One cake I particularly enjoy is this honey colored Pumpkin Cake with its shiny chocolate glaze. This cake is full of flavor and keeps fresh for days, thanks to the pumpkin puree and canola oil. The chocolate glaze is a delicious mixture of semi sweet chocolate with enough butter, corn syrup, and brandy to make it flow easily down the sides of the cake. Try to make this cake the day before serving, so the flavors of the cake and chocolate glaze have time to soften and mingle.

The unique ring shape of this Pumpkin Cake comes from using a bundt pan, a fancy tube pan created by an American, H. David Dalquist, back in 1950. The story goes that a group of Minneapolis Jewish women from a local Hadassah wanted a better pan for baking their bundkuchen. They went to Dalquist’s company, Northland Aluminum Products, with their problem and he created a ring shaped tube pan with fluted sides made from cast aluminum. He named the pan “bundt” (by adding the letter ‘t’ to the word “bund” which is German for “gathering”) and while sales of this pan were a little slow at first, they skyrocketed once Ella Helfrich from Texas, used the pan for her Tunnel of Fudge Cake that won the 1966 Pillsbury Bake-Off contest. The beauty of this pan is that the inner tube conducts the heat into the center of the batter so the cake batter will cook evenly, which is especially good for heavy cake batters.

I admit that I normally use canned pumpkin puree in this recipe, as I find it almost as good as fresh. But if you find yourself with a few extra pumpkins that were not carved into Jack-O-Lanterns, you might want to make your own puree. First off, you want to use the smaller pumpkin varieties like Sugar Pie, Baby Bear or Cheese Pumpkin (approximately 5-7 lbs., 2 1/2 – 3 1/2 kg.). To make the puree, first cut the pumpkin in half lengthwise, remove seeds and stringy fibers, and then place cut-side down on a greased baking sheet. Bake at 350 degrees F (177 degrees C) for approximately 45 minutes to 1 1/4 hours (depending on size) or until easily pierced with a knife. Scoop out the pulp and puree in a food processor until smooth. To extract all the liquid, strain through a cheesecloth lined strainer. Cool the puree before using.

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