Pumpkin Spice Cake

A two layer cake made with pumpkin puree and autumn spices, filled and topped with a UK recipe for thick and pipeable cream cheese buttercream. A perfect cake for autumn and Halloween.

Course Dessert

Cuisine American

Keyword Cake

Prep Time 20

Cook Time 35

Total Time 55

Servings

Calories 608kcal

Author thebakingexplorer

Ingredients

For the cake

400 g Pumpkin puree
200 ml Vegetable oil
4 Eggs large
400 g Self raising flour
350 g Light brown soft sugar
1 tsp Baking powder
¼ tsp Salt
1 ½ tsp Mixed spice
2 tsp Cinnamon
½ tsp Ground ginger
½ tsp Nutmeg

For the cream cheese frosting

225 g Butter softened, unsalted
225 g Icing sugar
450 g Full fat cream cheese
1 tsp Vanilla extract

For decoration

½ tbsp Demerara sugar
¼ tsp Cinnamon
100 g Orange fondant
20 g Green fondant

Metric - US Customary

Instructions

If you would like to make the fondant pumpkin decorations, weigh out 7g of orange fondant per pumpkin. Roll into a ball using the palms of your hands. Use a sugarcraft dresden tool to indent lines around the sides. Then use a sugarcraft bone tool to make a small hole in the top for the stem. Roll out a small amount of green fondant and insert it into the hole, using water or edible glue to secure it, shape it into a stem. Repeat until you have enough pumpkins, set them aside to dry out and set
Pre-heat the oven to 160C Fan/180C/350F/Gas Mark 4 and grease and line two 8" cake tins (that are at least 2" deep)
In a large jug or a mixing bowl, mix together the vegetable oil, pumpkin puree and eggs using a hand whisk, until combined
In a large mixing bowl, stir together the light brown soft sugar, self raising flour, salt, baking powder, mixed spice, cinnamon, ginger and nutmeg
Pour the pumpkin mixture into the flour mixture and whisk together gently until combined
Divide the mixture between the tins, use scales for accuracy if you like
Bake them for 35-40 minutes or until a thin skewer or a cocktail stick inserted in the middle comes out clean. Leave them to fully cool either in the tins or on cooling racks
If the cakes have domed on top, level them off with a cake leveller or a sharp knife
To make the cream cheese frosting, use an electric mixer to beat the butter until smooth. Then mix in the icing sugar until the mixture is smooth and combined
Next, add the cream cheese and the vanilla extract and mix in until the frosting is thick and smooth - this won't take very long so be careful not to over mix
Put one of the sponges on your plate or cake stand, and pipe or spread a layer of the buttercream over it
And the second sponge on top, pipe larger rosettes of buttercream all around the edge and smaller ones in the centre
To decorate, mix the demerara sugar and cinnamon together and sprinkle it over the cake. If you have made the fondant pumpkins, add these to the cake too
Serve immediately, store leftovers in an airtight container in the fridge and eat within 3 days

Video

Notes

Make sure all your ingredients (particularly the eggs) are at room temperature before you start baking.
I used unsalted butter and Philadelphia cream cheese for the cream cheese frosting.
If you live in a place where pumpkin pie spice mix is easily available, then you can use 3 tsp of that instead of the mix of spices I've listed in the recipe. I live in the UK so pumpkin spice mix is not something that's commonly sold here.
Mixed spice is a British spice blend containing cinnamon, coriander seed, nutmeg, clove, pimento, and ground ginger. If you can't get hold of it where you're based, you can use a Pumpkin Spice mix instead or add more of the other spices.
I really recommend using light brown soft sugar if you can for the cake, but if you can't get hold of it, caster sugar will work well too.
You can use a different type of oil besides vegetable oil. I'd recommend one that doesn't have a strong flavour, canola and sunflower oil would both work well.
Although I provide cup measurements, I highly recommend weighing your ingredients out using digital kitchen scales*. It is the most accurate way to measure ingredients and will ensure the best results. Digital scales are very low cost and can be purchased for around £12 ($16.50) .
For teaspoon (tsp) and tablespoon (tbsp) measurements, please use measuring spoons* and not the type of spoons you eat with. Again this will ensure accuracy and provide the best results.

Nutrition