Slow Cooker Sticky Caramel Pumpkin Cake
on Aug 24, 2019, Updated Oct 12, 2021
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Pumpkin Cake is a crock-pot dessert recipe that came to me later in life but when it showed up, it did so in a big way. This pumpkin cake recipe was our first recipe to go viral, within our first year of starting Platter Talk back in 2013.
Featured in Country Living, Better Homes and Garden, House Beautiful, MSN Food, and in various other high-profile media outlets, it is one of our most popular cake recipes. Best of all, you can make this easy pumpkin cake recipe in just two hours at home.
Table of Contents
About this
Halloween is still a few weeks away, but suddenly, gourds and pumpkins are popping up all over the place.
Speaking of pumpkins, one of them ended up in the most unexpected places the other day – in my slow cooker. When it came out, it looked like this:
Growing up on a big Mennonite family farm, I always had a special relationship with pumpkins. And cakes.
In fact, homemade cakes are my favorite recipes to make. I’m talking about such yummy desserts as Chocolate Cake made with Whiskey and Coffee, Traditional Swedish Almond Cake, and Upside-Down Rhubarb Cake.
They’re all so delicious! We even came across a Pumpkin Pie Dump Cake, which uses a carrot cake box mix. It is an incredibly delicious fall dessert!
Each year I would plant a row or two in my mom’s huge garden, and as I grew older, I would try to grow the biggest pumpkins possible.
I tried milk-feeding them as I read about in the Little House on the Prairie books, using fresh milk and cream from our cows via a bowl and a candle wick spliced into the pumpkin vines.
It wasn’t until the fall season when I first left for college that some of my pumpkins had tipped the scale at over 40 pounds!
As fate would have it, I was over 100 miles away and wasn’t even able to bask in the glory of my pumpkin pride.
And then, 35 years later, this pumpkin cake recipe showed up.
It was given to my recipe pimp and beautiful friend, Amy, who picked it up in the grocery store check-out isle.
I made this easy pumpkin dump cake for my new food and recipe blog, and all of a sudden, Platter Talk became real.
And so did this incredibly simple crock-pot dessert.
Ingredients
- Packed pumpkin
- Flour
- Sugar
- Butter
- Eggs
- Baking Powder
- Baking Soda
- Pumpkin Spice
- Salt
- Caramel Sauce (optional topping)
Recipe highlights
- This pumpkin dessert recipe is inexpensive or downright cheap at less than $10 for the whole thing.
- Make this crock-pot dessert in just two hours.
- You don’t need to be a baker to make this pumpkin dump cake, anyone can put it together!
- Most importantly, the taste of this pumpkin cake recipe is nothing short of a miracle, IMHO.
In conclusion, this pumpkin cake recipe pretty much has it all.
It’s affordable, it’s extremely easy to prepare, and it is scary delicious.
This is the perfect crock-pot dessert recipe to make for guests or family for Halloween, Thanksgiving, or any holiday.
Speaking of holiday treats, if you haven’t tried our homemade chocolate peanut butter truffles yet, you must make this no-bake treat now!
If you were like me and thought that crock pots were just for making dinner and meals for the family while you are spending your entire day doing something else, I say, “Think again.”
Speaking of the different ways to make a cake, check out this incredible air fryer cake! If you’re a fan of easy air fryer recipes, you’re going to love this one!
Oven Method
If you don’t have a slow cooker, you can make this slow cooker cake in an oven. Here is how to do that:
- Bake at 350° F.
- The type of pan you have will determine how long to bake.
- A loaf pan will require 45 minutes, a sheet cake or double layer cake will take about 30 minutes.
- It is recommended that you not use a glass baking pan for this cake as metal and ceramic pans seem to help keep the batter from falling.
To avoid using processed (granulated white sugar), you can use 1/3 cup of maple syrup and 1/3 cup of honey.
If you don’t want to use butter, readers have used 2/3 cup of sunflower oil with great success.
Finally, some people have added a little extra pumpkin spice to the batter and a cap-full of vanilla.
Try this recipe and let us know how you make it!
More of our Favorite Dessert Recipes:
- RumChata Cupcakes
- Baked Pumpkin Donuts
- Pumpkin Pie Pop Tarts
- Soft Pumpkin Cookies
- Forgotten Cookies
- Danish Kringle Recipe
Some of our Most Popular Holiday Recipes
- Giblet Gravy
- How to Roast Prime Rib
- Southern Cornbread Dressing
- Open-Face Apple Pie
- Cherry Christmas Cookies
- 101 Best Christmas Cookie for 2021
If you love caramel, you have to have a taste of our homemade caramel popcorn. One handful is all it takes to get you hooked!
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Slow Cooker Sticky Caramel Pumpkin Cake
Ingredients
- 2 cups all-purpose flour
- 2 teaspoons baking powder
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 1 teaspoon pumpkin pie spice or ground cinnamon
- 1 1/3 cups sugar
- 1 cup butter, softened
- 4 eggs, at room temperature
- 15 oz solid packed pumpkin, 1 can
- 16 oz caramel sauce, 1 jar
Instructions
- Coat 4 1/2 quart slow cooker with nonstick cooking spray, turn to “high.”
- Combine flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt, and pumpkin pie spice in mixing bowl.
