Pumpkin Cake

Dad's a health conscious guy whose breakfast comprises multigrain oats cooked in water, with Goji berries and basil leaves thrown in (don't try; it does not taste good). So for his birthday, I needed to make something healthy, yet good tasting so he wouldn't be the only one eating his cake. Well, reason with yourself all you want, but there isn't such a thing as a healthy cake... But I suppose pumpkin cake falls in the "healthier" category!

Dad: "Why is there a hole in my cake?"

Me: "Do you want some cream on your cake?"
Dad: "Yes, some non-fat cream."

Of course, there's no such thing as non-fat cream. Cream requires fat to be cream. Cream is fat that rises to the top of unhomogenized milk (thank you wikipedia). So, to make the cream cheese frosting, I used cream cheese and UHT whipping cream. I've discovered 2 benefits of using UHT whipping cream over pure cream:

1. It has 35% fat, compared to 45% of pure cream
2. The lower fat content means UHT whipping cream requires more whisking to become stiff, which is good when combining with cream cheese, which requires some whisking to get rid of lumps. If you whisk cream cheese together with pure cream, the pure cream will be overbeaten and grainy in the time it takes to break up the cream cheese lumps.

The pumpkin gave the cake a tender, sticky texture without being mucky. Like the texture in a chocolate lava cake where the cake just meets the lava.

Happy Birthday Dad, not many people can have their (healthier) cake and eat it :)