This vanilla and chocolate marble pound cake loaf is the best of both worlds! Delicious vanilla pound cake, with a vein of brownie in the middle.
This marble pound cake loaf a “best of both worlds” bake, where you don’t have to decide between chocolate and vanilla. You can have them both in one pan. The vanilla pound cake has wonderful flavour and texture, while the vein of brownie is moist and chocolaty. It’s a great combination of different flavours and textures and definitely a winner!
Ingredient and Substitutions
A few notes about the key ingredients …
Unsweetened Chocolate – the recipe requires unsweetened chocolate, usually sold in blocks in with the baking chocolate. You can’t easily substitute another type of chocolate here.
Sour Cream – for best results, use full-fat sour cream.
Recipe Tips
Using room temperature eggs, butter and sour cream will make the best loaf. So when you take the butter out of the fridge, take the eggs and sour cream out as well.
Baking times will vary slightly between kitchens. Be sure to check towards the end of baking. Bake until a tester inserted in the centre of the loaf comes out clean.
Making ahead, Storing and Freezing
Store loaf well-wrapped at room temperature, where it will keep well for a couple of days.
This loaf freezes well, so don’t hesitate to freeze any you can eat up right away.
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Get the Recipe: Marble Pound Cake Loaf
Ingredients
Brownie Batter:
- 6 Tablespoons unsalted butter
- 1 oz unsweetened baking chocolate, coarsely chopped
- 1/2 cup white granulated sugar
- 1/4 cup all-purpose flour, spooned and levelled
- 1 large egg
- 1/4 teaspoon vanilla extract
Pound Cake Batter:
- 2 cups all-purpose flour
- 1/2 teaspoon baking powder
- 1/2 teaspoon kosher salt, reduce to 1/4 teaspoon if using salted butter
- 1 1/4 cups granulated sugar
- 1 cup unsalted butter, at room temperature
- 2 Tablespoon vanilla bean paste , or vanilla extract
- 4 large eggs, at room temperature
- 1/2 cup sour cream, taken from the fridge 15 minutes before using
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 325° F. (regular bake setting/not fan assisted). Lightly coat a 9- x 5- x 3-inch loaf pan with cooking spray, then line the bottom and 2 long sides of pan with parchment paper, allowing 2 to 3 inches to extend over sides (to use as handles to remove later).
- Prepare the Brownie Batter: Combine the butter and chocolate in a microwave-safe bowl. Microwave on HIGH until melted, about 1 minute. Stir until smooth and slightly cooled. Whisk in sugar and flour. Add the egg and vanilla and stir to form a loose batter. Set aside to cool slightly while making cake batter.
- Prepare the Pound Cake Batter: In a medium bowl, whisk together well the flour, baking powder and salt. Set aside.
- In a large bowl with an electric mixer (or the bowl of a stand mixer with a paddle attachment), beat sugar and butter in a on medium-high speed until light and fluffy, about 4 to 5 minutes. Beat in vanilla bean paste. Add eggs, 1 at a time, beating well after each addition. Beat in sour cream just until smooth. Add flour mixture, one-third at a time, and beat on low speed just until blended after each addition.
- Spoon half of the Pound Cake Batter into prepared pan. Spoon Brownie Ripple Batter over Pound Cake Batter, covering it completely. Top with remaining Pound Cake Batter. Using a small offset spatula, smooth batter carefully.
- Bake cake in middle of preheated oven until a a cake tester inserted in centre of cake comes out clean, about 1 hour and 45 minutes. (If cake seems to be browning too quickly, cover top loosely with foil for last 30 minutes of baking.)
- Cool cake in pan on a wire rack 30 minutes. Remove cake from pan using parchment paper as handles, and cool completely on wire rack, about 1 hour. Be sure to let the cake cool completely before slicing, so the brownie layer has a chance to set. Slice and serve.
Notes
More Pound Cake Loaf Recipes to Love
Hi! I’m Jennifer, a home cook schooled by trial and error and almost 40 years of getting dinner on the table! I love to share my favourite recipes, both old and new, together with lots of tips and tricks to hopefully help make your home cooking enjoyable, stress free, rewarding and of course, delicious!
