All the Buzz at Honey B Farm: A Favorite Holiday Cake

I love to cook with seasonal ingredients, and at this time of the year I really like to use cranberries! Here is one of my favorite cakes, one that I bake every year around Thanksgiving or Christmas. It is a rich, tender pound cake with plenty of cranberries and nuts in it.   Pound cakes are an old fashioned type of cake.   I remember my grandfather loved pound cakes, and many of the Sunday dinners or holiday meals when I was growing up included pound cake for dessert. At Christmas time there would be slices of pound cake and slices of nut kolach almost always for dessert on Christmas Eve. I found this recipe for Cranberry Cream Cheese Pound Cake years ago in a Taste of Home magazine and it has been a favorite ever since.
     This recipe makes a good sized Bundt cake, so use your biggest pan. If this cake is too big for your family consider inviting friends or neighbors over for a slice or two and some tea! Or, better yet, put several thick slices on a fancy plate and give it to someone who might be a little depressed or who could use a special kindness, or a shut in, or a lonely elderly person. You can buy lovely plates at any thrift store for practically nothing. I have seen great looking holiday plates for a quarter or 50 cents. Wrap up a plate full of cake slices with plastic wrap and a pretty bow, and go visit someone! In this crazy, stressful world it's not hard to find someone who could use a friendly little visit! I like to keep a supply of extra plates on hand just for this purpose.   If you don't have any pretty plates to give away, wrap up a sturdy piece of cardboard or a clean large meat tray in pretty wrapping paper, and that will also make an attractive gift.
     As an aside, today while baking this cake, we were having an ice storm. Thick ice coated everything outside. It was so cozy and warm inside today while I baked this cake, and the whole house smelled wonderful!

Icicles formed all along the porch and ice coated everything outside today.

Anyway - Here is the recipe:

CRANBERRY CREAM CHEESE POUND CAKE

1 pkg (8 oz) cream cheese, softened

1 c. butter (2 sticks)

1 1/2 c. sugar

1 1/2 tsp. vanilla

4 eggs

2 1/4 c. flour (DIVIDED)

1 1/2 tsp. baking powder

1/2 tsp salt

2 c. fresh cranberries, but in half

1/2 c. chopped nuts

Preheat oven to 350. Beat cream cheese, butter, sugar and vanilla until smooth. Add eggs, one at a time, mixing well after each. Combine 2 c. flour, baking powder and salt. Add to creamed mix and beat until smooth. Mix remaining 1/4 c. flour with cranberries and nuts and fold into the batter. Spoon into a greased and floured 10 inch Bundt pan. Bake for 65-70 min, until cake tests done. Let stand 5 minutes, then turn from pan onto a plate. When cool drizzle with a powdered sugar icing or just powdered sugar if desired. I usually just sprinkle powdered sugar over the cake, as I think it is rich enough without icing.