Pumpkin Sheet Cake With Molasses Cream-Cheese Frosting
- Total Time
- 45 minutes, plus cooling
- Rating
- Comments
- Read comments
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Ingredients
- ½cup/113 grams unsalted butter (1 stick), softened but cool, plus more for the pan
- 2cups/256 grams all-purpose flour, plus more for the pan
- 1teaspoon baking powder
- 1teaspoon baking soda
- ¾teaspoon kosher salt
- 2teaspoons ginger
- 2teaspoons cinnamon
- ¼teaspoon freshly grated nutmeg
- ¼teaspoon ground cloves
- 1½cups/330 grams light brown sugar, firmly packed
- ¼cup/60 milliliters grapeseed or other neutral-flavored oil
- 2large eggs
- 2teaspoons vanilla extract
- 1(15-ounce/425-gram) can pumpkin purée
- ½cup/4 ounces/113 grams cream cheese, softened but cool
- ¼cup/57 grams unsalted butter, softened but cool
- 2cups/226 grams confectioners' sugar, sifted
- 1tablespoon molasses
- 1teaspoon fresh lemon juice
- ½teaspoon vanilla extract
- Pinch kosher salt
For the Cake
For the Frosting
Preparation
- Step 1
Heat oven to 350 degrees. Butter and flour a 9x13-inch baking pan.
- Step 2
In a medium bowl, whisk the flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt and spices until well combined.
- Step 3
In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, combine the brown sugar, butter and grapeseed oil. Beat on medium-high until light and fluffy, about 3 minutes. Add the eggs one at a time, mixing for about 20 seconds between each. Add the vanilla extract and pumpkin purée and mix until well combined, scraping the bottom and sides of the bowl as necessary.
- Step 4
Turn the mixer to low, and add the dry ingredients. Stir until a few spots of flour remain. Remove the bowl from the mixer, and use a rubber spatula to finish folding in the dry ingredients. The batter will be thick and fluffy, so make sure to scrape the bottom and sides of the bowl to ensure it is evenly mixed.
- Step 5
Pour the batter into the prepared pan, smooth the top, and firmly tap the pan on the countertop a few times to release any large air bubbles. Bake the cake until golden and puffed, and a tester inserted into the center comes out clean, 25 to 30 minutes.
- Step 6
Cool the cake, still in the pan, on a rack for 15 minutes, then use the tip of a knife to loosen the edges and carefully invert it onto the rack to cool completely.
- Step 7
Make the frosting: Add the cream cheese and butter to the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment. Mix on medium-high until smooth. Turn the speed to low and slowly add the confectioner’s sugar, mix until the sugar is moistened, then turn the mixer up to medium-high and whip until smooth. Add the molasses, lemon juice, vanilla and pinch of salt, and whip until smooth.
- Step 8
Invert the cooled cake to a serving platter, frost and serve. Alternately, you can also frost and serve this cake in the pan it was baked in, if you’d rather not transfer it to a serving platter.
Private Notes
Comments
This turned out AWESOME! Love the cake... No changes except to use canola oil since I didn't have grapeseed. Frosting recipe didn't seem quite right... I doubled the cream cheese, doubled the vanilla and only used about 1 1/2 c of powdered sugar. Definitely will make again!
Also makes great cupcakes (~24), bake them for 17ish minutes at the same temperature. The frosting recipe is not enough to pipe on all of them, but it never hurts to make a double batch!
Moist cake and very flavorful....i thought all that ginger and cinnamon would be too much but it was balanced. As described in the recipe the batter was fluffy and perfect. My only set back was the molasses, i ended up icing the cake as is and then this morning, scraped it and diluted the intense molasses flavor with an extra half recipe of the cream cheese icing. It helped....molasses is no joke!
This is the third time that I’ve made it. I made the full recipe but did not have dried ginger so use 2 tablespoons of fresh ginger. I doubled the other spices. I cooked it in a 9 inch fluted pan with removable bottom. I started checking the time at about 25 minutes and it took between 40 and 45 minutes to cook completely. I did not care for the molasses frosting. This time I used half a stick of butter which I browned and then cooled down. I added that to 3/4 of a block of cream cheese and about a cup of powdered sugar and a teaspoon of vanilla. I whipped that and then added a cup of whipping cream and whipped it until it was fairly firm . This was delicious. The cake was moist and the brown butter cream cheese whipped cream frosting was a perfect amount for a round 9 inch pan cake.
I experimented with Chinese Five Spice + ginger + cinnamon. Nice flavor.
Ditto on cutting the molasses waaay back. I've made this twice to rave reviews, but today I got over-the-top raves at a party after I had quickly made glazed pecans and crushed a bunch to sprinkle over the little lumps in my too hastily made frosting. That's a wrinkle I plan to keep. (Glazed pecans: Melt 2 Tbsp butter, 1/2 C sugar, 1 1/2 C pecans, 1 tsp vanilla in heavy skillet.)