Bake or Break

Cream Cheese Pound Cake with Strawberry-White Chocolate Sauce

I’ve never been a huge fan of pound cake. I like it just fine and definitely wouldn’t turn down a slice. (Although, when given a choice, I’ll go chocolate just about every time.) But, in the case of this one, there’s pound cake and then there’s pound cake.

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Mexican Chocolate Cupcakes with Dulce de Leche Frosting

To me, dulce de leche is one of the great inventions of the food world. It takes the idea of caramel and moves it into the territory of the amazing. I haven’t done a lot of baking with it, but I think I more than make up for that with this frosting. I’ve combined the amazing with another favorite, cream cheese, to make a simple to make, creamy, caramel-y frosting.

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Hummingbird Bundt Cake

Hummingbird Cake is one of my favorite cakes. I don’t make it often because it’s just too dangerous to have around. There’s something magical about that combination of bananas, pineapple, cinnamon, and cream cheese that is hard to resist.

In a recent issue of Southern Living, this slight twist on the traditional Hummingbird caught my eye. I immediately saved the recipe, putting it near the top of my to-bake list.

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Pecan Layer Cake with Banana Icing

I have a green metal box full of my grandmother’s hand-written recipes. When I need some baking inspiration, I love to look through it and see what jumps out at me.

Recently, I came across one of her recipes for a banana icing. No cake, just the icing. As I started thinking of what kind of cake would go well with the icing, my mind kept returning to the idea of a pecan cake.

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Cinnamon Cream Cheese Coffee Cake

How great is coffee cake? There aren’t that many cakes that can justifiably be eaten at any time of day. While we may not always need an excuse to eat cake for breakfast, it’s nice to do so with a tad less guilt sometimes.

This particular coffee cake is a slight twist on the traditional with the addition of a cream cheese swirl. All the things we love about coffee cake are still there — cinnamon, nuts, crumb topping. There just happens to be some cream cheese goodness swirled into it the delicate cake to take it to new levels of fabulousness.

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Chocolate Chip Bundt Cake

Bundt cake and I are great friends. The pure genius of them is that you can make a beautiful, delicious cake without all the layers and frosting.

I have had this recipe in my to-bake file for almost two years. I have no idea how I waited this long to make it. A Bundt cake with chocolate chips, brown sugar, and pecans??? Yes, please!

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