The Best Glazed Pumpkin Cake With Fresh Milled Flour

This pumpkin cake recipe is one that has been passed down for generations in my family and one of my very favorite holiday treats! I never fail to receive compliments and requests for the recipe when I bring this cake to gatherings. The original recipe was delicious, but I made some tweaks to include healthier ingredients. To my delight, the final product tasted just the same! I hope you love this cake just as much as I do!

Family Tradition

This pumpkin cake is a Holiday family tradition. We make this cake for Thanksgiving morning, throughout the Fall season, and again for Christmas. This recipe began with my great grandmother — a Southern woman who could do some seriously cooking and baking!

True to Southern cooking, the original recipe called for an entire cup of shortening! When I began down the path of more natural living, I started trying to tweak family recipes so they would still taste amazing, but utilize healthier ingredients. This sparked my experimentation with several family recipes. You can find the tips and tricks I have developed for substituting healthier ingredients here.

For this particular cake, I swapped all purpose flour for fresh milled soft white wheat, used coconut oil instead of the shortening, and utilized coconut sugar and maple syrup instead of refined white sugar. I do want to note that there are several different ways to use healthier ingredients in this recipe and others. Maple syrup, honey, coconut sugar, date sugar, and cane sugar can all be used instead of white sugar, for example. Feel free to experiment with whatever ingredients are most appealing to you using the tips I referenced above.

Ingredients

I chose to use soft white wheat for this recipe to keep the product as close to the original recipe as possible. I may try other wheats such as spelt in the future, but for now this works wonderfully. You can absolutely use all purpose flour for this recipe without issue. If you use all purpose, simply use 3 cups.

The original sweetener in this recipe was refined white sugar, so this can be used in the amount of 3 cups. However, in an effort to make this recipe healthier, I used alternative ingredients. I chose to use 1.5 cups of coconut sugar and 1.5 cups of maple syrup. There are many sweeteners that could be used in this recipe such as honey and I will likely experiment with them at some point. My goals was to lessen processed ingredients when possible, but keep in mind this won’t necessarily be considered a healthy recipe even with the tweaks. Sometimes, you just need a tasty treat!

In place of shortening, which was called for by the original recipe, I used coconut oil. This did not change the texture or flavor. I may try this with butter in the future, and if I do, I will update the post to include the experience. The pumpkin and spices should be enough to cover any flavor added by an oil such as coconut.

Tips for The Perfect Pumpkin Cake

• The Pan – You can use any Bundt pan you would like for this cake. I’m sure it would work in other pans as well, but I have never tried it as the shape is part of the tradition for my family. It will depend on what size pan you have, but this recipe will make enough for one large Bundt pan as well as about 6 mini Bundts for me. This works out well if I am making this cake for an event as my kids love eating the mini cakes. If you have a straight sided Bundt without the fancy shapes, it is easier to remove, but a little less decorative looking.
• Greasing the Pan – Bundt pans are very tricky and must be greased properly in order for the cake to release and keep the beautiful shape. My family’s method of preparing the pan has always been to spray with nonstick spray, then coat with flour. There are a lot of sprays that can be used here, such as olive oil or coconut oil if you do not wish to use traditional nonstick spray. I have been using coconut oil myself. When you add the flour, be sure to tilt the pan around and hit the outside of the pan to distribute the flour. Once it is sufficiently coated, hold the pan upside down and hit the outside to get rid of the excess flour.
• Removing from the Pan – Let this cake cool completely before trying to remove it from the pan to reduce the chances of the cake splitting and tearing. It can be a gamble if the cake will come out perfectly or not if a Bundt pan is used, but don’t worry — if it breaks a little it still tastes amazing!
• The Glaze – Wait until the cake is cooled to glaze. If the cake is too warm, the glaze will soak into the cake. While it will still taste great, you will not have that visible glaze that hardens slightly. The ingredients for the glaze may seem at odds with the flavor of the cake (pumpkin and lemon???), but I promise, this combination works beautifully!

How to Make the Pumpkin Cake

First, preheat the oven to 325°F and grease your Bundt pan. Remember to prepare the pan properly (see tips above).

Sift the dry ingredients (flour, baking soda, baking powder, cinnamon, nutmeg, cloves, allspice, and salt) together in a bowl and set aside.

Next you will cream the fat and sugar together in the bowl of a stand mixer until well combined. In this case, I used solid coconut oil and creamed it with coconut sugar and maple syrup. This should take approximately 2 minutes.

Once creamed, add the eggs, vanilla extract, lemon extract, and pumpkin purée to your stand mixer bowl and combine. Note that at this stage, the batter might look slightly curdled (see picture below). This is okay!

You will then add in the dry ingredient mixture a little at a time, stirring in between additions, until everything is combined. Below is a picture of how the batter will look at this stage.

Lastly, pour the batter into your prepared pan and bake for approximately 1 hour. This can vary based on the size of your Bundt pan. I actually prefer to fill my pan about 3/4 full of batter and I use the remaining batter to make muffins. If you find the top is getting too browned, you can place a sheet of foil over it while it finishes baking.

Once the cake is out of the oven and cooling, you can make the glaze. We have never had a recipe for the actual glaze. The exact quantity of ingredients will vary depending on how much glaze you prefer. Most of the time, I just dump some powdered sugar in a bowl and combine it with enough lemon juice that it becomes the correct consistently. It should be liquid and able to run off of a spoon, but no so runny that it will just soak into the cake before hardening. See a quick video below of the consistently I strive to attain.

https://youtu.be/TYzOd5NzyZk?si=MB7b4V_Imjsw4nB6

Once the cake is out of the pan and cooled, you can add the glaze. If your glaze is too thin, or the cake too warm, the glaze will soak into the cake rather than hardening like an icing on top. Still delicious, but I prefer to have the visible lines of glaze.

How to Store

This pumpkin cake lasts several days at room temperature in an air-tight container. You could likely prolong this by a few more days by storing in the refrigerator, but it has never lasted long enough at my house for me to test that! If it is stored in the refrigerator, I recommend covering with plastic wrap to avoid it drying out.