Pumpkin; Fall's Most Basic Bitch Flavor

I'm sure that all of you are aware of your surroundings at this point in time. The weather is cooler, the leaves are turning, and that one indiscernible flavor has started to creep into every spectrum of your diet.

You thought right folks,
Pumpkin.

In fact, this video sums it up quite nicely.

OH GOD. THE SHEER HORROR OF IT ALL.

Even though I'm not one to totally immerse myself in pumpkin everything for the whole fall/winter season, I will admit that it does seem to end up in quite a few baking projects.
I won't lie, I really do like pumpkin desserts.

I've been meaning to make this pumpkin cake recipe (again) for about three or four weeks and finally had the opportunity.

Although since I have made it before, I thought I would skip the step by step baking instructions and just skip to the frosting and decorating process.

I'm not too skilled in this department but if it doesn't sound TOO vain I think I have made some improvements.

SO
First things first.
I baked the cake (duh). The recipe yields two 8-9 inch round cakes. I let them cool on a wire rack, covered them in saran wrap, and had them chill in the fridge overnight.

Before assembling, I whip up my frosting batch.
First, you beat the cream cheese and butter.

Once that is all smooth and creamy, you'll add the maple syrup and confectioners sugar.

Make sure it is PURE MAPLE SYRUP people! Not Mrs. Butterworths syrup or Maple Syrup extract.

Also with this step, I just eyeballed the maple syrup and the confectioner's sugar. I honestly don't like my frosting to be too sweet. So I just whip and taste along the way.
Use your best judgement. As long as it's of spreading consistency you should be okay.

End product should look similar to this

Note that I have my angled spatula in the frosting bowl. I do HIGHLY recommend this tool when icing or frosting desserts/cakes.

Now the next step, take out your cakes and unwrap them. Figure out the best way to stack them before actually attempting to do so. Leveling off the tops also help if they rose too high during the baking process.

I also recommend decorating the cake on cardboard cake rounds. It just makes transporting the cake easier.

Drop a dollop of frosting on the cake round before adding your first cake layer. This helps keep the cake from sliding around and shifting on your cake round.

After adding the first cake layer. Spread your frosting on top. This will be your filling.
For this recipe, I doubled the frosting because I found that I nearly ran out after spreading the filling portion.

I sprinkled some pecans on top because reasons.
Now, add your top layer.

As for this next step, I've noticed some debate on whether it's really necessary. But after icing a few cakes somewhat unsuccessfully I found that the end result looks better when incorporated in the process.
If you've ever watched Cake Boss, you know that this man does what is called, "dirty icing." Basically, this is adding a thin coat of icing to your cakes and letting them set before actually doing the final icing. It's good to do this so that your frosting isn't filled with tiny cake crumbs. This is also why some people call this step a "crumb coat".

So! Onto dirty icing this baby.

It's okay if your cake isn't pretty at this point.
After this, I let it sit to firm up a bit in the fridge again for about an hour or so.

Next, take it out again and spread on your final frosting layer.

I did kind of have a tough time making this smooth enough. Cream cheese frosting always seems a little harder to work with.

Now onto decorating! Since I'm unoriginal and lack imagination, I just decided to copy the design from the original post. Except I added a little more on the bottom and changed the colors.

Aaaand you're done!
I felt like this looked like crap. But *shrugs* I haven't had a whole lot of practice decorating with piping techniques.
I was hoping to make the outside look likes leaves but the frosting was just so unwilling to hold it's shape when piped.

Still yummy though.

I did mention earlier that this is my second time making this cake and the decorating process was totally different. This was my first attempt at this about two years ago.

I feel like this was a more appropriate theme for this time of the year, yes?




Also,
You guys,
I think I'm in friend-love.

Cutest ever token of appreciation and expressions of feelings from my fabulous and most amazing friend and doppelganger
No you cannot has.

Until next time!