What's Cooking Wednesday: Idad's Pumpkin Cake

Idad was my great-grandfather (my mom's mom's dad). Even though he passed away when I was eleven, I don't remember much about him. Then, several years ago, I asked my mom if she had a pumpkin cake recipe and she gave me this one, telling me that he would make it and send it to his grandchildren when they went off to college as freshmen. Kinda cool, right?

In my head, October is "Pumpkin Month" so I tend to want all things pumpkin and that includes this cake. Idad's recipe did not include icing, but I think the cake looks naked without it so I added a simple cream cheese icing. The cake itself is delicious (especially for breakfast!) so the decision for icing is totally up to you, but there are no naked cakes here, folks!

Idad's Pumpkin Cake

3 cups sugar

1 cup Crisco

3 eggs

1 teaspoon vanilla

3 cups flour

1 teaspoon baking soda

1 teaspoon nutmeg

1 teaspoon allspice

1 teaspoon ground cloves

1 teaspoon cinnamon

1/4 teaspoon salt

1 (15 oz.) can pumpkin (NOT pumpkin pie filling!)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Cream the Crisco and sugar together. Add the eggs, one at a time, and beat well after each addition. Beat in vanilla. In another bowl, combine the flour, baking soda, nutmeg, allspice, ground cloves, cinnamon, and salt. Beat into butter mixture alternately with pumpkin. Grease and flour a bundt cake pan. Pour cake batter into pan. Bake for 1 hour and 15 minutes or until toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. Let cool in pan 10 minutes and then invert onto a serving platter. When completely cool, drizzle with icing, if desired. 

Cream Cheese Icing

4 oz. cream cheese, softened

1/2 cup powdered sugar

6-7 teaspoons milk

Combine cream cheese, powdered sugar, and 5 teaspoons milk in a bowl and beat until smooth. It needs to be a nice glaze (mine was a little thick), so add teaspoons of milk until desired consistency. Drizzle over cake.