Pumpkin Spice Cake

This is our seasonal twist on the classic carrot cake! Use your pumpkin carving scraps to create this beauty of a cake.

Serves 16

Ingredients
300g plain flour
4 tsp baking powder
2 tsp bicarbonate of soda
4 tsp Sweet Spice blend
½ tsp salt
200g unsalted butter, softened
275g light brown sugar
1 tbsp honey
4 eggs, beaten
500g pumpkin or butternut squash flesh (peeled weight), grated
100g pecans, toasted & chopped
1 orange, peel zested into ribbons and juiced
Icing:
200g cream cheese, softened
80g unsalted butter, softened
40g icing sugar, sifted
1 tbsp honey

• Pre-heat the oven to 180°C, and butter/flour/line a 10-inch round cake tin.
• Sift the flour, baking powder, bicarbonate of soda, Sweet Spice and salt in a bowl.
• Using electric beaters, cream the butter, sugar and honey until pale & thick. Add the eggs, one at a time, beating in between. The mixture will look a little curdled but this is normal. Add the flour mix and beat until just combined.
• Fold in the grated pumpkin and toasted pecans. The mixture is very thick, but fold it well while not over-mixing it. Spread the batter evenly in the prepared cake tin.
• Pop in the middle of the oven for 25 minutes. The cake will turn quite a dark brown after this time, so cover the top gently with foil, turn it round and put back in the oven for 20-25 minutes, or until a cake tester comes out clean.
• Take the cake out of the tin and allow to rest for 5 minutes. Using the cake tester, pierce the top all over and then carefully, a little at a time, drizzle the orange juice over the cake.
• Let the cake cool down a little, then turn onto a cooling rack while still warm. Allow to cool completely.
• For the icing, use electric beaters to cream together the cream cheese, butter and honey. Add the icing sugar gradually, and continue to beat until smooth.
• Spread the icing over the top of the cake, decorating the edge with the orange zest ribbons to finish it off.