Halloween pumpkin cake

Halloween pumpkin cake

Like carrot cake? Then try using up your leftover pumpkin in this clever traybake for Halloween

Difficulty and servings

Easy

Cuts into 15 generous portions

Preparation and cooking times

Preparation time

Prep 20 mins

Cook time

Cook 30 mins

Freezable

(without frosting)

Method

  1. Heat oven to 180C/fan 160C/gas 4. Butter and line a 30 x 20cm baking or small roasting tin with baking parchment. Put the flour, sugar, spice, bicarbonate of soda, sultanas and salt into a large bowl and stir to combine. Beat the eggs into the melted butter, stir in the orange zest and juice, then mix with the dry ingredients till combined. Stir in the pumpkin. Pour the batter into the tin and bake for 30 mins, or until golden and springy to the touch.
  2. To make the frosting, beat together the cheese, butter, icing sugar, orange zest and 1 tsp of the juice till smooth and creamy, then set aside in the fridge. When the cake is done, cool for 5 mins then turn it onto a cooling rack. Prick it all over with a skewer and drizzle with the rest of the orange juice while still warm. Leave to cool completely.
  3. If you like, trim the edges of the cake. Give the frosting a quick beat to loosen, then, using a palette knife, spread over the top of the cake in peaks and swirls. If you're making the cake ahead, keep it in the fridge then take out as many pieces as you want 30 mins or so before serving. Will keep, covered, for up to 3 days in the fridge.
Try

Try this

Pumpkins can vary dramatically in water content, so keep an eye on the cake towards the end of cooking - yours may take less or more time to cook through. If you're not carving out a pumpkin this year butternut squash works brilliantly, too.

Per serving (15 slices)

408 kcalories, protein 5g, carbohydrate 52g, fat 21 g, saturated fat 13g, fibre 1g, sugar 37g, salt 1.33 g

Recipe from Good Food magazine, October 2007.

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Latest comments and suggestions

Results 61-80

  • 23 October 2009

    knitwit rated and commented on this recipe

    5 stars

    This was a total hit and was a welome break after making gallons of pumpkin soup!! It did take an extra 10 minutes to cook though

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  • 29 October 2009

    viv*97 rated and commented on this recipe

    5 stars

    This is a fabulous cake. It's quite easy to make and tastes delicious! I took the cake to work this morning and it was all gone by lunchtime with loads of wonderful comments and requests for the recipe! Need to make another one for home now

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  • 31 October 2009

    puddingbowl rated and commented on this recipe

    4 stars

    I have made this for a Halloween afternoon I'm hosting today. My casserole was too small so we had a bit of batter left over for a little thin tester cake which the flatmates had for dessert last night. Tastes great hot with a bit of icecream, really dense and puddingy. Took longer than stated to cook but that might just be our student cooker. Overall thought it tasted like a particularly nice spicy carrot cake. Looking forward to icing it today :D

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  • 31 October 2009

    Suzanne rated and commented on this recipe

    5 stars

    Delicious cake, my family loves it! Easy to make, used 'speculaas kruiden' instead, as I am in The Netherlands.

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  • 01 November 2009

    monroe commented on this recipe

    I made this to take to a halloween party and everybody loved it. Even better than my usual carrot cake. Although I agree with other raters, it took longer than the 30 minutes to make, more like 50. Absolutely yummy

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  • 01 November 2009

    monroe rated this recipe

    5 stars

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  • 03 November 2009

    annie rated and commented on this recipe

    5 stars

    My mum made this cake for my sons birthday, and the whole family loved it. Ended up making frosting twice though, the first time using the juice of half an orange, instead of 1 tsp, sloppy!!

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  • 03 November 2009

    sue b commented on this recipe

    The cake was delicious and enjoyed by everyone who tried it. I will definitely make it again. However, my frosting was really runny, so much so that I couldn't speard it on the cake. We used it as a sauce instead and poured it over a piece of the cake in a dish. But does anyone know why it should have gone so thin?

