This Perfectly Spiced Pumpkin Cake recipe is sensationally tender and moist with a to die for brown butter glaze. This is one of the best pumpkin dessert recipes ever to make your fall unforgettable like my Pumpkin Spice Turtle Cake! If you love my pound cakes like Lemon Pound Cake, Cream Cheese Pound Cake and my Sour Cream Pound Cake, you will adore this twist filled with Autumn Flavor!
The Best Pumpkin Pound Cake
Fall is not my favorite season, but it is one of my favorite baking times of the year because of all the wonderful fall desserts and flavors. This Pumpkin Pound Cake is one of those wonderful fall dessert recipes. The beauty of it is in its simplicity. The quality ingredients shine through.
How to Make the Best Pumpkin Cake
These are the ingredients that truly help to make the Best Pumpkin Cake!
- Butter (Unsalted is key to control the salt in the recipe and it adds richness and flavor!)
- Eggs (They are very important to the structure of the cake! The egg whites stiffen the cake bringing it all together. They are like building blocks. The egg yolks are wonderful for moistness and creating a tender crumb.)
- Flour (I used all purpose since it is already a very tender cake)
- Sour Cream (this provides so much richness, flavor and moistness!)
- Pumpkin (The key ingredient in making this incredible!)
- Cinnamon (this is the best flavor to pair with pumpkin!)
HOW TO MAKE BROWN BUTTER GLAZE
Generally speaking, pound cakes are simple to make, but to a novice baker, it looks pretty difficult including the pound cake glaze. I can assure any of my followers who are new to baking that this pumpkin pound cake is super simple to make and the pound cake glaze is even easier.
This cake’s brown butter glaze is composed of melted butter, confectioner’s sugar and milk…that’s it! Whisk those ingredients together and you have a pound cake glaze that sends this pumpkin pound cake into the stratosphere of deliciousness and is tremendously easy on the eyes! If you love brown butter as a flavor, make sure to also check out this Kentucky Brown Butter Cake as well!
PRO TIPS FOR BAKING THE BEST POUND CAKE
As most of you already know, I’ve been making pound cakes for almost as long as I’ve been on this earth. I’ve made countless cakes and I won’t lie and say that they’ve all come out perfectly. Baking mistakes are normal but it’s my job to repeat a recipe until there are no more mistakes to be made.
Here are a few tips that serve as the byproduct of my occasional baking neglect. Don’t make the same mistakes I did y’all.
Tip #1: Prep before you start
It may seem obvious but you’re more likely to make a mistake if you haven’t fully prepared. Read your recipe thoroughly, pre-measure your ingredients and assemble them in the order they are needed. Set yourself up for success from the jump and the entire process will go more smoothly.
Tip #2: Bring your ingredients to room temperature
Allowing all your ingredients to come to the same temperature evens the playing field. In the baking process all your ingredients will heat at the same rate and make for a pound cake with maximum volume.
Tip #3: Don’t overbeat your mixture
Add in your eggs one at a time, beating only until the yellow disappears. Overbeating eggs may create a fragile crust that crumbles and separates from the cakes as it cools.
Now that’s all I’m gonna give away for today guys. I’ve got a few more tricks up my sleeve but you’ll have to tune in next time for those.
This pumpkin pound cake is simple yet its flavor is amazing. The pumpkin shines through, and the spices really help to bring out the flavor even more.
Tender and moist, this cake melts in your mouth. And when you top it with my brown butter glaze, you will be humming until the cows come home! So get out that bundt pan and get to work on this pumpkin pound cake right away…just in time for Thanksgiving!! The results are well worth it.
PUMPKIN DESSERT RECIPES
If you like this pumpkin pound cake, you will really get a kick out of these other pumpkin dessert recipes:
If you want more pound cake recipes, click HERE

Pumpkin Pound Cake with Brown Butter Glaze
Ingredients
For the Pound Cake:
- 1 cup unsalted butter room temperature
- 2 cups granulated sugar
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 5 large eggs
- 3 cups all-purpose flour
- 2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
- 1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
- 3/4 cup sour cream room temperature
- 3/4 cup canned pumpkin
- 2 tablespoons pure vanilla extract
For the Browned Butter Glaze:
- 5 tablespoons unsalted butter melted and browned until tiny specs form
- 1 cup confectioner's sugar
- 2 tablespoons milk
Instructions
For the Pound Cake:
- Preheat your oven to 350 degrees and prepare your 10 cup bundt pan with shortening and flour or non-stick baking spray.
- In your mixer bowl, cream together butter, sugar and salt on high speed until light and fluffy for 5 minutes.
- Next add in eggs, one at a time, and mix until well incorporated.
- Slow mixer to lowest speed and carefully add in flour, cinnamon and baking powder then add in sour cream, pumpkin and extract and cream until just combined.
- Pour cake batter into bundt pan and bake for 50-60 minutes or until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out moist but mostly clean.
- Cool cake for 10 minutes then invert cake onto cooling rack and cool until room temperature.
For the Brown Butter Glaze:
- Whisk together melted butter, confectioner's sugar and milk.
- Drizzle glaze over cooled cake and serve.
Could I make this in 3 8” pans for a layer cake? I know you have the pumpkin turtle cake recipe but I’m looking for a texture more like your yellow cake recipe. I may just use that and add pumpkin spices, ha, but this looked as if it may work.
Yes absolutely you can!!
This was so easy and so yummy to eat! I received so many compliments, Thanks to you!. I need to not be afraid of the ‘brown butter icing’ I was afraid I’d burn it while trying to achieve the brown specs. 🙁 The icing was good, but wish it had your color to it.
Would it be ok to add a little bit more pumpkin and possibly nutmeg to the cake recipe? Thinking of making it again for Friendsgiving!
Hope you see this, Happy Holidays~
Excellent recipe! Can I also use a loaf pan for this recipe? If not, no worries. I believe in following your recipes to the letter. Thank you.
I made this fir by a Block party delicious!
I made this fir by a Block party delicious!
AH-mazing!! So easy to put together and tastes incredible. Brown butter takes time but it’s so worth it. My 4 year old helped me make it and we had a great time putting it together and, of course, eating it! The glaze is out of this world!!
This cake is so delicious and the directions are helpful. Also it doesn’t need the brown butter icing but oh my goodness is that good! It just elevated it. I may have snuck a spoonful on its own. I’m making some to socially distance drop off to my family this Thanksgiving.
So I made this cake for my daughter for her birthday. She said she had a craving for pumpkin cake. It was perfect. and she loved it. I am not a baker but I followed the instructions carefully and it came out looking exactly like the picture and tasted so good with the brown butter glaze.
Thank you. You are a brilliant baker and I will look to your website the next time I am thinking about making a dessert.
Here’s the more detailed instructions for the Browned Butter Glaze:
For the Brown Butter Glaze
While cake cools, add butter to saucepan and again melt then brown until the butter turns an amber color.
Turn off heat and whisk in sugar, water and vanilla extract until smooth.
I made this and it was both simple to make & delicious! Looking forward to trying the 7Up poundcake next. Thank you!