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Pumpkin Spice Cake

Last Updated On: November 14, 2024 | Published: November 18, 2014 by Melissa Diamond | 198 Comments
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Today, I'm sharing our popular scratch Pumpkin Spice Cake recipe with you!

Just as with our moist homemade spice cake recipe, this is a fall cake that you are going to want to come back to again and again.

It is so soft and tender, and should be a staple for fall celebrations!

This scratch Pumpkin Spice Cake is the BEST! So moist and flavorful- keep it in mind for your fall birthdays, Thanksgiving, and special occasions!

Why we Love It

There is so much to love about this Pumpkin Spice Cake! 

  • Soft texture and tender crumb
  • Warm, cozy flavor
  •  Crowd pleasing fall dessert, perfect as a fall birthday cake recipe, Thanksgiving cake recipe, and more!
  • Delicious with any sort of cream cheese frosting, but we love it with spiced cream cheese frosting!
Pumpkin Spice Cake Recipe from Scratch is the BEST!

We have several favorite fall cake recipes in our Cake Recipes Section, including Sweet Potato Cake, Maple Pound Cake, Gingerbread Cake, and Apple Spice Cake. However, this delicious homemade Pumpkin Spice Cake tops our list!

How to Make Pumpkin Spice Cake

You can find the full, printable Pumpkin Spice Cake recipe card further down in this post, but here is a quick rundown of our steps!

  • First, preheat oven to 350. Grease & flour three 8 inch pans. We also like to line our cake pans with parchment paper.
  • In your mixing bowl add the dry ingredients (flour and the next seven ingredients). With the mixer on low speed, mix the dry ingredients for 30 seconds so all will be well blended. Add the pieces of butter a few slices at a time. Mix until the dry ingredients are moistened by the butter and take on the texture of moistened sand. Scrape the sides and bottom of the bowl.
  • In another bowl combine eggs, vegetable oil, pumpkin puree, milk and vanilla. Whisk until well blended, set aside.
  • With the mixer on low speed, slowly add approximately half of the egg mixture. Increase to medium speed for 1 ½ minutes. Scrape bottom and sides of the bowl. Add the remaining egg mixture in 2 pourings, beating 20 seconds after each addition.
  • Divide the cake batter between the three prepared pans and bake at 350 degrees F for 30-35 minutes or until a wooden skewer comes out clean or with just a few crumbs attached. Let it cool in the pans for 10 minutes on a wire rack and then turn out.
 

Recipe FAQs

Today, we are using the reverse creaming method of mixing today. In this method, the ingredients are added in a different order than what you may be used to with the traditional creaming method.

The dry ingredients are first added to the mixing bowl and combined, then the butter is added (which coats the dry mixture, creating the look of coarse sand). Finally, the combined wet ingredients are added in a few separate pourings.

The end result is a velvety cake texture and crumb that is incredibly moist! Some other great recipes that use this method are our yellow cake, chocolate cake recipe, and orange dreamsicle cake.

If you prefer the conventional creaming method, you can follow our Pumpkin Snickerdoodle Cake Recipe instead (minus the cinnamon swirl ingredients & instructions)!

Yes, this cake should be refrigerated because of the cream cheese frosting. However, for best taste and texture, it is best to remove the pumpkin spice cake from the refrigerator two hours before serving. This will give the cake time to warm and soften.

This Pumpkin Spice Cake is one of my absolute favorites for fall. But we have several other pumpkin cakes that you must try!

You can find them in our Fall Cake Recipes section, but here are a few favorites: Pumpkin Praline Cake, Pumpkin Spice Latte Cake , Pumpkin Gingerbread Cake, and Pumpkin Spice Cake from cake mix!

We also have a heavenly Pumpkin Bundt Cake, Pumpkin Snickerdoodle Bundt Cake, or if you're feeling a little fancy, check out our scratch Pumpkin Roll Cake!

We love cream cheese frosting with all of our spice cakes, pumpkin cake included! For today's cake, we used a spiced cream cheese frosting for an added dose of warm spices.

If you need a less perishable option, you can use our vanilla buttercream recipe and add spices to it!

Yes! Just as with the majority of our cakes (from marble cake to white cake and more), these pumpkin layers freeze beautifully.

After cooling to room temperature (warm is fine), wrap the layers individually with plastic wrap followed by aluminum foil. We like to first place each layer on a foil-covered cardboard cake circle for extra support. They will stay fresh for up to three months!

*If you are only freezing the pumpkin cake layers for a few days, double wrapping in plastic wrap is enough, you can skip the aluminum foil step.

Pumpkin Spice Cake with Spiced Cream Cheese Frosting Recipe- MyCakeSchool.com

Other Favorite Fall Cakes!

We have SO many favorite cakes for fall. Here are a few more.

Some of our most popular are our Carrot Cake Recipe, Easy Pumpkin Spice Cake, Applesauce Cake, and Gingerbread Cake.

For more favorite fall cake recipes and tutorials, make sure to check out our Fall & Thanksgiving Roundup Post! You'll also find a delicious recipe for homemade pumpkin cupcakes! Make sure to check out our collection of classic Thanksgiving cakes as well!

