Mrs. Pettibone’s Christmas Pound Cake

Here's a recipe that always brings back childhood memories of Christmas in New Orleans for me. Our neighbor, Mrs. Pettibone, used to make up a bunch of these pecan pound cakes and give them out as presents around the neighborhood. One Christmas, her dog Luther (a German Shepard who happened to be blind), somehow managed to climb on top of her kitchen table and put quite a dent in a few of the pound cakes she had just made. "Luther! You gonna be thanking God you is blind, boy! That way you not gonna see what I'm gonna do to you when I catch you this very day!!"

Ingredients:

• 1/4 tsp Baking Soda
• 1 cup Buttermilk
• 2 sticks Unsalted Butter
• 2 cups White Sugar
• 1 tsp pure Vanilla Extract
• 1 tsp Salt
• 6 large Eggs
• 3 cups White Flour
• 10 oz Pecan pieces, chopped coarse

Cooking Procedure:

• Preheat your oven to 300 degrees
• Place the buttermilk in a small bowl
• Add the baking soda & stir well
• Note: This mixture will foam up a bit
• Set this buttermilk mixture aside
• In a mixer, combine the butter & sugar
• Stir well
• Add the vanilla extract & salt
• Stir well
• With the mixer running, add the eggs, one at a time
• Mix well
• With the mixer running, gradually add the flour (1 cup at a time)
• Beat this well
• Add the buttermilk mixture
• Beat this cake mix until creamy
• Using a rubber spatula, fold in the pecan pieces
• Grease a large loaf pan
• Pour in the pound cake mix
• Place the loaf pan in the oven
• Bake the pound cake for 2 hours...or until a knife inserted into the center of the loaf comes out clean
• Let the pound cake cool at room temperature
• Once the pound cake is cool, gently remove it from the loaf pan

Serve the pound cake naked or with a dollop of whipped cream