of corn starch. This is what I usually do!)
3/4 teaspoon Salt
8oz Heavy Cream
5 oz Chopped Chocolate or Chocolate Chips, preferably dark + 1oz for topping (optional)
Beat the sugar and butter together in a stand mixer for 5 minutes, until really light and fluffy. About 8-10 minutes with a hand mixer. Stop and scrape half way through.
Add eggs one at a time, stopping and scraping well after each addition.
Add vanilla bean paste.
Whisk together flour, salt, and cornstarch (if using)
Add half of the flour mix and beat. Add the heavy cream and mix. Add the remaining flour in and beat for 5 minutes.
Stir in chopped chocolate or chocolate chips.
Bake in a COLD oven. Grease pans very well as the recipe tends to stick. I like to use Baker's Joy, never any sticking!
Bake at 350 degrees. 45 minutes - 1 hour.
Post contains affiliate links because I need more chocolate. Send help.
