sticky toffee pumpkin cake

my new favorite fall dessert which will be taking the place of pie at this year’s thanksgiving

i don’t even know where to start the story of creating this sticky (brown butter bourbon) toffee (spiced) pumpkin cake. one idea slowly transformed into something totally different, and the final recipe somehow ended up conveying the essence of the original concept and betraying it entirely. 

the amalgamation of this sticky toffee pumpkin cake’s inspiration would best be described through a venn diagram, but, since i can’t draw, i’ll list the components: 1. fall flavors of fruit, nuts, and spices; 2. pumpkin; 3. halloween; 4. thanksgiving; 5. a photo of a cantaloupe dessert i saw on weirdoldfood two summers ago; 6. a foggy memory of two different pumpkin desserts, one from ten years ago another from ten years before that; 7. sticky toffee pudding. More on that below:

1. as i wrote last week, fall is the best for seasonal baking. in my last recipe, i talked about warm spices, fall fruit, and nuts, which are all included again in this recipe, but with an entirely different feel (and this time the nuts are optional). 

2 / 3 / 4. i wanted to highlight pumpkin/squash in this recipe because ’tis the season. i also wanted to create a recipe you could make both for halloween (if you make halloween desserts, my apologies for not getting this to you sooner) or thanksgiving if you want to save yourself the stress of making a pie (if you want to be stressed on thanksgiving, my apple pie recipe can be found here). this recipe can also be baked in advance, stored in the fridge or freezer (depending on how far in advance you’re making it), and thrown in the oven while you eat your thanksgiving meal. this means you can time it to be perfectly warm by the time you want dessert (that’s what i’ll be doing this year). 

5. two summers ago i took a screenshot of this dessert from weirdoldfood. no, the dessert does not sound appealing, but the concept behind it, and the aesthetic, have lived rent-free in my head for nearly 18 months. i love the idea of hollowing the seeds out of the center of a fruit, stuffing it, and slicing it.

6. since seeing this photo i have wondered what other fruits i could hollow out and stuff with dessert to create that perfect slice. pumpkin immediately jumped to mind. why? well, pumpkin is indeed a fruit, and one that is similar in size to a cantaloupe, with a similar-sized cavity left when you remove the seeds. but what to fill the pumpkin with? there were so many pumpkin desserts to choose from: pumpkin pie of course, but also pumpkin bread cake, pumpkin cheesecake, pumpkin cookies, pumpkin muffins, pumpkin cinnamon rolls, and the list goes on and on. if a dessert exists, someone has probably pumpkin-ified it. but when thinking of fond pumpkin memories, i was taken back to two dishes in particular that made pumpkin their star. 

the first time i ate squash in a sweet application, and loved it, was around the age of 10. i was staying at a bed and breakfast with my mother, and in the morning they served a warm pumpkin pudding with some diced toasted nuts. it was delicious and so creamy, and it completely melted on my tongue. i thought it could be fun to make a pumpkin pudding inside of a pumpkin/squash. but then, of course, i laid awake in bed and thought of all of the issues that would arise: not all squashes have the same moisture content, so some squashes might leak liquid into the pudding base and lead to a curdled egg mess. baking time would also widely vary based on the kind and size of squash one might use and again the amount of moisture in it, and testing the amount of stabilizer needed to get that perfect baked pudding texture would be a lot of trial and error.

with all that in mind i scraped my brain for other pumpkin memories and another broke through to the surface: one from about ten years ago, at a restaurant i can’t remember, where i had slices of roasted fall/winter squash (i think kabocha) braised in a spiced toffee sauce and served with a cold scoop of ice cream. and so, thinking of that toffee-squash dessert led me to another holiday dessert i have not yet discussed, sticky toffee pudding.

7. why did my mind jump to making a pumpkin sticky toffee pudding? because i could not think of anything that sounded better than pumpkin cake soaked in toffee sauce.

for those who have not made sticky toffee pudding, you rehydrate dates in water, blend them up, stir that into cake batter, bake it, poke holes or slice the cake, soak it in toffee while it’s still hot and serve (some recipes bake a second time before serving, and this one does too). the concept is the same here, where the cake has a pumpkin puree in place of pureed dates (so no need to rehydrate anything, just blend up freshly prepared pumpkin, but note that this does cut down on sweetness, and means you don’t get the same texture). the cake and toffee get baked in the same pumpkin you made the puree from and the cake and toffee steam together, becoming tender and emphasizing the squash flavors.

the pumpkin/squash is sliced while warm, revealing the toffee-soaked pumpkin spiced cake on the inside. you can then add all your accompaniments: butter-toasted pecans, ever-so-slightly sweetened whipped cream, and warm toffee sauce. 

when you first try the cake the first thing you notice is the flavor: pumpkin-y, pumpkin spice-y, toffey-y, and brown buttery. then the texture: squishy, tender, moist, falling apart as soon as it hits your tongue. it feels like a hug, and pairing it with the warm toffee sauce, the cold cream, and those crunchy buttery nuts incorporates all the fall flavors and textures you could ever want. i could not stop myself when i first tried this, two slices quickly turned into three. i super appreciate those bites with the squash as well. it tempers the sweetness a bit and adds in a new texture. the whole dessert was full of surprise but also so familiar. it is one of my favorite fall desserts i’ve made in a whole. i don’t want to oversell it in case you don’t feel the same way (i can certainly imagine some will be put off by the texture), but i will be serving this at thanksgiving this year instead of pie (this recipe basically combines the best parts of pumpkin pie and pecan pie in one). 

one important note is that while this recipe is similar to that of a sticky toffee pudding, we do end with a different result because of subbing the squash puree for the dates. the date’s texture and sugars make sticky toffee pudding so dense and gooey, whereas the pumpkin lends itself to a slightly lighter texture. this is why this dessert is called a cake and not a pudding. it is more like a regular cake soaked in toffee sauce.

on to the recipe! it’s pretty straightforward and is one of my easier recipes, but i must note a few things: