The most moist brown butter pumpkin cake full of warm fall spices, with fluffy salted maple buttercream. This high altitude maple pumpkin cake is decorated beautifully with piped buttercream in a woven pattern to resemble a chunky knit sweater or blanket.
You might also love these recipes for pecan praline pumpkin pie, autumn cake with buttercream pumpkins and flowers, and pumpkin Charlotte cream cake.
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Why You’ll Love This Recipe
Brown Butter and Spices. The nutty flavor of the browned butter and cozy spices give this cake the perfect combination of flavors for pumpkin everything season.
Moist for Days. One of the best things about baking with pumpkin is how moist your baked goods will be, and this cake stays so soft and moist, even days after baking.
High Altitude Tested. I develop all the recipes on my site for Denver’s altitude of 5,280 feet. If you’re at a lower or higher elevation, please see my FAQs for guidance on adjusting recipes for your altitude.
See the recipe card at the end of the post for the full ingredients list and instructions.
Ingredients
Cake
- Brown Butter. Besides flavor, the brown butter adds moisture and richness to the cake.
- Pumpkin. You’ll need plain canned pumpkin, not pumpkin pie filling.
- Sugar. A combination of granulated sugar and light brown sugar adds sweetness and moisture.
- Eggs. The eggs add structure and richness to the cake.
- Buttermilk. The acidity makes the cake so tender and moist.
- Vanilla + Maple Extracts. Flavor.
- Flour. All purpose flour adds structure and strength.
- Baking Soda. The baking soda reacts with the acid in the buttermilk and pumpkin to leaven the cake.
- Spices. Salt, cinnamon, ginger, cloves and nutmeg give this cake amazing flavor that perfectly complements the pumpkin.
Baker’s Note: This recipe uses a lot of buttercream, due to the piped decorating technique. If you will not be frosting the cake with the piped buttercream design shown in this post, you can cut the buttercream recipe in half.
Buttercream
- Butter. I use unsalted butter for my buttercream, and then add salt to taste.
- Powdered Sugar. Sweetens and thickens the buttercream.
- Meringue Powder. Adds stability and improves the texture.
- Salt. A good amount of salt nicely complements the flavor of the maple. Usually I only add a pinch of salt to my buttercream to balance the sweetness, but in this recipe, the buttercream is noticeably salted.
- Vanilla + Maple Extracts. Flavor.
Instructions
Cake
- Preheat the oven to 350 F, and spray the bottoms of three 8-inch cake pans with non-stick spray.
- In a saucepan over medium heat, melt the butter. Continue to cook the butter, swirling the pan occasionally, for about 10 minutes, until the water has evaporated, and the butter is forming nutty, fragrant golden brown solids at the bottom of the pan. Remove the pan from the heat and let the butter cool for 10 minutes.
- In a large bowl, whisk together the pumpkin, brown sugar, granulated sugar, eggs, buttermilk, vanilla and maple extract. Whisk in the browned butter.
- In a separate bowl, sift together the flour, baking soda, salt and spices.
- Add the dry ingredients to the wet, and whisk for about 15-30 seconds until smooth.
- Divide the batter between the pans. Bake the cakes on the center oven rack for about 22-25 minutes, until a cake tester or toothpick comes out clean.
- Set the pans on a wire cooling rack, cover loosely with a clean kitchen towel, and cool completely before frosting.
Buttercream
- In the bowl of your stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, beat the butter for one minute, until smooth.
- With the mixer on low, add the powdered sugar, meringue powder and salt. Add the vanilla and maple extracts. Increase speed to medium, and whip for 4-5 minutes, scraping the bowl occasionally, until light and fluffy. Turn the speed down to “stir” and mix for 1 more minute.
- Remove the cooled cakes from the pans. Fill, frost and stack the cakes, then frost all over with a thin crumb coat of buttercream. Chill in the fridge for 30 minutes, then finish frosting all over with a final coat of buttercream.
Decorating with Piped Buttercream
The design on today’s maple pumpkin cake is done with piped buttercream in a woven pattern, so that it resembles the plush, cozy texture of a chunky knitted sweater or blanket. I used tip 6B, a large open star tip, although tip 1M will also make an interesting looking design on a buttercream sweater cake. You’ll also need a 16-inch disposable piping bag. Decorating a cake with piped buttercream requires a lot of buttercream, much more than if you’re just frosting the cake with an icing spatula.
Tips and Best Practices
- Chilled Crumb Coat. Your cake needs a thin crumb coat of frosting that’s well chilled. Refrigerate your crumb coated cake for 30-60 minutes before you start piping.
- Practice First. Start by practicing the piping on a piece of wax paper taped to a cutting board. After you’re finished, you can scrape the frosting back into the bowl to use it again.
