Key Lime Pound Cake and Pound Cake with Lemon Glaze

I finally bought a mixer! I know, your thinking "A baker without a mixer?" True. I was using a blender until last night. I wanted to hold out until I could by a nice mixer, maybe a Kitchenaid, but I couldn't use my smoothie maker ANYMORE! So I bought a simple hand held mixer, not the cheapest, but not the best either...but hey, it works!

I am SUCH a fan of lime! Key lime pie, Limeade, Mojitos, Margaritas, KEY LIME POUND CAKE...BRILLIANT!! This is a must try!

I used Paula Dean's recipe for "Mama's Pound Cake". You know it's gonna be good yall if it's a Paula Deen recipe! And as you know, "Butter is just a little stick of smiles and happiness!"

I used a very basic recipe for the glaze. The same recipe my mother and grandmother used to decorate sugar cookies at Christmas time, but I added a little key lime juice to one glaze and a little fresh squeezed lemon to the other.

Ingredients:

Cake:
1/2 pound of butter
1/2 cup vegetable shortening
3 cups of sugar
5 eggs
3 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 cup milk
1 teaspoon vanilla

Glaze:
1 Cup confectioners sugar
A little milk (about 2 tablespoons)
2 tablespoons of key lime juice OR 3 tablespoons of fresh squeezed lemon juice

Directions:
1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees

2. Cream butter and shortening together

3. Add sugar a little at a time

4. Add eggs one at a time

5. Mix dry ingredients in a separate bowl

6. Alternate adding the dry ingredients and the milk a little at a time

7. Mix in vanilla

8. Pour into a greased and floured pan

9. Bake for 1 1/2 hours or until a toothpick comes out clean

10. When the cake is cooled mix confectioners sugar, milk, and key lime juice until the glaze is loose enough to pour over the cake. OR cofectioners sugar, mile, and fresh squeezed lemon

11. Pour glaze over the cake

12. ENJOY!!!

Tips:
I divided this recipe in half after it was all mixed together and added 1/8 cup of key lime juice to half the batter. The taste is very subtle, but very good. Just enough!

Add the milk to the confectioners sugar a little at a time...a little milk and key lime or lemon juice goes a long way!

When sqeezing a lemon, squeeze it upside down so that the seeds do not fall into your glaze.

This recipe makes LOTS of cake batter! It was pouring over the sides of my bowl...hmmm note to self....get bigger mixing bowls! Anyway, this recipe made 8 of these little cakes! If you are using mini cake pans, you can cut this recipe in half. (Cute little cake pans courtesy of Mom Dukes...thanks Mom!)