Pumpkin Cake (Light!)

Sorry for the hiatus—I’ve been very busy with school and work and have not been taking the time to document my cooking. Winter break is very soon though (thank goodness) and there will be many posts to come in that time. Hooray!

So I’m doing this thing lately where I’m taking recipes and making ingredient swaps to make them healthier. This recipe came from the November issue of Cooking Light, so it was pretty light to begin with, but I made a few swaps to trim a little more fat/calories/carbs/whathaveyou. I’m going to post the original recipe below, with my ingredient swaps in bold.

This is a great fall recipe. Anything with pumpkin is, right? I’m not a huge fan of pumpkin but this cake is delicious. The cream cheese frosting doesn’t hurt either. :) This cake would be great for any kind of holiday get-together.

Before I go on, big ups to my boyfriend, Pranas, for being the official amyBITES photographer for the day. It allowed me to focus exclusively on the baking and therefore the photos are much better than usual. Thanks Pranas! Now onto the goodies!

Cake:

• 2 1/4 cups all-purpose flour (white whole wheat flour)
• 2 1/2  teaspoons baking powder
• 2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
• 1/4 teaspoon  salt
• 1 cup packed brown sugar
• 1/4 cup butter, softened (Blue Bonnet Light)
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 2 large eggs (1/2 cup egg substitute)
• 1 (15-ounce) can pumpkin puree
• Cooking spray
  
  Frosting:
  
  
• 2  tablespoons butter, softened (Blue Bonnet Light)
• 1/2  teaspoon  vanilla extract
• 1  (8-ounce) package 1/3-less-fat cream cheese
• 2  cups  sifted powdered sugar

1. Preheat oven to 350°.

2. To prepare cake, weigh or lightly spoon flour into dry measuring cups; level with a knife. Combine flour, baking powder, cinnamon, and salt in a small bowl, stirring with a whisk.

3. Combine brown sugar, 1/4 cup butter, and 1 teaspoon vanilla in a large bowl; beat with a mixer at medium speed until well combined. Add eggs, 1 at a time, to sugar mixture; beat well after each addition. Add pumpkin; mix well. Fold in flour mixture. Spread batter into a 13 x 9-inch baking pan coated with cooking spray. Bake at 350° for 25 minutes or until a wooden pick inserted into the center comes out clean. Cool completely in pan on a wire rack.

4. To prepare the frosting, combine 2 tablespoons butter, 1/2 teaspoon vanilla, and cream cheese in a medium bowl; beat with a mixer at medium speed until combined. Gradually add the powdered sugar, beating until well combined. Spread frosting evenly over top of cake.

Your cast of characters. You can’t see the brown sugar, but it’s behind the mixer.

Put all your dry ingredients (flour, baking powder, cinnamon, salt) in a bowl. As you can see, I used white whole wheat flour. This is milder in taste and appearance than whole wheat flour, but has all the same health benefits (high fiber, fewer carbs, etc.). I’ve been really pleased with it and it’s an easy swap. King Arthur Flour makes it so it should be on your grocery shelves.

Whisk the dry ingredients together so there aren’t any clumps and everything’s even.

Now set that aside and move on to your wet ingredients. Cream together your brown sugar and softened butter (or margarine).

Then, add your eggs one at a time (or your egg substitute, in two parts). Mix until thoroughly combined.

It’ll look something like this…a.k.a. wet sand. Delicious. Well, not so much yet, but it will be.

Now it’s time for the star of the show: the pumpkin! I like Libby’s but you can use whatever brand you choose.

Add it allllll in, baby. All 15 ounces. Then mix until combined.

It’ll look something like this. Like…wet, orange sand. Still kinda gross. Don’t worry though. Things will turn around when we add in the dry ingredients.

Add in your dry ingredients about a 1/2 cup at a time. Don’t add the next batch until the previous one is pretty well incorporated. It’ll end up looking like the picture above. It’s a pretty thick batter so you might have a little trouble if you’re using a flimsy mixer. If that’s the case, you can just fold the dry ingredients in with your spatula/spoon.

Now spread the batter out in your 13x9” baking dish. Make sure to coat it well with cooking or baking spray! Try to make it nice and even.

Like so. Now put the cake in your preheated oven and bake for approximately 25 minutes (or until a tester comes out clean).

Let it cool. While you wait, you can go ahead and make your frosting.

Frosting ingredients. Pretty simple.

Cream together your butter/margarine and cream cheese until well combined.

Add your powdered sugar about a 1/2 cup at a time. Note: At this point, you might want to put the frosting the fridge for a little while. It’s pretty humid here so the frosting was pretty gooey at this point. Which tastes delicious just the same but turned out to be a bit messy. So it’s up to you!

Frost the cake!

Cut into 24 pieces and serve!  I dusted the top with some ground cinnamon for kicks. This cake is delicious. It’s super moist and you really can’t go wrong with cream cheese frosting!

For those of you interested, here are the nutrition facts of this cake:

Original Recipe (per serving, 1 piece)

Calories: 178 

Fat: 5.5g (sat 3.3g)

Protein: 3g

Carbohydrate: 30g

Fiber: 0.9g

Cholesterol: 32mg

Iron: 1.2mg

Sodium: 135mg

Calcium: 62mg

With amyBITES’ substitutions (per serving, 1 piece)

Calories: 156

Fat: 3.6g (sat 1.6g)

Protein: 3g

Carbohydrate: 26.8g

Fiber: 1.7g

Cholesterol: 7.3mg

Iron: 1.2mg

Sodium: 138.8mg

Calcium: 62mg