This marble pound cake has a great buttery flavour and a lovely moist texture because it's made with sour cream. The chocolate cake part is made with dark chocolate. This marble pound cake makes a lovely accompaniment to afternoon tea.
Preheat the oven to 325°F (165 °C). Brush a 9×5-inch (23x12.5 cm) loaf pan with melted butter, then dust with flour, tapping out the excess. Set aside for later. For the loaf pan, I recommend either the Oxo Good Grips Non-stick Pro loaf cake pan (available on Amazon) or the Nordic Ware Aluminum 1 pound Commercial loaf pan (available on Amazon)
Sift together the flour, baking powder, and salt into a medium bowl. Set aside for later.
In a large bowl, cream the butter and the sugar until it is light. Add the eggs, one at a time, mixing well between each addition. Add the vanilla and mix again.
Add the sifted dry ingredients to the batter, alternating with the sour cream.
Scoop out half the vanilla batter into a medium bowl. Mix the melted chocolate into it.
Dollop the vanilla and chocolate batters into the prepared pan and swirl them a little with a knife or spoon.
Bake the loaf for about 70 minutes, or until a cake tester poked through the center comes out clean.
Let the loaf cool for about 30 minutes before unmolding it onto a wire rack to cool completely.
Notes
For this recipe, use a dark chocolate with a high percentage of cocoa and that isn't too sweet. I recommend Cacao Barry Ocoa chocolate, which is a 70% dark chocolate that is sold in 1 kilo resealable bags in IGA grocery stores in Quebec and online at Vanilla Food Company.For the cake pan, I have two recommendations of pans that I like to use:
Oxo Good Grips Non-stick Pro loaf cake pan (available on Amazon)
Nordic Ware Aluminum 1 pound Commercial loaf pan (available on Amazon)
This marble cake can be frozen whole, wrapped tightly with plastic wrap, and then a layer of aluminum foil to better protect it. The day before serving, defrost the marble cake in the fridge, then slice it to serve.You can also freeze this marble cake sliced so that you can defrost individual pieces, either by staggering the pieces all wrapped together so that they can easily be separated when frozen OR individually wrapping each slice before freezing.