- Mark Guidelines on your Cake. Decide how many rows you want to pipe onto your cake, and mark lines on your cake to use as a guideline, so your piping doesn’t end up crooked. You can do this by measuring the height of your cake, then dividing that by how many rows you want. My cake was about four inches tall, and I decided to pipe four rows, so I taped three toothpicks to a bench scraper and lightly dragged it around the side of the cake to mark my lines. Honestly, this was a bit crowded for me, and I might have preferred to only pipe three rows to have more room to work with. A cake that’s five or six inches tall would work well with four rows.
Piping a Woven Buttercream Pattern
- Starting at the top edge of the cake, pipe a “shell” at a 45 degree angle (downwards from the top left to the bottom right).
- Then pipe another shell at a 45 degree angle (upwards from the bottom left to the top right). The second shell should overlap the ending point of the first shell.
- Continue this pattern all the way around the cake to complete the first row.
- Now pipe the remaining rows, refilling your piping bag as needed.
- Finish by piping a shell border around the top edge of the cake.
Be sure to read all of my BAKING FAQs where I discuss ingredients, substitutions and common questions with cake making, so that you can be successful in your own baking! I also suggest reading these comprehensive posts on making Perfect American Buttercream, How to Stack, Fill, Crumb Coat and Frost Layer Cakes and How to Use Piping Bags.
Frequently Asked Questions
Store leftover cake in an airtight container at room temperature for up to 3-5 days.
Tip 6B.
I’ve used the imitation maple extract from my grocery store for years, and I don’t mind the flavor, but recently, I’ve been using this pure maple extract.
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High Altitude Salted Maple Pumpkin Cake
All recipes on Curly Girl Kitchen are developed for high altitude at 5,280 feet. See FAQs for adjusting to higher or lower elevations.
Equipment
- Stand Mixer with Paddle Attachment
Ingredients
Cake
- 1 cup unsalted butter
- 1 can (15 oz) pumpkin (not pumpkin pie filling)
- ½ cup light or dark brown sugar, lightly packed
- 1 cup granulated sugar
- 4 large eggs
- ½ cup whole buttermilk
- 2 tsp vanilla
- 1 tsp maple extract
- 2 ¼ cups all-purpose flour, fluffed, spooned and leveled
- 1 ¼ tsp baking soda
- 1 tsp coarse Kosher salt (if using table salt, use half the amount)
- 1 ½ tsp ground cinnamon
- 1 tsp ground ginger
- ½ tsp ground cloves
- ¼ tsp ground nutmeg
Buttercream
- 3 cups unsalted butter, softened to room temperature
- 6 cups powdered sugar
- 1 ½ tbsp meringue powder, optional
- 1 tsp coarse Kosher salt (if using table salt, use half the amount)
- 1 tbsp vanilla extract
- 1 tbsp maple extract
Instructions
Cake
- Preheat the oven to 350 F, and spray the bottoms of three 8-inch cake pans with non-stick spray.
- In a saucepan over medium heat, melt the butter. Continue to cook the butter, swirling the pan occasionally, for about 10 minutes, until the water has evaporated, and the butter is forming nutty, fragrant golden brown solids at the bottom of the pan. Remove the pan from the heat and let the butter cool for 10 minutes.
- In a large bowl, whisk together the pumpkin, brown sugar, granulated sugar, eggs, buttermilk, vanilla and maple extract. Whisk in the browned butter.
- In a separate bowl, sift together the flour, baking soda, salt and spices.
- Add the dry ingredients to the wet, and whisk for about 15-30 seconds until smooth.
- Divide the batter between the pans. Bake the cakes on the center oven rack for about 22-25 minutes, until a cake tester or toothpick comes out clean.
- Set the pans on a wire cooling rack, cover loosely with a clean kitchen towel, and cool completely before frosting.
Buttercream
- In the bowl of your stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, beat the butter for one minute, until smooth.
- With the mixer on low, add the powdered sugar, meringue powder and salt. Add the vanilla and maple extracts. Increase speed to medium, and whip for 4-5 minutes, scraping the bowl occasionally, until light and fluffy. Turn the speed down to "stir" and mix for 1 more minute.
- Remove the cooled cakes from the pans. Fill, frost and stack the cakes, then frost all over with a thin crumb coat of buttercream. Chill in the fridge for 30 minutes, then finish frosting all over with a final coat of buttercream.
This recipe was one of my BEST cakes I have ever made when I made it last year. So nice to have HA recipes living here in Denver.
Also! Can this be used as is to make cupcakes instead of cake? Or do the measurements not work?
Thanks!
I’m so glad you loved it! You can find my pumpkin cupcakes recipe here: https://curlygirlkitchen.com/pumpkin-cupcakes-cream-cheese-buttercream-high-altitude/
So what if we’re not in high altitude? Should I modify the recipe?
Please see my FAQs: https://curlygirlkitchen.com/baking-faqs/