Production
Pumpkin Sheet Cake Formula in Baker's Percent: Home Recipe and Bakery Sheet
A pumpkin cake can be made as a thin home sheet cake with a frosting, or as a thick bakery sheet cake that is cut into 14 pieces. This page puts the two side by side: the home recipe in baker's percent and the working values of a bakery that uses canned pumpkin purée.
The formula, home recipe and bakery sheet
| Ingredient | Baker's % | Home recipe | Bakery sheet (14 pieces) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Wheat flour (type 550) | 100 % | 350 g | 472 g |
| Pumpkin purée | 142.9 % | 500 g | 674 g |
| Sugar | 51.4 % | 180 g | 243 g |
| Almonds, ground and blanched | 42.9 % | 150 g | 202 g |
| Rapeseed oil | 28.6 % | 100 g | 135 g |
| Butter, soft | 28.6 % | 100 g | 135 g |
| Natural yoghurt | 28.6 % | 100 g | 135 g |
| Baking powder | 2.9 % | 10 g | 13 g |
| Baking soda | 1.4 % | 5 g | 7 g |
| Eggs (5, at 55 g each, an estimate) | 78.6 % | 275 g | 371 g |
| Batter | 505.7 % | 1,770 g | 2,386 g |
In the home recipe, the 350 g of flour are 100 %. The eggs are not weighed in the recipe, so they are counted at 55 g each as an estimate. A pinch of salt and some pumpkin spice (cinnamon, nutmeg and ginger) are in the recipe without weights. The pumpkin purée at 142.9 % is not a hydration in the bread sense, because a cake batter is calculated differently from a yeast dough.
The bakery column is a calculation. A bakery sheet is cut into 14 pieces of about 150 g, which is 2,100 g of baked cake. With a baking loss of 12 %, the sheet takes 2,386.4 g of batter (2,386.4 = 2,100 ÷ 0.88). That is 1.35 times the home recipe, with 471.9 g of flour. The size of the sheet depends on your bakery. The 150 g are taken as the baked piece without its decoration.
How the numbers are calculated
- Add the percentages. The batter is flour × 5.057, so every 100 g of flour gives 506 g of batter.
- From the cake you want to the batter you need. Batter = baked weight ÷ 0.88. For 14 pieces of 150 g, 2,100 ÷ 0.88 = 2,386.4 g.
- From the batter to each ingredient. Ingredient = batter ÷ 5.057 × percent ÷ 100, which is the bakery column in the table.
You can do the same with the baker's percentage calculator.
Home recipe: frosting and method
The home recipe fills the cake with a quark and cream cheese frosting. The frosting is calculated on its own, and the percentage in the second column is against the 350 g of cake flour.
| Frosting | Home recipe | % of cake flour | Share of frosting |
|---|---|---|---|
| Quark, low fat | 500 g | 142.9 % | 58.1 % |
| Cream cheese | 300 g | 85.7 % | 34.9 % |
| Sugar | 60 g | 17.1 % | 7.0 % |
| Frosting without lemon juice and vanilla | 860 g | 245.7 % | 100 % |
The frosting also takes the juice of half a lemon and some vanilla powder, without weights, and it makes about 860 g. The home recipe prepares the purée from one Hokkaido pumpkin, boiled in a little water, fully drained, puréed, cooled and weighed to 500 g. The eggs, sugar and salt are whisked for 5 to 10 minutes until light. A second bowl takes the purée, oil, butter and almonds. Flour, baking powder and baking soda go in with the yoghurt and the spice, and the whisked eggs are folded in gently in two parts. The batter goes on a lined tray and bakes for 20 to 25 minutes at 180 °C top and bottom heat, to a core temperature of 85 to 90 °C. After full cooling the cake is cut in half, filled with a thin layer of frosting, and the rest of the frosting goes on top with some orange zest.
Decoration
Decoration is part of the formula. In the bakery there is always apricot glaze under the decoration. Then there are several options: powdered sugar, often with seeds, or a fondant glaze with seeds scattered on top. Streusel and seeds also work, chocolate couverture is another option, and a plain glaze is only rarely used. In the home recipe the decoration is the frosting and fresh orange zest. The decoration is not weighed in either version. Weigh it per piece in your bakery and put it in the costing, because decoration is often forgotten there.
In the bakery
- Sheet and cutting. They are rectangular, not square, with one side longer than the other. Check the size of your own tray.
- Mixing. The batter is made in a larger mixer with a 60-litre bowl and a whisk. The batter temperature is about room temperature. Mix only until it is combined, 4 to 5 minutes at most.
- Pumpkin. Use pasteurised canned pumpkin purée.
- Baking. 165 °C, usually in a fan oven, for about 1 hour. It can take up to 1.5 hours, or 1 hour 20 minutes, depending on how high the cake is. In a deck oven with top and bottom heat, use the same temperature and about 10 minutes less. No steam. The baking loss is 12 %, lower than for bread.
- Cooling and packing. Let the cake stand for about 1 hour before you cut and pack it. It is usually packed fresh on the tray in a crate.
- Storage. About 2 days in the cooler. Do not freeze it.
Things to watch
- Wrong formula: check the weights of the purée and the eggs, because both change the batter.
- Mixed too long: an over-mixed batter loses air and the cake gets tight.
- Wrong batter temperature: bring the batter to the right temperature, about room temperature.
- Wet, slippery bottom: the temperature was too high and the baking time too short. Some customers want a moist cake on purpose, so agree the target with the customer.