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  • 03 November 2009

    westy rated and commented on this recipe

    5 stars

    Really lovely cake, very moist - took 50 mins in my fan oven. I found that chopping the sultanas makes them not sink to the bottom of the mixture. Luckily, when scooping out the pumpkin, I found that it came out all ready shredded..job done! To sue B - did you use too much orange juice? if so use extra icing sugar to thicken it up again.

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  • 04 November 2009

    Rachael rated and commented on this recipe

    5 stars

    Totally delicious. I cut it in half, have frozen the other half as it's quite big and I don't want to get fed up with it. I also pushed some smashed up walnuts in the batter just as it was going into the oven and they worked a treat. Only thing is the icing was quite runny, I'll be more careful adding the orange juice next time.

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  • 04 November 2009

    Briony rated and commented on this recipe

    5 stars

    Delicious. I used some carrot as didn't have enough pumpkin, and it worked very well.

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  • 05 November 2009

    Janet rated and commented on this recipe

    5 stars

    Really loved this recipe. Like carrot cake only better and made loads.Intended using the mixture for cupcakes but ran out of cases so ended up making about 12 cupcakes + a round cake (like half a victoria sponge).Iced the large cake with orange buttercream and froze most of the cupcakes.They froze really well and were almost as nice (and less guilt-inducing ) as the iced cake.

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  • 09 November 2009

    JOOLES rated and commented on this recipe

    5 stars

    Amazing, truly amazing. I used Squash as we have so much of it growing, plus i didn't have sultanas so used currents instead. My partner said it was like carrot cake as some of the other comments have said, and i agree with this. It was really easy to make and smelt amazing, the, batter the oven when it was cooking and the finished article. The house smelt all lovely and welcoming. I will say though this took 55 mins to cook in my fan oven. After 30 mins i added 10 mins more and kept this up till cooked, needing just 5 mins more at the end. After the first 30 mins was up i also added some foil to the top of it as it was getting a bit dark and i was a bit worried, it turned out perfect.

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  • 09 November 2009

    JOOLES commented on this recipe

    Oh and just to add i diddnt have a square tin so used my spring form 9" round tin and it was fine.

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  • 17 November 2009

    bugbabe rated and commented on this recipe

    5 stars

    Awesome, couldn't tell the difference from a carrot cake but that is no bad thing. Gots lots of rave reviews too.

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  • 30 December 2009

    Sara Moore rated this recipe

    5 stars

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  • 15 January 2010

    janeyjane rated this recipe

    5 stars

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  • 26 August 2010

    knitwit commented on this recipe

    I make loads of cakes and this one has to be rated as one of the most successful I have ever made.A cross between carrot cake and bread pudding......scrumptious!

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  • 09 September 2010

    toyotasmith commented on this recipe

    I know this might sound stupid but I've never used pumpkin before and was just wondering what pieces you actually use to cook with. Do you use the stringy bit near the seeds or just the fleshy bit? Would like to make this for my little brother's birthday as it is on Halloween. Thanks for anyone's help

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  • 28 September 2010

    Little Chef Team rated and commented on this recipe

    5 stars

    Easy to make and so yummy!

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Difficulty and servings

Easy

Cuts into 15 generous portions

Preparation and cooking times

Preparation time

Prep 20 mins

Cook time

Cook 30 mins

Freezable

(without frosting)

Ingredients

For the cake

  • 300g self-raising flour
  • 300g light muscovado sugar
  • 3 tsp mixed spice
  • 2 tsp bicarbonate of soda
  • 175g sultanas
  • ½ tsp salt
  • 4 eggs , beaten
  • 200g butter , melted
  • zest 1 orange
  • 1 tbsp orange juice
  • 500g (peeled weight) pumpkin or butternut squash flesh, grated

FOR DRENCHING AND FROSTING

  • 200g pack soft cheese
  • 85g butter , softened
  • 100g icing sugar , sifted
  • zest 1 orange and juice of half
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Per serving (15 slices)

408 kcalories, protein 5g, carbohydrate 52g, fat 21 g, saturated fat 13g, fibre 1g, sugar 37g, salt 1.33 g

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