Pumpkin Butter Cake

Last year, someone bought a brand new Faber cake mixer just like mine. And he used it for the first time to bake a Legendary Pumpkin Cake. It was legendary all right. Because the cake became a pumpkin kuih. And his cake mixer is apparently possessed because it can talk.

RG, I love all your cooking and baking posts. In fact I love all your posts, whatever they may be. You keep me so entertained! No, I am not being condescending, please. I am being supportive and encouraging. We all start somewhere and if we are passionate enough, we will excel. That, I promise you.

So please indulge me as I go all auntie on you. In my humble opinion, the problem with your cake was :

1. For the amount of butter and flour, there was too much pumpkin.
2. There was no leavening agent in the flour (baking powder and baking soda) and hence the cake did not rise. But given point no. 1, it may not have risen either as the batter was too heavy.
3. The flour was whisked into the batter. It is better to fold it in using a spatula. You see, the lowest speed on the Faber cake mixer is still too fast compared to the more more sophisticated (hence more expensive) mixers like Kitchen Aid. All that violent whisking will result in a tough cake.
4. The baking pan was too big
5. The baking time was too long or if the cake was still raw after 40 minutes or so, it would be best to cover the top of the baking pan with aluminium foil.

I am not trying to be clever or a show-off because I am simply sharing what I know and observed. I believe in sharing good things and I'd like to see you succeed in baking a cake. The beauty about baking is that people from all walks of life can participate. Some people do so well that their cakes are good enough to sell. Case in point, Fatboybakes, a civil engineer by training.

Does this look like a face to you? Reminds me of those sculptures on Easter Island.

And hey, I am really glad you baked that pumpkin cake :) I have had many mishaps when I started cooking and if only I had started this blog much earlier, I would have regaled all and sundry with my kitchen misadventures. Like the time when I used my auntie's plastic microwave safe container to grill (yes grill. On convection function. **faints**) some chicken drumsticks and to my horror saw the container melt before my eyes. I can't believe I was so zero!

I often wonder if my auntie ever wondered what happened to her missing container (there were two). Ee-Ee, if you are reading this, now you know. I am very sorry.

Or the time when I cooked mee sua and left it to stand only to come back from college to discover a big lump of congealed mee sua in the pot. LOL!

I was motivated to bake this pumpkin cake because I wanted to use up the pumpkin puree that I prepared on Christmas Day. I keep a lot of stuff in the freezer, some of which I don't even know what they are hah..hah... I settled on this recipe from Wendy of Table for 2 or More..... and this Pumpkin Butter Cake is simply awesome! This cake is soft and moist and that I could tell immediately when I sliced into it because the knife glided smoothly into the cake with no resistance.

This is a good recipe and it is a keeper. If at all there is a legendary pumpkin cake, this has got to be the one. 

Pumpkin Butter Cake
Recipe source : Adapted from Table for 2 or More.....

Ingredients :
- 250g self-raising flour
- 140g sugar
- 250g butter
- 1 tsp pure vanilla extract
- 5 large eggs
- 200g pumpkin puree

Method :
1. Cream butter and sugar until light and fluffy.
2. Add vanilla extract.
3. Add eggs, one by one, beating well after each addition.
4. Add half of the flour and fold in the flour until just combined. (I used a spatula from this point forwards)
5. Fold in pumpkin puree.
6. Add remaining flour and fold until just combined.
7. Pour batter into a lined loaf pan and bake at 160C for about 50 minutes or until skewer inserted into the centre of cake comes out clean.
8. Let cool on a rack before removing the cake from the pan.

Note for my own reference : 
- I divided the batter between 2 smaller loaf pans.
- I rotated the pans at the 30 minute mark for even baking.
- At the 40 minute mark, I tented the pans to prevent over browning and the cakes were done at the 50 minute mark.