Naming Rights (and recipe for Lemon Pound Cake with Sweet Tea Glaze)

Naming Rights (and recipe for Lemon Pound Cake with Sweet Tea Glaze)

There’s probably a little part of each of us that wants immortality. Many of us follow a faith that includes that as a payoff. Some are promised a boatload of girlfriends and others a mansion on a gold-bricked boulevard. Children are one way some people hope for a life that extends beyond the grave and others like to have their names on buildings. I work on a college campus where nearly everything is named after someone – astronauts, captains of industry, and the like. 

I’ve got a little of that notion in me. I’ve got two boys who unless they change their names because one of them becomes a famous actor and has an agent that doesn’t think Hutcheson looks good on a marquee or the other one ends up in the Witness Relocation program under a new name, my last name will likely live on several decades after I’m gone.

Writing is another one of my strategies for immortality. I’ve written a book and it will be in the Library of Congress as long as there is such an institution. This column appears in papers all across the country to there’s a good chance some of these will be around forever.

There’s one more way I hope to achieve permanency that’s proving to be a little more difficult. I want to have a food named after me. I’m not the first to have taken this route. You’ve likely had a Caesar salad or two in your lifetime. This leafy dish was named, not for the Roman Emperor, but for a Caesar Cardini the chef created it. Fettuccini Alfredo, Carpaccio, Bananas Foster, Graham Crackers, Crab Louis, and Potatoes O’Brien are just a few of the more common dishes named after real people.

Almost every week I come up with a new recipe hoping that one will eventually become so closely associated with me that it takes on my own name but no luck thus far. There is no Meatloaf Hutcheson or Scott Bars as of yet but I’m still trying. This week I thought I might be on to something; but as I was developing my recipe I had this lingering feeling that something very similar was already associated with someone else. Then it dawned on me. So this week’s recipe is formally called Lemon Pound Cake with Sweet Tea Glaze but I’m sure it will end being known as Arnold Palmer Cake. Oh well, back to the drawing board.

Lemon Pound Cake with Sweet Tea Glaze (aka Arnold Palmer Cake)

  • 1-1/2 cups all-purpose flour

  • 1 teaspoon baking powder

  • 1/2 teaspoon salt

  • 2 sticks unsalted butter, softened

  • 1 cup sugar

  • 2 teaspoons vanilla

  • Zest of one lemon

  • 1/4 lemon juice

  • 4 eggs

Sweet Tea Glaze

  • 1 cup brewed tea, extra strong

  • 1 tablespoon butter

  • 1-1/4 cups confectioner’s sugar

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Butter a loaf pan and line it with parchment paper. In a medium bowl, combine the flour, baking powder, and salt. In a mixer cream the butter then add 1 cup of the sugar and continue mixing. Add the vanilla, lemon zest, juice, and eggs and mix until combined. Add the dry ingredients and mix just until smooth. Pour into the lined pan and bake for 60 minutes or until an inserted knife comes out clean. 

While the cake is baking, place the cup of brewed tea in a sauce pan and bring it to boil until the tea is reduced to a quarter cup. Whisk in the butter then bring to room temperature. Whisk in the powdered sugar. 

When the cake is done, let it cool in the pan for about 15 minutes and then remove from the pan and set on a wire rack placed on a sheet pan. Pour half of the glaze on the cake, letting it drip down the sides. Once the glaze has soaked in, pour on the rest of the glaze. Slice and serve. The cake can be wrapped in plastic and refrigerated for up to a week.

Originally published in quality newspapers on June 24, 2010

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