Pumpkin and Ginger Slab Cake

This delicious cake is full of rich golden pumpkin and aromatic spices and is a cake that will be perfect for your Easter table, to offset all of the other Easter treats coming your way. It is also a large mixture, which will last you throughout the entirety of the Easter holidays if kept refrigerated in a covered container.

The warmth of the ginger and the sweet cinnamon combine beautifully with the pumpkin in this cake. Because of the delicious cream cheese frosting which adorns it, the cake needs to be refrigerated in our climate, but even after four to five days of refrigeration, it is still as moist and flavoursome as when it was first baked. I am so enamoured with this cake. Thanks to my wonderful friend Julia for the original recipe. 

Pumpkins are officially in season from Autumn to Winter in Australia, but due to their long shelf life are available all year long, meaning that we can use them frequently in savoury and sweets baking. However, they are at their best right now, well priced, so now is the time to start baking with pumpkin. I like to steam a whole lot of pumpkin pieces, remove the skin, mash them up, and then I have pumpkin mash in the refrigerator whenever I need it. 

Fortunately in Australia we don't need to buy canned pumpkin, and I never have as pumpkins are always available, and I almost always buy the Kent or Jap pumpkins. However, canned pumpkin would be fine to use in this cake, if you need to.

It's a cinch to make, it's a cake where the dry ingredients are added to the wet ingredients, mixed together and voila, it's ready to add to the cake pan. However, the pumpkin does need to be cooked in advance, mashed and drained of any juices, and chilled in the refrigerator before using it.

We love ginger in our house, and if you are like us and would really like to taste the zing of ginger in this cake, add 1/3 cup of crystallised ginger to the batter. Or, even add some chopped up Stem Ginger, the kind that comes in a ginger syrup. I make this stuff at home from our annual ginger crop and it is beautiful in baked goods. I add it whenever I can to my cooking. But if that is a leap too far for you, then just the powdered ginger, which must be fresh and aromatic, will still bring some nice heat to your cake.

Preheat your oven to 160 degrees C

Ingredients:

2 cups mashed pumpkin

2 cups of castor sugar

1 cup vegetable oil

4 large eggs

2 cups Self Raising Flour

2 teaspoons baking soda

1 teaspoon baking powder

2 teaspoons ground cinnamon

2 teaspoons ground ginger

1/3 cup finely chopped crystallised ginger (optional)

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/2 cup chopped pecans

Method: (Pumpkin and Ginger Cake)

Preheat your oven to 160 deg C

Preferably use a Pyrex Lasagne dish to bake this cake, or use two greased and floured 20 cm (9-inch) round layer cake pans if you wish. (My Pyrex rectangular dish is slightly smaller than a Lasagne dish, but still it worked fine).

Combine sugar, vegetable oil, and eggs in a large bowl with a large spoon or whisk. Mix well. The mixture will just plop very satisfyingly from your spoon.

Sift the dry ingredients into a separate bowl and add the crystallised ginger pieces if using and stir through. Stir into the oil mixture, beating well. 

Stir in the pumpkin mash.  This will come together as a lovely aromatic and smooth mixture. The cake batter will start to bubble ever so slightly due to the leavening agents. Mine did anyway.

Grease and line your pyrex baking dish on the base and the sides with baking paper, with an overhang at the ends so that the cake can easily be lifted out of the dish. An overhang of baking paper also allows for the cake to rise above the rim of the dish if necessary. Or this is a great cake to take to a party in the dish, and then make life easier by cutting the slices in the dish. 

Pour the cake batter into  your lined lasagne dish or round cake tins.

Bake at 50 to 60 minutes for the lasagne pan, or 35 to 40 minutes for the round tins.

Place cake(s) on a cooling rack.

Cream Cheese Frosting:

2 tablespoons butter, softened

125 g cream cheese, room temperature

1 1/2 cups icing sugar, sifted

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Method:

Mix all the Cream Cheese ingredients together with an electric mixer.

Frost the pumpkin cake with the cream cheese frosting and sprinkle with chopped pecans.

Cook's notes:

• 1/3 cup finely chopped crystallized ginger or stem ginger will raise the zing of ginger to a whole new level and give you some chewy bits of deliciousness throughout the cake.
• Because this is a large cake, if it sinks ever so slightly in the middle, just flip the cake over and ice it with the cream cheese frosting.
• Happy baking!

I hope the Easter season will be a time of reflection, relaxation, and peace for you, and a time when you can celebrate your joy of cooking with family and friends as well. 

It will be busy for us. 

We will be involved in a Pickleball tournament over Easter. Mr. HRK will be  playing in the tournament. He loves competing in tournaments, whereas I will be happy just supporting the event where I can as a Committee member of our Mackay Indoor Pickleball Club. Players are travelling from far and wide to attend so it will be a busy time, but lots of fun, and there will be some great pickleball to watch. I love playing pickleball, but am happy to play just socially most of the time. 

Happy Easter!

Warm wishes,

Pauline