My friend Joan gave me the Joy the Baker Cookbook recently, so I thought I would try some of the recipes from it, since they did look delicious.
I happened to have some small avocados that I bought last week in my kitchen, and the avocado pound cake recipe caught my eye. I’m not sure why I even had avocados, since it’s not like I had any Super Bowl plans, and I had no intent to make guacamole. I suppose that I just like eating avocados once in a while. But avocados? In pound cake? I had never heard of such a thing. It sounds like a modern invention. Perhaps one that was described in a letter like this.
February 6, 2011
Dearest Joy,
I missed your presence today more than ever. I know that your work is demanding and keeps you away for weeks at a time, but really, darling, I wished you were here with me today especially.
I had the usual gang over: Bob and Karen, Steve and Diane, Kevin and Michael. They were here to watch the Super Bowl, but I just wanted them here because I was so lonely without you. I really couldn’t care less about the football game. All I wanted was you.
I tried to at least pretend to care about traditions. I went out to buy a bag of avocados so I could make guacamole. We really don’t eat avocados often enough, Joy. That soft, buttery texture, the beautiful green color, there’s just nothing like it. I mashed up the avocado flesh along with some lime juice using a fork. It felt strangely satisfying to mash up the green mushy fruit.
I remember you telling me before how you make your guacamole, so I added some minced garlic, salt, cumin, cayenne pepper, onion, and some seeded tomatoes. Right before my very eyes, the pile of green ovals of avocado had magically transformed themselves into a delicious dip for chips. Perfect for the Super Bowl. But the Super bowl wasn’t perfect without you.
I sat there in the reclining chair, half watching the game, half eyeing the three couples sitting around the living room, holding hands, leaning on each other, just being couples. How I wished you were here by my side in that moment. I was just the seventh wheel on a six-wheeler.
The game ended sooner than I had imagined it would, and the three pairs of two marched out of the apartment to have separate dinners, in private. I was once again alone in the apartment, now having to face the rest of the night without the distractions of the Super Bowl and friends to keep my mind off of how miserable I was without you here. I listlessly cleaned up the empty glasses and bowls of chips, while at the same time I felt how empty I felt with you on the road.
I had everything cleaned up, when I realized I still had some avocados left. There were two of them on the counter, round and somewhat soft. I couldn’t help but think of your breasts, Joy, even though yours are so much more ample and so much prettier than two brown avocados. But I couldn’t help it. I can’t stop thinking about you.
The problem I had at hand, though, was that the avocados were probably going to be overripe soon, and I didn’t want to deal with mushy avocados. I didn’t think I had the strength to face that problem alone. So I had to use them up somehow. I was tired of guacamole. I had stuffed my face with so many chips dipped in guacamole, just to drown my sorrows in luscious monounsaturated fat.
I was sitting there drinking some wine when I thought about how much you loved pound cake. You turned me onto it. I never thought that I could love something so simple, but somehow you did it. That soft, buttery cake that had so few ingredients and yet was so delicious. My mouth was watering.
So it came to me. Couldn’t I mix in some avocado into pound cake batter, since it was basically like butter? I could just replace some of the butter with avocado, and make a pound cake with it. I was determined to make this work. For you.
Flour, butter, sugar, eggs. And avocado. The batter was a pale green, like that pastel color you like when you’re painting Easter Eggs for the local kids. I always loved your generous spirit. I just poured it into a loaf pan and baked it for fifty minutes until it was done. Easier than pie.
I ate the slightly green pound cake, thinking of you with every bite. It was so moist and delicious. Chunks of cake melted in my mouth, and I strangely thought of the last time I ate you out. I loved darting my tongue into your inner depths. I felt like I was reaching your soul with my tongue, while you moaned and screamed my name. Making you happy brings me a satisfaction that I can’t get anywhere else.
You know what I miss most, though, is the nights we spend together in bed. It’s just not the same without you, your half of the bed cold and lifeless while I stare at the pillow on your side that’s missing your head on it. I just want to have your body next to mine, so I can hold you in my arms and make love to you like you deserve. Your vagina envelops my penis like a warm mouth on a lollipop, and we thrust together in harmony, two sea creatures undulating synchronously in the ocean of our love. You moan, I moan, and we exchange fluids like our parents told us not to. You climax before me. Ladies first. As the pH in your vagina goes up from the massive release of fluids from your orgasm, I release my own fluids into your area, streams of life swimming upstream in an acidic chamber of warmth.
We collapse after climaxing and hold each other in our arms. Your arms drape around my shoulders, and I feel totally safe and complete as I drift off to sleep in the arms of the woman I love.
I miss you terribly.
Forever yours,
Gregory
Geez, talk about a sappy love letter. Do people even write letters anymore? I just seem to be exchanging emails with my dates lately. Not that they’ve really gone anywhere, but still, I wish someday I’d have somebody to write a letter to like that.
Oh anyway, enough about that, let’s talk about the recipe. The somewhat odd measurements (like 3/8 cup buttermilk) are because I halved the recipe from the book, which is for two loaves. I did not think I needed two whole loaves of pound cake, when I had no gigantic party to go to.
Avocado Pound Cake
from Joy the Baker Cookbook
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1/4 cup yellow cornmeal
1/4 teaspoon salt
3/4 teaspoon baking powder
3/4 teaspoon baking soda
3/8 cup (3/4 of a stick) unsalted butter, softened
1 1/2 cups white sugar
1/2 cup plus 1 tablespoon ripe mashed avocado
2 large eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
3/8 cup (1/4 cup plus 2 tablespoons) buttermilk
- Preheat oven to 350F.
- Grease and flour a 9×5-inch loaf pan.
- Whisk together the flour, cornmeal, salt, baking powder, and baking soda, and set aside.
- Beat the butter and sugar together until light and fluffy.
- Add in the avocado and beat until incorporated.
- Add the eggs one at a time, beating after each egg.
- Add the vanilla extract and beat until mixed.
- Add half the flour mixture and beat until just incorporated.
- Add the buttermilk and the remaining half of the flour mixture, and beat until just incorporated.
- Pour the batter into the loaf pan.
- Bake for 45 to 55 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean.
- Let the pound cake cool in the pan for 20 minutes before turning out onto a wire rack to cool.
You’re supposed to use a stand mixer for the beating, but since I don’t have one in my tiny kitchen, I just used a hand mixer.
The wet ingredients: butter, sugar, mashed avocado, eggs, and vanilla extract. I actually used a hand mixer, unlike my usual method of just mixing with a spoon, since I wanted to get the avocado nice and smooth.
And then the dry ingredients go in: flour, cornmeal, salt, baking powder, and baking soda, along with some buttermilk.
The batter, with a nice green color, goes into the loaf pan.
My pound cake was done after 50 minutes. The greenness has disappeared, at least on the outside.
Onto a wire rack to cool. It looks kind of like normal pound cake on the outside.
Well, except that the top seems flatter than the pound cake I usually make.
The inside has a green tinge to it from the avocado. The cornmeal adds a bit of grittiness, and the avocado lends a slight avocado flavor to the pound cake. I actually liked this pound cake quite a bit, it’s a departure from the normal pound cake with its own unique taste, yet it has that sweetness and richness that I would want from pound cake.
I did get some comments, though, that it wasn’t quite pound cake-like enough. Maybe I should just present it as “avocado loaf.”