- Beat sugar and butter in large bowl with electric mixer for about 3 minutes, until light.
- Add eggs, one at a time, mixing well after each one.
- Add packed pumpkin, blend until well mixed.
- Gradually add flour mixture and beat at low speed for a minute or so until smooth.
- Spread evenly in slow cooker and cover.
- Cook on high setting 2 hours or until center-inserted tooth pick comes out clean.
- Let cake stand, uncovered 10 minutes.
- Invert onto wire rack, invert again onto serving plate.
- Drizzle half of caramel sauce over cake. Serve warm with additional sauce.
Video
Notes
- Be sure to apply a generous coating of non-stick spray to your slow cooker before adding the ingredients for this pumpkin cake recipe.
Nutrition
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
Updated from the original post of September 19, 2014
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Hi, i stumbled across this on pinterest, looks truely amazing,i was wondering if you can help me, im a Brit, attempting to make something with my pumpkin i just carved, but a lot of the recipes i find say canned pumpkin. we cant get that here so what do i do with fresh pumpkin, can i still use that for this dessert? and do i need to cook it first? ive pureed it and just put it in my fridge. hope you can help. regards Michaela.
Hi, i stumbled across this on pinterest, looks truely amazing,i was wondering if you can help me, im a Brit, attempting to make something with my pumpkin i just carved, but a lot of the recipes i find say canned pumpkin. we cant get that here so what do i do with fresh pumpkin, can i still use that for this dessert? and do i need to cook it first? ive pureed it and just put it in my fridge. hope you can help. regards Michaela
Michaela, This truly is a fantastic dessert and so easy to make. I’ve heard similar comments from other Brits. I’m not an expert on converting or substituting fresh pumpkin for canned pack pumpkin, but I can’t imagine there are not resources to be found via Google. I would guess the pumpkin needs to be cooked and because the canned pumpkin is “packed,” I would think that weight for weight, the fresh pumpkin should be as dry (liquid free) as possible. Good luck with this and we would love to hear how it turns out for you. Thanks so much for the great question.
Is this best served warm, or can it be made earlier in the day? Having it for dessert tonight for company!
Either way works, Carol. Just as with any cake, I think warm is always preferable.
Thanks! I’ll wait till later, then.
I tracked down canned pumpkin in England especially to make this. It went down so well with my family this evening! I’d probably leave it in the slow cooker longer next time – the top was done but the bottom a bit damp and dense. No one complained though. I could only find toffee sauce but it really made it – with vanilla ice cream too, yum! I want a smaller slow cooker now so I can make smaller puddings when I don’t have loads of guests. Thank you so much!
What a fantastic comment! I’m happy you were able to try this with the ingredients available to you. Thanks so much for your feedback.
I’ve heard of people placing things in ramekins then cooked in those in the slow cooker…?
I think what you’re saying is that you’ve heard of people using ramekins as a baking vessel, in lieu of using a slow cooker. Such a method could be suitable for this recipe as well.
This recipe was brought to my attention from a friend via Pinterest. It is in the slow cooker now and looks delicious!! My only concern is that my slow cooker only has a low and high setting and its on high. The high setting is really hot and I’m afraid the sides may burn a bit. Did you have any issue with that? I put lots of Pam on so it hopefully won’t stick to the sides. Very excited to test this out at my family supper tonight! 🙂
Hi Kate. After preheating your crock pot on high, consider turning it down to low until it is done. You may get some crunchy edges but keeping the cover on during the cooking process retains the moisture which will help it from drying out. I can’t wait to hear how yours turns out!
Hi, looks good but I don’t have a slow cooker. Can bake it in the oven too ir does it have to be a slow cooker?
Try it and let us know!
This turned out so good as is no caramel sauce added yet. So nice to be able to free up the oven for other things like your old fashioned pumpkin cookies which also turned out great, sweeter than the cake and no glaze added. We were in charge of desserts this year for our potluck thanksgiving dinner, my husband didn’t think I could make anything good and bought pies as backup, but these two pumpkin recipes plus I made an eclair cake from pinterest were loved by all. Thank you for the recipes.
Julie, This ranks among my favorite comments. Ever. I’m elated that you tried both of these and made them your own. In my own this is the essence of cooking with recipes and without. Thank you so much for taking the time to offer your feedback and your experience with these two recipes; I hope we can provide equally appealing ones to you in the future.
I would love to try this recipe, but my crock pot is only 1.5 quart. Do you know what I can do to still be able to make this delicious treat??
If the ingredients will fit in your crock pot, I would still try to make it. Otherwise, consider cutting back the ingredients (proportionately) just a bit.
G’day from Oz! Thanks for sharing your recipe at the Say G’day Saturday Linky Party. I’ve just shared this on Pinterest/Facebook/Twitter.
Hope you can link up with us again this Saturday!
Best wishes,
Natasha in Oz
Many thanks for having us and of course your kind comments!
It looks wonderful!
As I live in Sweden, it’s hard to find all the american products – do you think it is possible to exchange the canned pumpkin for pumpkin purée?
Thanks for your comment. I would substitute purée pumpkin for the packed pumpkin. Perhaps try to press some of the liquid out of the purée and aim for an equal amount (weight) to the packed pumpkin. Good luck; this one is delicious!