We hope that you enjoy this fantastic homemade Pumpkin Spice Cake recipe. It's the only scratch Pumpkin Spice Cake recipe that you'll ever need.

We have lots more Cake Recipes for you to scroll through, including cake recipes from scratch and cake mix recipes.

We also have many Cake Decorating tutorials for you as well!

Here are a few of our favorite cake decorating tutorials for fall:

Have you made this? We would LOVE for you to leave a ⭐️ rating as well as a comment and photo below! We really appreciate your feedback!

The BEST Pumpkin Spice Cake Recipe by MyCakeSchool.com! Perfect for fall celebrations!

Pumpkin Spice Cake {Scratch Recipe}

BY Melissa and Bebe
This moist, soft, scratch Pumpkin Spice Layer Cake is the BEST! Perfect for fall celebrations!
Prep Time: 15 minutes
Cook Time: 30 minutes
Course: Cakes and Cupcakes
Servings: 15 servings
RATE THIS RECIPE
Print Recipe Pin Recipe

Ingredients

For the Pumpkin Spice Cake Layers

  • 2 ¾ cups (360g) all purpose flour
  • 1 Tablespoon (15g) baking powder
  • 1 teaspoon (5g) baking soda
  • 2 teaspoons (6g) cinnamon
  • 1 teaspoons (2)g nutmeg
  • ½ teaspoon ginger
  • 2 cups (400g) granulated sugar
  • ½ teaspoon (3g) salt
  • 1 ½ sticks (170g) unsalted butter, softened. It should easily dent when pressed but not be overly soft through and through.
  • 4 large eggs, room temperature.
  • ¼ cup (54g) vegetable oil
  • 15 oz (425) Canned Pumpkin (not pumpkin pie filling)
  • ½ cup (121g) milk
  • 1 teaspoons (4g) vanilla extract

FOR THE SPICED CREAM CHEESE FROSTING:

  • 3 sticks (340g total) unsalted butter, softened
  • 339 grams (12 oz) cream cheese, softened (we used 1 ½ packages)
  • 1 teaspoon (2g) cinnamon (Adjust amount to your liking)
  • ½ teaspoon (1g) nutmeg (Adjust amount to your liking)
  • 1 teaspoon (2g) ground ginger (Sift if clumpy. Adjust amount to your liking.)
  • 6 - 6 ½ cups confectioners’ sugar (Sifted. Adjust amount to your liking.)
  • 2 teaspoons (8g) vanilla extract

Instructions

For the Pumpkin Spice Cake Layers

  • This recipe uses the reverse creaming method.)Preheat oven to 350. Grease & flour three 8 inch pans.
  • In your mixing bowl add the dry ingredients (flour and the next seven ingredients). With the mixer on low speed, mix the dry ingredients for 30 seconds so all will be well blended. Add the pieces of butter a few slices at a time. Mix until the dry ingredients are moistened by the butter and look like coarse sand. If you pinch some of the mixture between your fingers it will stick together. Scrape the sides and bottom of the bowl.
  • In another bowl combine eggs, oil, pumpkin, milk and vanilla. Whisk until well blended, set aside.
  • Method is important in this recipe so with the mixer on LOW speed, SLOWLY add approximately ½ of the egg mixture. Increase to medium speed for 1 ½ minutes. Scrape bottom and sides of the bowl. Add the remaining egg mixture in 2 pourings, beating 20 seconds after each addition.
  • Bake at 350 degrees 30 - 35 minutes, let cool in pans 10 minutes then turn out.

To Prepare the Frosting

  • Using your mixer beat the butter and cream cheese until well blended. Add the vanilla and spices. With the mixer on low speed gradually add the confectioners’ sugar and mix until it is a good piping consistency.
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198 Comments

  1. Lauren I noticed the same thing so I just added the vanilla to the frosting mix right before the milk the recipe says 2 teaspoons. Good luck! ?

    Reply

  2. @Lauren- Thanks for pointing this out! I've just updated this to say 2 tsp. as Norma said above. Sorry about that! ;0) -Hope you enjoy it!

    Reply

  5. Hi Cathy, I did not make a note about the thickness of the batter so I'm not sure about that. I hope you like the cake.

    Reply

  6. After making pumpkin pie I have 300g left of pumpkin and I want to make this cake. What can I use to substitute for the remaining 125g of pumpkin required in this recipe?

    Reply

  7. Hi Edward, I think you could use a cooked and mashed sweet potato and not lose the pumpkin flavor in the cake. If you have to make a trip to the grocery store, it would be easier to buy a can of pumpkin. Hope all goes well.

    Reply

  11. Hi Irrka, I'm sorry I missed your question earlier this month. I think this cake recipe would be fine to do some simple carving. It would be best to carve while partially frozen.

    Reply

  12. This cake turned out fantastic. Moist and tasty. Thank you for the substitute suggestion. However, I ended up scaling the recipe down to 3/4 instead of adding a substitution and baked it in a 9x13 baking pan. Not as pretty but tasted so good. I used 1 cup of sugar instead of 1.5 cups.

    Reply