HEY! I saw this really cool idea using bundt pans....

As promised, I devoted my entire Saturday to creating something truly special for this weekend. It was real live Canadian Thanksgiving!!! Woohoo!!

Throughout the day, and the past few weeks, I was thinking about things I was particularly grateful for. For one, I have found a newfound appreciation and thankfulness for the wonderful people that make up my family. I know, I know, EVERYONE says this.. it's like the automatic go-to when put on the spot. But I took a hard look in the last couple of days and I've really come to know how much they mean to me. 

Anyways. I'm also thankful for.... you guessed it. Butter. LOTS of butter. And pumpkins. To make pumpkin puree for......  THE GREAT PUMPKIN SPICE MARBLE CAKE. Blah. That's a mouthful. It's sort of a hybrid of two recipes for pumpkin shaped cakes. Now. Firstly... When I discovered this cake I thought... OH HOW SMART. They just stacked two bundt pans on top of each other and presto chango... a pumpkin. Easy freaking sauce. 

..... How naiive I was. 

Yeah so it's actually a pumpkin MOLD... a ten cup pumpkin mold. So. To make TWO bundt pans I was crossing my fingers a double recipe would fill the pans... but not OVERfill the Kitchenaid. Tricksy. 6 cups of flour, 6 cups of sugar, 2 cups of butter, a TON of spices and about 3 cups of pumpkin and 4 cups of milk. That's alotta cups. 

Just the dry ingredients. Oh boy.

Dare you to drink it.

Thankfully it fit. Whew. That would have seriously.... sucked. So then you snatch 3 cups of your monster batter and mix in a bunch of cocoa. 

This is the cocoa.

This creates the MARBLING. You the pour in the regular batter, and spoon in the chocolatey pumpkin mix. Then, with a knife, you swirl it around till it looks pretty. 

Add the cocoa'd batter in spoonfuls laik dis.

Just give me a spoon now.

All bakey and wonderful!

Popped out relatively in one piece. SCORE.

The recipe also called for dulce de leche. Read that again... slowly. DULCE. DE. LECHE. Still are unsure about how to say it? Don't you fret. I, being the responsible baker, found a pronunciation guide to assist you (and myself) in the proper way to say it. 

dool- se (as in set without the T)

de (Like dead without the second D)

leche (as if you were in a french restaraunt wanting to say "i need le check" but without the ck)

Dulce de Leche. Aka... caramelized Eagle Brand. Hold me. 

To do this... you need to boil in in water for probably 2 hours... if not more. Protip: keep adding water so the pan doesn't dry out. This would like scorch the metal AND cause a molten lava eagle brand explosion. Not What You Want.

This is what I used as the glue to stick the cakes together. Intense? Yeah. 

It should look something like this when it's done. It's also great on toast.... :)

Afterwards.... it was time to glaze the cake. Easy glaze? