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Five Flavor Pound Cake

Last Updated On: November 16, 2024 | Published: January 07, 2024 by Melissa Diamond | 16 Comments
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We love pound cakes and today's Five Flavor Pound Cake is a brand new recipe for us. We've heard of this cake flavor over the years, but had never actually tried the cake until now!

Five Flavor Pound Cake on a cake pedestal, sliced.

The star flavors of this recipe come from vanilla extract, lemon extract, coconut extract, rum extract, and butter extract.

This cake recipe, which is based on our popular buttermilk pound cake, is moist with a tight crumb, and has wonderful flavor. With so many extracts, anyone would have trouble pinpointing all five-- but altogether it is delicious.

Why We Love It

There are many reasons to love this Five Flavor Pound Cake recipe! Here are just a few:

  • Very moist with five layers of flavor
  • Pound Cakes and Bundt Cakes are so quick to make and easy to decorate!
  • Perfect for picnics and potlucks, entertaining, or just because!
  • Easy to make in advance and freeze!

Quick Look at Ingredients

You can find the full, printable recipe card at the bottom of this post. Here is a quick look at our ingredients (minus the glaze) as well as a few notes.

Ingredients for Five Flavor Pound Cake

Cake Flour gives this cake a softer texture as it contains less protein than all purpose flour, which results in less gluten formation.

Unsalted Butter is our preference for our cake recipes, as it gives us more control over the amount of salt in the cake. If using salted butter, I would omit the salt from the recipe.

Flavorings for today's recipe are vanilla, butter, lemon, rum, and coconut extracts. These are the five flavors most often used in a Five Flavor Pound Cake.

Buttermilk is the liquid in today's recipe. One great thing about buttermilk is that the boost of acidity softens the strands of gluten in the cake batter, which results in a more tender cake. Some popular buttermilk cake recipes are Lemon Buttermilk Cake, Vanilla Buttermilk Cake, and our Lemon Pound Cake!

How to Make Five Flavor Pound Cake

Here is a rundown of the steps for today's cake. Sometimes it helps to see step by step photos of the process! However, scroll to the bottom of the post if you'd like to go straight to the printable recipe.

  • Grease and flour a bundt or tube pan. (We used a 10 inch/12 cup baking capacity.)
  • Preheat the oven to 325℉
  • In a separate bowl whisk these dry ingredients: cake flour, baking powder, and salt to combine, set aside for later.
Bowl of Dry Ingredients, with a whisk.
  • Using an electric mixer (paddle attachment if using a stand mixer), cream the butter on medium speed until smooth. Next, gradually add the sugar and beat until light and fluffy for 3 to 5 minutes.
Butter and sugar mixture in mixing bowl.
  • Add the eggs one at a time, blending after each until the yolk is incorporated.
Adding eggs to pound cake batter in mixing bowl.
  • Add the extracts to the 1 cup of buttermilk.
  • With the mixer on low speed, add the flour mixture alternately with the buttermilk to the butter, sugar, and egg mixture in the mixing bowl. Begin and end with the dry ingredients. I do three additions of dry, alternating with two additions of wet. Mix just until well combined.
Five Flavor Pound Cake Batter in mixing bowl.
  • Scoop batter into prepared bundt pan.
  • Bake at 325 degrees for 1 hour and 5-10 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean. *Baking times may vary.
Freshly baked Five Flavor Pound Cake.
  • Allow to cool in the pan on a wire rack for ten minutes before turning out.

Easy Glaze

We glazed our pound cake with a simple glaze (based on our easy vanilla glaze). This is a combination of confectioners sugar, a few tablespoons of milk, and flavoring and a pinch of salt. We used vanilla extract and coconut extract, but you could use any flavor or combination you'd like.

Apply the glaze to the cooled cake either with a spoon, or for a more controlled drip, you can apply it with a disposable piping bag with the tip snipped away. For a different look, today I squeezed the piping bag for an extra second or two on each drip so that it traveled the length of the cake.

