Buckwheat pumpkin cake with almonds. An Italian simple pantry cake

How do you like your cakes?

The answer also depends on the occasion but, usually, absurdly sumptuous cakes for parties or simple cakes. I prefer simple cakes with a short list of ingredients and recipes I can make using a couple of bowls and essential kitchen tools.

In other words, my favorite cakes are those, in Italy, we call torte da credenza. It literally means pantry cakes. They are the base of home cooking, and you can keep them in the cupboard for several days. Think about simple cakes, like an apple pie, a ciambella, a crostata.

I have a preference for cakes with a good deal of nuts. Or for sweets bursting with seasonal fruit. Sometimes I add it in the filling, sometimes in the dough, as in this pumpkin ciambella from my nonna repertoire. Simple and a little rustic.

I can still see Grandma lacing up one of her flower-decorated aprons. She is in the kitchen, preparing a bowl, weighing out the ingredients, and within minutes, as I lick the leftover batter from my fingers, a delicious smell is already coming out of the oven.

My buckwheat pumpkin cake.

This pumpkin pie is tall, fluffy, and moist.
It almost looks like one of those traditional German cakes they sell in slices that I can’t resist. There is no filling here, but if you like the idea, you can cut the cake horizontally and spread a layer of jam or chocolate before reassembling the doughnut.

The recipe is naturally gluten-free because, in addition to buckwheat flour, it contains ground almonds and potato starch (cornstarch works well too).

Finally, if you add a dollop of whipped cream, you can also serve it as an after-dinner dessert. My mother-in-law would tell you to make it.

Buona cucina, Monica

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Buckwheat pumpkin cake with almonds

mold, 20cm diameter
List of the ingredients

buckwheat flour, 150 g
potato starch or cornstarch, 50 g
ground almonds, 50 g
7 g baking powder
3 eggs
300 g pumpkin pulp, already cooked
100 g brown sugar
100 ml milk (also lactose-free)
1 teaspoon cinnamon powder
1 pinch of salt
powdered sugar for decoration

Directions

Cook the pumpkin in the oven until soft.

After cooking the pumpkin, let it cool, remove filaments, seeds, and skin, and mash the flesh with the tines of a fork. Keep aside.

In a bowl, beat eggs, add milk, salt, chopped almonds, sugar, and mix; pour in flour, starch, and cinnamon, and mix again before incorporating by stirring in pumpkin pulp.

Use an electric whisk to make a smooth batter.

Bake in a preheated oven, static function, at 180C degrees for about 40 minutes (do a toothpick test).

Let it cool.

Dust with powdered sugar.