For this week’s Sweet Spells Sunday, I’m going to share a recipe for Pumpkin Cakes with Cinnamon Glaze and Sage Buttercream! I made these a few weeks ago and my friends absolutely devoured them!
The recipe for the cakes is originally from Lovely Little Kitchen and made much more than expected because it’s for a full bundt cake pan and I was baking it in mini bundt molds. I decided to bake the extra batter in a mini loaf pan so it didn’t go to waste. So if you want to halve the recipe to save ingredients, you can. Otherwise, you’ll want to prepare two pans. Also, note that to assemble the pumpkins, you’ll need two mini bundts—so a pan that bakes six bundts will only produce three pumpkin cakes.
Ingredients:
Pumpkin Cakes:
2 cups sugar
1 cup vegetable oil
4 eggs
1 16oz can pumpkin puree
3 cups flour
1 tsp. salt
1 tsp. baking soda
1 ½ tsp. baking powder
2 tsp. cinnamon
1 tsp. ground ginger
½ tsp. nutmeg
Cinnamon Glaze:
powdered sugar
milk
cinnamon
orange food coloring
Buttercream Frosting:
powdered sugar
softened butter
green food coloring
optional: powdered sage
Directions:
Preheat your over to 350 F and prepare your baking molds. I’ve been using Wilton baking spray lately and that’s worked wonders for me.
With an electric mixer, mix together the sugar and oil. Add the eggs in one at a time and then add the pumpkin puree. Whisk together the dry ingredients in a separate bowl and then gradually add it to the wet ingredients. Once it’s fully incorporated, pour it into the molds.
I’d say fill them about 2/3 of the way full. Bake the cakes for about 45 minutes—but check around the 30-minute mark with a knife or toothpick to see if they’re baked through the middle. If your knife comes out clean, they are done.
Remove the cakes from the pans and let them cool while you prepare the glaze and icing.
I didn’t put the measurements for the glaze or icing because usually I do it to taste and consistency, and don’t measure anything out.
For the glaze, you want a hearty cinnamon flavor and a very fluid consistency so it will easily glide over the cakes.
For the buttercream, you want a semi-stiff icing—stiff enough to pipe out with a leaf tip. If you want to add sage to the buttercream to give the cakes a little extra flavor, just mix in powdered sage until it tastes present, but not overpowering. You don’t want it competing with the other flavors too much.
To assemble the cakes, cut off the bottoms of the bundts so they’re perfectly flat. Then spread a layer of buttercream on the bottoms and stick two together. Make sure the grooves of the cakes line up perfectly.
Then, place the cakes on the cooling racks over a tray or parchment paper to catch the glaze. Pour the glaze evenly over top of the cakes. Brush it up the sides with a spatula if it doesn’t fully cover the bottom halves. Let the glaze dry and then pipe buttercream leaves on top.
And voila! You have beautiful pumpkin cakes for any occasion—it doesn’t just have to be for Halloween. Then again, if you’re a real witch at heart, it’s always Halloween.