Enjoying a slice of this now and had to leave a review—so good! The only change I made was to add a heaping spoonful of cocoa powder to the brownie filling, and the flavor is perfect (and didn’t dry out at all). Love love this recipe—having both vanilla and chocolate in one slice in pound cake form is genius. Thank you!
Glad you enjoyed it and more chocolate is always good :) Thanks!
I just placed what I believe “will be a great loaf cake” in the oven, thanks to your recipe.
Sincerely,
S. West
Thanks Sandy :) Enjoy!
I made this pound cake for Dinner Club last night; we were at a picnic setting so I wanted a dessert that was not messy. I served the slices with fresh cut strawberries.
The cake got rave reviews! I made only one change; I used 3 vanilla beans instead of the vanilla paste.
I cooked the cake an hour and 40 minutes; I feel it could have been cooked at least 5 minutes less; I did use tin foil over the cake for the last 30 minutes. My only other comment would be that I did not get enough of a chocolate taste but I like chocolate a lot so it could just be me.
Excellent recipe and easy to make!
Glad you enjoyed this, Noreen! And yes, for chocolate lovers, a little taste leaves us wanting more sometimes, for sure :)
Can you substitute Whole milk yogurt for Sour Cream?
Hi Courtney, I haven’t tried it in this recipe, but I’ve made that substitution in other baking recipes with good success. A thicker, Greek style yogurt probably works best when substituting for sour cream, as it has a similar consistency. Enjoy!
I love the combination – a little bit of chocolate and beautiful vanilla cake – the perfect dessert! So happy you shared this recipe – so I will too!
Thanks Tricia :)
Jennifer, this may sound a bit naive, but how do you measure butter in tablespoons accurately? Do you scoop it or cut into little pieces to go into the tbsp, or is there a better way? Thanks for the tip.
Hi Paula! There are a couple of easy ways to measure out 6 Tbsp. The easiest way I found is to always buy butter in sticks. At least here, the sticks have handy, dandy Tbsp. markings on the foil wrapper, so I can just cut the stick 6 Tbsp along the stick. It’s a little more expensive usually, but handy if you do a lot of baking. Failing that, I usually weigh butter out with my kitchen scale. 1 Tbsp. of butter weighs 1/2-oz, so 6 Tbsp. would be 3 oz. in weight on the scale. One last tip, that doesn’t work so well with 6 Tbsp measures, but works well with 1/2 cup, 3/4 cup, 1 cup etc. So if you needed 1/2 cup butter, you put 1/2 cup water in a liquid measuring cup, then add dollops of butter until the water level in the cup reaches 1 cup. The butter in the measuring cup = 1/2 cup! Of course, your butter is now wet, but it doesn’t hurt it :) Hope that helps!
This is like a black and tan in pound cake form! Pretty cool:) I bet it will pair well with a glass in the absence of coffee:)
My son recently asked me to bake him half a chocolate cake and half of vanilla cake, but not one chocolate layer and one vanilla stacked, just literally a half moon of each joined together. This cake gives me an idea of how I could approach the problem:)
Sounds like a perfect solution to your half vanilla/half chocolate cake issue! This whole layering thing gave me a ton of ideas too :)
This one’s a win-win Jennifer! Double the flavor, double the fun!
Thanks Mary Ann :)
This is definitely the best of both worlds. How can you say no to a little vanilla and chocolate swirl action?!? It looks absolutely divine! I love that it freezes well, too. Makes life a little easier sometimes, right?
Thanks Cindy and yes, I love being able to freeze sweets. Helps to ration them out a bit ;)
What a delicious recipe for those indecisive eaters like me :) I want a little of everything most of the time, lol. Sounds like the perfect combination and would go so lovely with a nice cup of coffee right about now!
Thanks Dawn and I’m the same. Can never decide ;)
This really does look like it has the ideal texture, and it’s so pretty to boot! I would love to have a loaf of this in my freezer for last minute desserts, I bet it’s amazing with a scoop of ice cream, yum!!
Thanks Sue and yes, this is a great dessert slice!
I love this Jennifer. Just the name alone makes me want to bake a loaf of this. It’s also super pretty!
Thanks so much, Chris :)
Followed the recipe exactly and This came out perfectly. Delicious and divine to look at too! You are a gift ?❤️ Thank you for sharing this.
Thanks Denise and glad you enjoyed this!