… it’s so good I’m featuring it a second time
Pumpkin is a wonderfully versatile vegetable. It can change character to go with the mood of a meal or be miraculously transformed into a luscious dessert or scrumptious cake.
Here’s a couple of recipes I’ve purloined from Martha Stewart … they’re delicious.
Pumpkin Cake with Burnt Butter Icing
Cake:
8 tablespoons unsalted butter (room temperature)
1 2/3 cups of self raising flour
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1/4 teaspoon ground allspice
large pinch salt
1 1/2 cups sugar
2 eggs (large)
1 cup pumpkin puree (use fresh or canned)
1/2 cup warm milk
Icing:
4 tablespoons unsalted butter
1 cup icing sugar (sifted)
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 or 2 tablespoons milk
Preheat oven to 180 degrees C. Prepare a 20cm round cake tin.
In a large bowl, sift flour, cinnamon, nutmeg, allspice and salt. Put to one side.
Using an electric mixer, beat sugar and butter together until light and fluffy (takes about 2 minutes). Add eggs and blend until combined. Add pumpkin puree and mix together. When all these ingredients are well combined, add flour mixture. Beat on low speed until just combined.
Pour into prepared tin and bake for approximately 55 minutes (or until skewer comes out clean when poked in the middle of the cake).
Leave cake in tin, but place onto wire rack and let cool for about 20 minutes.
In the meantime, prepare the icing …
Melt butter in a small saucepan and heat until it goes nutty brown. This takes about 10 minutes. Remove from heat and pour butter into a bowl - leave out any burned residue.
Add the sugar, vanilla and 1 tablespoon of milk and stir until smooth. Add extra milk if icing is too thick. Let cool for 5 minutes.
Turn out cake onto wire rack and ice with burnt butter icing immediately.
Pumpkin Spice Cake with Honey Frosting
Cake:
1/2 cup unsalted butter, melted
2 1/2 cups self raising flour
large pinch salt
1 1/2 teaspoons cinnamon
3/4 teaspoon ginger
1/2 teaspoon nutmeg
1/8 teaspoon allspice
1/8 teaspoon ground cloves
2 large eggs
1 1/2 cups sugar
425 grams pumpkin puree (fresh or canned)
Frosting:
1/2 cup unsalted butter, softened
225 g low-fat cream cheese, softened
1/4 cup honey (if you don’t like honey, replace with icing sugar
Preheat oven to 180 degrees C. Prepare a 20cm square cake tin.
Combine flour, salt and spices in a bowl. In a separate bowl, beat eggs, sugar, butter and pumpkin puree until combined. Add dry ingredients to pumpkin mixture and beat until smooth.
Pour into prepared tin. Make sure the top is flat and smooth. Bake for about 45-50 minutes. The cake should be moist so when you check with a skewer it should have a few crumbs attached. Let cake stand for 10 minutes then transfer onto cake rack to cool completely.
In the meantime …
Mix all the frosting ingredients together until smooth. Spread over the top of the cooled cake. You may like to decorate the top with walnuts or dried apricots.
I’m smuggling in another recipe here. It’s a highly illegal one because it’s not actually pumpkin. And it’s not a seasonal/local food for that matter. Rather the recipe I’ve added is a sweet potato recipe. Since both these vegetables have a similar sweetness and are great for desserts, I’m including it.
Sweet Potato Whip with Caramelised Applies
4 large sweet potatoes (orange flesh are best)
1/4 cup unsalted butter, softened
2 tablespoons double cream
1/2 cup stewed sweetened apples
2 teaspoons fresh ginger, grated
large pinch salt
freshly ground black pepper
500 g apples (peeled, cored, and cut into 2.5 cm pieces)
3 tablespoons sugar
Preheat oven to 190 degrees C. Bake sweet potatoes until tender - about 1 hour. Remove from oven and scoop out flesh.
In a bowl of an electric mixer, place sweet potato flesh, 2 tablespoons of butter and the cream. Beat until smooth. Add stewed apples and ginger, season with salt and pepper.
Place sweet potato and apple mixture into a greased ovenproof dish. Bake until heated through for about 10 minutes.
In the meantime …
Toss apples with the sugar. Melt remaining butter over a medium heat in a frying pan. Add apple mixture. Cook, stirring occasionally, until apples are caramelised. This should take about 10 minutes.
Remove sweet potato mixture from oven and place caramelised apples on top. This dish can be served as a dessert with whipped cream or ice cream, OR, as an accompaniment to roast pork.