A rich and nutty pistachio pound cake topped with vanilla lavender strawberries and fresh whipped cream. This is a wonderful dessert to enjoy in the evening with a cup of coffee.

If I had to pick my favorite form of social media, I would have to pick Instagram. That is where I discovered Yossy Arefi, who is the blogger behind Apt 2B Baking Co. Yossy is another blogger who recently released a cookbook, and I am completely smitten with it! The book is called Sweeter off the Vine is divided by season and by fruit.

Yossy’s photography is gorgeous, and the cookbook reflects her style. If anything, the book is just a pleasure to thumb through. But don’t just do that because the recipes are as delicious as they are beautiful. It was so hard for me to decide on a recipe to try first, but once I looked at the strawberries speckled with vanilla beans on top of a thick slice of pistachio pound cake, I knew that had to be it. I was expecting the desserts to have fruit as a part of each dessert. I was expecting the strawberries to be in the pound cake, but I am pleasantly surprised at this more sophisticated way to use seasonal strawberries.

The pistachio pound cake is rich, nutty, and surprisingly moist. But what makes this pound cake amazing is the addition of the strawberries and fresh whipped cream. It turns it into a complete dessert with an incredible flavor profile. The strawberries are macerated in a vanilla bean and lavender infused sugar. The strawberries alone make a perfectly light dessert on its own. My daughter ended up stealing the bowl to snack on the berries by herself!

Yield: 1 pound cake

Pistachio Pound Cake with Vanilla Lavender Strawberries

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Prep Time 20 minutes

Cook Time 45 minutes

Total Time 1 hour 5 minutes

Ingredients

Strawberries

• 1 ½ lbs fresh strawberries
• ¼ cup granulated sugar
• ½ teaspoon lavender
• ½ vanilla bean pod, beans scraped

Pistachio Pound Cake

• 1 cup shelled pistachios (unsalted)*
• 1 ½ cups all-purpose flour
• ½ teaspoon baking powder
• ¾ teaspoon salt
• ¾ cup (1 ½ stick) unsalted butter, room temperature
• 1 ¼ cups granulated sugar
• 3 large eggs, room temperature
• ½ teaspoon vanilla extract
• ¼ teaspoon almond extract
• ½ cup whole milk, room temperature
• Fresh sweetened whipped cream

Instructions

1. Hull, wash, and halve the strawberries. Mix together the sugar, lavender, and vanilla beans from their pod. Toss the strawberries in the sugar and set aside in the refrigerator.
2. Preheat the oven to 325 degrees F. Grease and flour a 9 x 5 loaf pan.
3. Add the pistachios to the food processor and blend until it resembles flour. Be careful to not over blend or else it will turn into butter!
4. Mix together the pistachio flour, all-purpose flour, baking powder, and salt. Set aside.
5. Beat the butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Add the eggs one at a time, beating very well between each addition – at least another minute. Beat in both extracts.
6. Alternate between adding the flour and the milk into the butter mixture. Begin and end with the flour which should be added in three additions, while the milk should be added in two additions.
7. Pour the batter into the loaf pan and bake for 45 – 55 minutes, or until a toothpick comes out clean. Allow to cool for about 15 minutes in the pan before taking out and putting on a wire rack to cool completely.
8. To serve: cut a thick slice of the pistachio pound cake, then top with the strawberries and top with the whipped cream.

I received this book for free to review, all thoughts and opinions are 100% my own!