If your glaze is too thick, add a bit more milk. If it is too thin, add a bit more confectioners sugar.

Five Flavor Pound Cake, sliced, on a cake pedestal.

Recipe FAQs

This Five Flavor Pound Cake can safely sit out at room temperature for at least 2-3 days in an airtight container or under a cake dome.

Yes, just as with the majority of our cakes, from orange bundt cake to banana pound cake, chocolate bundt cake, Mascarpone Pound Cake, and more, this pound cake freezes beautifully.

After baking, turn out after ten minutes. Allow to cool until warm (or room temperature), then wrap tightly in plastic wrap followed by aluminum foil. You can place it on wrapped cake board for added support. Freeze for up to three months!

To thaw, move the wrapped cake from the freezer to the kitchen counter. Leave wrapped for 30-45 minutes before unwrapping (or until condensation is no longer forming). Store as usual under a cake dome or in an airtight container.

As we mentioned in the post, the five flavors for this pound cake are most often listed as vanilla, butter, rum, coconut, and lemon extracts. However, you can easily make adjustments or add additional extracts if you'd like to experiment!

We often use cake flour in our cake recipes as they create a softer and more tender crumb. This is thanks to the lower protein content of cake flour, which results in less gluten formation.

Ordinarily, when experimenting with a recipe with so many extracts, I would pick and choose from my favorite extracts, or maybe even add a little almond extract as long as we are experimenting (I love almond!). However, I wanted to stay true to the five flavors traditionally called for in five flavor pound cake.

However, there are lots of ways that you could change things up if you'd like.

With three sticks of butter, this pound cake already has a great buttery flavor naturally, without the butter extract. I also think it would be fun to add a little lemon zest or maybe a cup of shredded coconut along with the extracts to enhance those flavors.

Also, instead of using the buttermilk cake as we did, you can also add the 5 flavors to other favorite pound cakes as well, including our whipping cream pound cake, sour cream pound cake, cream cheese pound cake, and more!

More Pound Cakes

We have many more pound cakes for you to try! From our very first pound cake recipe to marble pound cake, strawberry pound cake, Pina Colada Pound Cake, and more, these recipes are sure to please!

Have you made this? We would LOVE for you to leave a ⭐️ rating as well as a comment and photo below! We really appreciate your feedback!

Five Flavor Pound Cake on a cake pedestal, sliced.

Five Flavor Pound Cake

BY Melissa and Bebe
This moist and delicious Five Flavor Pound Cake is so delicious with five layers of flavor!
Prep Time: 15 minutes
Cook Time: 1 hour 5 minutes
Course: Dessert
Servings: 15
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Ingredients

  • 3 sticks unsalted butter, softened (339g)
  • 3 cups (600g) sugar
  • 5 large eggs, room temperature (place in a bowl of warm water for 5 minutes to speed up the process).
  • 3 cups (342 g) cake flour (Not self rising. We use Swan's Down, bleached)
  • ½ teaspoon (2)g baking powder
  • ½ teaspoon (3g) salt
  • 1 cup (235 g) buttermilk
  • 1 teaspoon (4g) vanilla extract
  • 1 teaspoon (4g) rum extract
  • 1 teaspoon (4g) coconut extract
  • 1 teaspoon (4g) butter extract
  • 1 teaspoon (4g) lemon extract

Easy Vanilla Glaze

  • 2 cups confectioners sugar (measure then sift)
  • 3 tablespoons milk (add additional as needed in small increments)
  • pinch of salt
  • ½ teaspoon vanilla extract (or your flavors of choice. you could even do ¼ teaspoon of each flavor.)
  • ½ teaspoon coconut extract (or flavors of choice)

