Pumpkin Cake with Cream Cheese Frosting
By America's Test KitchenPublished on November 11, 2011
Time
1¼ hours, plus 2 hours cooling
Yield
Serves 16
Ingredients
Cake
2 cups (10 ounces/283 grams) all-purpose flour 1 tablespoon ground cinnamon 2 teaspoons baking powder 1 teaspoon baking soda 1 teaspoon table salt 1 teaspoon ground ginger ½ teaspoon ground allspice 1 ⅔ cups (11⅔ ounces/331 grams) granulated sugar 1 cup vegetable oil 4 large eggs 1 (15-ounce) can pumpkin puree 1 tablespoon vanilla extractFrosting
6 tablespoons unsalted butter, softened1 ½ cups (6 ounces/170 grams) confectioners' sugar 1 (8-ounce) package cream cheese, cut into 8 pieces and softened1 teaspoon vanilla extractInstructions
- Adjust oven rack to middle position and heat oven to 350 degrees. Grease and flour 13 by 9-inch baking pan.
- Whisk flour, cinnamon, baking powder, baking soda, salt, ginger, and allspice together in bowl. Using stand mixer fitted with whisk attachment, beat sugar, oil, and eggs on medium-high speed until thick and fluffy, 3 to 5 minutes. Reduce speed to low, add pumpkin and vanilla, and mix until incorporated. Slowly add flour mixture and mix until only a few small lumps of flour remain, about 1 minute.
- Transfer batter to prepared pan and bake until toothpick inserted in center comes out clean, 30 to 35 minutes. Transfer pan to wire rack and let cool completely.
- Using stand mixer fitted with paddle, beat butter and sugar on medium-high speed, until fluffy, about 2 minutes. Add cream cheese, 1 piece at a time, beating thoroughly after each addition. Add vanilla and mix until smooth.
- Turn cooled cake out onto wire rack, then invert onto serving platter. Frost cake and serve. (Cake can be refrigerated for up to 3 days. Bring to room temperature before serving.)
for the cake
for the frosting
Time
1¼ hours, plus 2 hours coolingYield
Serves 16Ingredients
Cake
Frosting
Test Kitchen Techniques
Ingredients
Cake
Frosting
Test Kitchen Techniques
Ingredients
Cake
Frosting
Test Kitchen Techniques
Why This Recipe Works
UPDATE: This recipe has been slightly reformulated to be more failproof since its initial publication. The revision you see here was published in April of 2022. Pumpkin cake recipes should be easy, but the pumpkin cake recipes we tried made damp cakes with a harsh burn of spice. And the cream cheese frosting was way too sweet and rich. To avoid these pitfalls, we made the cake with packed pumpkin puree instead of canned pumpkin pie filling. The cake made with the puree actually tasted like pumpkin, which was one of the features we wanted for our Pumpkin Cake with Cream Cheese Frosting. Using puree also allowed us to control the spices ourselves, and we opted to use just a bit of ginger, cinnamon, and allspice to give the cake a subtle spiciness. And to solve the problem of heavy and cloyingly sweet frosting, we lessened the amounts of butter and confectioners' sugar and increased the amount of cream cheese. The result was a tangy frosting that perfectly complemented the spiced cake and gave us our ideal Pumpkin Cake with Cream Cheese Frosting.
Instructions
- Adjust oven rack to middle position and heat oven to 350 degrees. Grease and flour 13 by 9-inch baking pan.
- Whisk flour, cinnamon, baking powder, baking soda, salt, ginger, and allspice together in bowl. Using stand mixer fitted with whisk attachment, beat sugar, oil, and eggs on medium-high speed until thick and fluffy, 3 to 5 minutes. Reduce speed to low, add pumpkin and vanilla, and mix until incorporated. Slowly add flour mixture and mix until only a few small lumps of flour remain, about 1 minute.
- Transfer batter to prepared pan and bake until toothpick inserted in center comes out clean, 30 to 35 minutes. Transfer pan to wire rack and let cool completely.
- Using stand mixer fitted with paddle, beat butter and sugar on medium-high speed, until fluffy, about 2 minutes. Add cream cheese, 1 piece at a time, beating thoroughly after each addition. Add vanilla and mix until smooth.
- Turn cooled cake out onto wire rack, then invert onto serving platter. Frost cake and serve. (Cake can be refrigerated for up to 3 days. Bring to room temperature before serving.)
for the cake
for the frosting
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