Pound cake, as the name implied, used a pound of sugar, a pound of flour, a pound of eggs, and a pound of butter—a powerful representative of just how much sweet food Westerners could eat.
A pound was roughly nine taels, nearly a jin. This cake required almost a whole jin of granulated sugar.
Even more terrifyingly, the cake did not actually taste all that sweet, because that pound of butter made the finished cake softer and moister. The rich mouthfeel brought by the fat made it easier to swallow and dulled the taste of the sugar. Many dessert shops even used a jin and a half of sugar to make it sweeter.
This thing was practically a calorie bomb. A small piece contained enough calories for an adult's daily needs. Other than being difficult to store, it was even more useful for wilderness survival than bringing compressed biscuits.
After lunch, Schiller began preparing the cake. Other than Steve, who worked out year-round, basically no one disliked desserts. Sweets also helped relieve anxiety, so Schiller often kept sweet wafer cookies and chocolate in his office for the nurses to hand out to patients who behaved well.
Carter's situation had inevitably cast everyone into an atmosphere of anxiety, and delicious desserts were the best way to dispel it.
Unfortunately, Schiller's supplies were fairly basic, so he certainly could not make any elaborate high-end desserts. He decided to make the most classic and least failure-prone pound cake, paired with fruit and cream. It could quickly replenish calories for people who did not like eating and lift their spirits.
The men went to prepare the afternoon barbecue. With Gray Mist and Venom, the two Big Eaters, around, there was no need to worry about having too many ingredients left over. Schiller simply bought