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I know, I know. I claimed I’m not a chef and I’m not. I’m not a baker either (despite it being my late great-grandfather’s occupation). So what’s with another recipe, you ask? Well, it’s all things pumpkin season and my mother makes this pumpkin pie cake that our entire family loves. It’s an upside-down cake of sorts–pumpkin pie-type filling on the bottom with a crust on top. The problem? Besides calling for 1 cup of suger (Yikes! I can just feel the blood sugar spike reading the recipe.) and sweetened condensed milk for the pumpkin filling portion, it uses a boxed yellow cake mix, which has more sugar and refined flour, to make the crust topping. Since beginning THM four years ago, I’ve counted her pumpkin pie cake as one of those once-a-year “cheat” things I have at Thanksgiving and call it an “off-plan personal choice” in moderation. But this year, I got a wild hair to see just what would happen if mixed two recipes from a couple of food blogs together. I used the cake (pumpkin) portion of the Pumpkin Cream Cake* from Mrs. Criddle’s Kitchen (which you should also make because it is AWESOME!) and used Sheri Graham’s Vanilla Cake Master Mix* in place of the boxed cake mix. I keep a double batch of Sheri’s Vanilla Cake Master Mix in the pantry because I make my Fun-Sans-Fetti Cake Batter Dip with it, but in the recipe below I’ve just included the individual ingredients in case you don’t have the mix on hand. Well, the results were exactly what I had hoped for! Since my kids tasted it and proclaimed it to be as good as the real thing, I wanted to share.

I do want to add a caveat though, while this is a health-IER recipe than the original due to removing the sugar, sweetened condensed milk, and cake mix, it is still pretty calorie-dense. There are over 2-1/2 tablespoons of butter in each serving. And, as THMers know, counting calories isn’t necessary, but you don’t want to abuse them either. You won’t want to make this a frequent dessert so as to avoid calorie abuse, but it is a great sugar-free treat for special occasions like Thanksgiving.

Pumpkin Pie Cake Recipe – THM (S)

Ingredients

For the pumpkin pie “filling”:

• 1 cup salted butter (2 sticks), room temperature
• 2/3 cup THM Super Sweet Blend
• 2 cans of pumpkin, 15 oz. each (or one 29 oz. can)
• 6 eggs
• 2 tsp vanilla
• 2 cups THM Baking Blend (or 1 cup coconut flour)
• 2 tsp baking powder
• 2 tsp pumpkin pie spice
• 1 tsp cinnamon

For the crust topping:

• 1/2 cup oat fiber (NOT oat flour)
• 1/2 cup coconut flour
• 1/2 cup vanilla whey protein powder (I use Jay Robb Vanilla Whey Protein Isolate)
• 1/4 cup THM Super Sweet Blend (or equivalent on-plan sweetener)
• 1/2 tsp sea salt
• 4 tsp baking powder
• 4 tsp glucomannan
• 1 cup salted butter, melted

Preparation

Preheat oven to 350º. Spray 9×13 cake pan with coconut oil cooking spray.

In a large bowl, cream together softened butter and sweetener. Stir in pumpkin, eggs, and vanilla. Mix well. Add baking blend, baking powder, and spices, stirring to combine thoroughly. Pour this mixture into prepared 9×13 pan and spread out.

In a separate bowl, combine oat fiber, coconut flour, whey protein powder, sweetener, salt, baking powder, and glucomannan. Mix well. Sprinkle this dry mixture over the pumpkin. Drizzle 1 cup of melted butter over dry cake mix. Bake at 350º for 50-60 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in center comes out clean. Allow to cool before serving. Serves well with homemade whipped cream or THM-compatible ice cream.

As written, this recipe serves 12-15. It can easily be halved and baked in a 9×7 pan for 45 minutes to serve 6-8.

Click here to print this recipe

* Many thanks to Sarah Criddle and Sheri Graham for letting me share all or portions of their recipes in this post. Please visit Mrs. Criddle’s Kitchen at https://mrscriddleskitchen.com and Sheri Graham at https://sherigraham.com for more great recipes.