Amazing Superfood Pound Cake

So there I am, in the store, looking for something new and unusual to bake with. The nice woman next to me was looking for buckwheat. I thought... oh that's it! I'll make buckwheat pancakes. We couldn't find any buckwheat. What I did find was Hemp Protein. Huh? Hemp? Now I did already have some Hemp Hearts from Costco and quite honestly, they were pretty tasty. Like Sunflower seeds. And since whey protein wasn't working out for me, at all... makes a great cake, just hard on the digestive system... I thought what the hell! 

And so I present the most awesome pound cake with cherry caramel sauce. 
Gluten free. Grain Free. Sugar Free. And yes, it's really pound cake.

I kid you not. I did a little experimenting for sure. And imagine my shock when I opened the bag and it was green. Yes, green. Actually, I opened the Hemp for breakfast. Pancakes! I substituted it for my whey protein in my batter. A little funky, yes, but I was like a steam engine all morning. The energy was amazing. Dr. Oz may be a kook, but on this one he's got it right. Definitely a superfood.

Back to the cake. Since the pancakes were ok, I figured what could happen. Waste a few ingredients... so what. It'll get eaten. So I made the cake and crossed my fingers. 

Would it bake up green? Would it it explode in the oven? Would the police come knocking when the neighbors complained of the funny odor in my kitchen? Nope. 

It actually baked up beautifully. Hey I had to try it? And though it was delicious as it was, I knew hubby would say it needed something. So I added some caramel drizzle. And yeah, that worked too.

Cherry Hemp Caramel Pound Cake

2 cups almond flour

2 tablespoons peanut flour

2 tablespoons Hemp Protein Powder

1/4 cup coconut flour

1 tablespoon baking powder

5 eggs room temp

8 oz full fat cream cheese room temp

1/2 cup unsalted sweet butter room temp

1 cup swerve

1 teaspoon Maple Extract

Caramel sauce

1/4 cup swerve granular.

2 tablespoons cream

1 teaspoon cherry extract

1 tablespoon water

1 tablespoon unsalted butter

Preset oven to 325 and grease a non-stick (dark coat) large 9 x 5 loaf pan. 

Whisk all dry ingredients EXCEPT swerve together in a medium bowl.

In a large mixing bowl, beat swerve (or preferred granular sweetener), butter and cream cheese till smooth. Add eggs, one at a time and mix well. Slowly add in dry ingredients, pausing to mix periodically until smooth. Don't flip out over the green coloring from the hemp. it'll go away.

Pour batter into loaf pan and smooth out top. Bake about an hour or until set and firm. Remove from oven and place on cooling rack or 15 minutes, then turn out on rack to finish cooling.

When cool, make your caramel sauce. Thanks to Carolyn at www.Alldayidreamaboutfood.com for introducing me to this fabulous trick! Swerve really does carmelize, but if not for her recipes I'd never have tried it!

Melt Swerve over low heat with a tablespoon of water, once liquified, add the butter and continue stirring about 7 minutes until color is darkening to an amber. remove from heat and add cream and extract. Careful during this process, it will bubble immediately and might splatter up. Once mixed in return to heat and let bubble another minute. Remove from heat and cool until thick and pourable, just 2-3 minutes. Drizzle over cake and your done. Refrigerate for best results.