It was my turn to hold our monthly book club meeting.
That meant that I got to choose the book, “Where the Crawdads Sing” by Delia Owens and I got to make the cake.
Deciding on what kind of cake was easy…. It had to have pumpkin / butternut squash in it because I had to use up what I had left from last summer’s harvest.
A little internet search led me to this recipe Pumpkin Bars with Cream Cheese Frosting.
I chose it based on 2 criteria: The recipe sounded good and the blog post was the least irritating of the ones I had looked at that morning. It was still extremely irritating….. it took me forever to page through inane photos to find the recipe, but once I got there I could print it and stop scrolling.
I actually used butternut squash in my recipe and it’s a cake…. Bars are not supposed to be 3 inches high and fluffy.
But it was a really good cake….
Click here to Pin Pumpkin Cake, Cream Cheese Frosting
PrintPumpkin Cake, Cream Cheese Frosting
I actually used a mix of pumpkin from the freezer and leftover butternut squash that I had roasted for dinner the night before. I just mashed it all with a spoon before adding it to the cake.
- Prep Time: 15 minutes
- Cook Time: 35 minutes
- Total Time: 50 minutes
- Yield: 18 – 20 servings 1x
- Category: Cake
Ingredients
- 1 2/3 cups (12oz, 350gr) granulated sugar
- 1 cup (8oz, 240ml) vegetable oil
- 4 eggs
- 1 3/4 cups (15oz, 450gr) pumpkin / butternut squash, mashed
- 2 cups (9oz, 260gr) flour
- 1 tsp baking soda
- 2 tsp baking powder
- 1 tsp salt
- 1 tsp vanilla
- 3 tsp cinnamon
- 1/2 tsp nutmeg
- 1/2 tsp ginger
- 1/4 tsp cloves
- Cream Cheese Frosting:
- 10oz (300gr) cream cheese, softened
- 2oz (60gr) butter, softened
- 2 cups (8.5oz, 240gr) powdered (icing) sugar
- 1 tsp vanilla
Instructions
- Butter and flour a 9 X 13 (23cm X 33cm) cake pan
- Preheat oven to 350F (175C)
- Cream oil and sugar.
- Add eggs, one at a time, mixing well after each egg.
- Add pumpkin / squash, vanilla and mix.
- Combine dry ingredients and add to wet ingredients, stirring gently just to combine.
- Pour into prepared pan and bake, 30 – 35 minutes, or until toothpick inserted into center comes away clean.
- Remove and cool completely on a wire rack.
- Cream Cheese Frosting:
- Combine cream cheese, butter, vanilla and sugar and whip until smooth.
- Add more powdered sugar if too thin / a dollop of milk if too thick.
- Frost cake
Notes
I only had 2 cups of powdered sugar…. I like gooey frosting but it probably could have used another 1/2 cup,
Keywords: pumpkin cake, butternut squash
This was an amazingly light and fluffy cake. Everyone loved it,
This would be great in layers for a birthday cake – with the cream cheese frosting in the middle and on top……
We were happy to have leftovers – and happy that it kept well as it took us 5 days to finish it. It’s been a few years since I made a proper sheet cake….
Everyone loved the book, too. I highly recommend it.
Cake looks interesting, but I am more interested in your book club. Only ex pats in it or also some French? Wondering how the French would understand a book like that. Just curious. Susan
All expats, British and American. I think it would be challenging for a French reader unless they had spent time in the US. I loaned a similar book (but true story) to a Belgian friend who regularly reads in English, and he had a lot of questions. The concepts are sometimes hard to translate.
On the other hand, I’ve been reading books in French – at my level it’s not something I do for pleasure lol
I have a delicious recipe for a pumpkin sheet cake. I do make it”out of season,” but not often.
I do have a couple food blogs that I follow that have lots of pictures, but they also have a jump-to-recipe link at the top of the post so I can skip all the junk.
A ‘Jump to’ and Print button should be mandatory lol. My mother always made sheet cakes. I’ve just gotten out of the habit. Still have my rather beat-up ole aluminum 9 X 13 pan…. 45 – 50 years now lol
Looks like my sort of cake…I love anything with frosting !!
Especially cream cheese frosting 😉