Instructions

  • Grease and flour a bundt or tube pan. (See notes)
  • Preheat the oven to 325℉
  • In a separate bowl whisk the cake flour, baking powder, and salt to combine, set aside for later.
  • Using an electric mixer (paddle attachment if using a stand mixer), cream the butter on medium speed until smooth. Next, gradually add the sugar and beat until light and fluffy for 3 to 5 minutes.
  • Add the eggs one at a time, blending after each until the yolk is incorporated.
  • Add the extracts to the 1 cup of buttermilk.
  • With the mixer on low speed, add the flour mixture alternately with the buttermilk to the butter/sugar/egg mixture in the mixing bowl. Begin and end with the dry ingredients. I do three additions of dry, alternating with two additions of wet.
  • Scoop batter into prepared bundt pan.
  • Bake at 325 degrees for 1 hour and 5-10 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean. *Baking times may vary.
  • This makes approximately 8 cups of batter.
  • Allow to cool in the pan for 10 minutes before turning out.

Glaze

  • Combine ingredients, stirring until smooth. If it is too thick, add more. milk in small increments. If too thin, add additional confectioners sugar. Cover the bowl with plastic wrap until ready to use.

Decorating the Cake

  • Once the cake has cooled, you can spoon the glaze over the cake, or for more control, you can spoon it into a disposable piping bag with the tip snipped away.

Notes

Substitute for Buttermilk: No Buttermilk? Here is a substitution: Add 1 tablespoon lemon juice or vinegar to a measuring cup. To that, add milk to the 1 cup mark. Stir and allow to sit for a minute or two to thicken.
Substitution for Cake Flour: Using all purpose flour (plain in UK) to make Cake Flour: For each cup of flour in a recipe, remove 2 Tablespoons of flour and replace with 2 Tablespoons cornstarch (cornflour in the UK). This recipe has 3 cups of flour so you will measure out 3 cups of all purpose flour, remove 6 Tablespoons and replace with 6 Tablespoons cornstarch, whisk to blend.
Bundt Pan: Our bundt pan has a baking capacity of 12 cups and measures about 10 inches. If you are working with a smaller pan, it will take longer to bake. Be careful not to overfill. (General rule of thumb: don't fill pan past ⅔ full)
Freezing: This cake can be frozen. If working in advance, we like to tightly wrap our freshly baked cake in a layer of plastic wrap and foil while the cake is still a bit warm and pop in the freezer. The cake can be frozen for up to three months.
Thawing: Bundt cakes and pound cakes take longer to thaw than cake layers. It is best to move the frozen, wrapped cake to the refrigerator the night before, and then move to the kitchen counter the next morning (still wrapped) to continue thawing for a few hours. If you'd like, you can remove the foil after a condensation has formed.

5 from 17 votes (15 ratings without comment)

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16 Comments

    1. Hello! We always use unsalted butter for our cakes and just add the salt separately. (Some brands of salted butter contain more salt than others.) If using salted butter, I would just omit the 1/2 teaspoon salt in the recipe. You can adjust to your liking ;0)

      Reply

  3. This sounds so yummy. I actually have every single one of those extracts, lol. It's been a while since I've baked, moved, but this is something I can't wait to make. Thanks. I'll come back to let you know how well it was received.

    Reply

  7. This cake turned out superb! My daughter said it is the best pound cake she has ever tasted. I don't know about that, but it is delicious! Thank you for sharing!
    I had one a few weeks ago that a friend made. It was good too (someone else's recipe, and I am not sure if it is different from your recipe) but I liked how mine tasted better:)

    Reply

    1. Hi Robin! I'm so glad that you all loved the cake, thanks for your feedback! Your cake looks perfect ;0)

      Reply

    1. Hi Denise,

      When it is time to add the mixture of dry ingredients (flour/leavening/salt) and mixture of wet ingredients (buttermilk/extracts) to the mixing bowl, you don't want to add them all at once. You'll alternate between adding the dry and wet-- and you'll start with the dry mixture.

      Since we we break it down into three additions of dry ingredients and two additions of wet, that means that as we are mixing on low speed, we add in about a third of the dry mixture, followed by about half of the wet mixture. Then, add in about half of the remaining dry mixture followed by the remainder of the wet mixture. Finish with the rest of the dry mixture and mix just until combined.

      Reply