For Mouth-Watering Pumpkin Cake, Your Flour Choice Matters

Once again, the Great Pumpkin has begun its descent into coffee shops, bakeries, and Trader Joe's aisles far and wide. It's an event that seems to come earlier and earlier every year, thanks in part to Starbucks' increasingly premature release of its infamous pumpkin spice latte, which celebrated its 20th anniversary in 2023. 

All that being said, one can argue store-bought pumpkin fare doesn't hold a candle to its homemade counterpart; even more so when it comes to pumpkin desserts, whether they're made with canned pumpkin or freshly carved gourds. This year, we're saving pumpkin pie for the Thanksgiving table and celebrating the first signs of fall with pumpkin cake, a simple and snackable treat that comes together quickly and is super easy to adapt. 

While pumpkin cake is an excellent venture for novice bakers looking for a fuss-free project, there's one thing that will make or break the end result: the type of flour used to make it. Contrary to the dessert's name, using cake flour might not actually be the best option. You should reach for all-purpose flour instead, and here's why. 

The best pumpkin cakes are, to use an oft-maligned adjective, super moist. For that reason, most pumpkin cake recipes call for oil instead of butter, as the latter yields a more delicate crumb. While the low gluten content of cake flour gives those butter-based cakes tenderness and shape, it can fall short of yielding the resilient — but still soft and fluffy — texture you want from a good pumpkin cake. 

All-purpose flour, on the other hand, will fortify your pumpkin cake with a strong gluten structure, leaving you with a dense bite that (thanks to the oil) won't easily dry out. According to Sally McKenney of Sally's Baking Addiction, all-purpose flour contains more protein than cake flour, which makes it higher in gluten and "suitable for anything, from chocolate chip cookies to pizza dough" — and, of course, pumpkin cake. Bread flour contains even more protein, which is why it's used for even sturdier baked goods, like bread and bagels. 

If you prefer to make grain-free baked goods but still want a moist pumpkin cake that won't crumble to pieces, using a combination of alternative flours in place of all-purpose could do the trick. The only caveat? It just might take a little experimentation.

Instagram-famous recipe developer Gabriette Bechdel is a good source of inspiration, as most of her recipes are grain-free. Her homemade version of the cult-favorite Chocolate Vegan Blackout Cake from the Los Angeles grocery chain Erewhon is a perfect example — one that took plenty of trial and error. Instead of all-purpose flour, Bechdel replicated the cake's singular texture with a mix of coconut flour, almond flour, and tapioca flour (plus other ingredients, including ground flaxseed). 

Bechdel also uses a combination of almond and tapioca flour for her grain-free beet cake, zucchini bread, and salted sesame banana upside-down cake. With that track record, it might be worth a shot to play around with alternative flours for your next pumpkin cake. But if dietary restrictions aren't an issue for you, stick to all-purpose flour if you can.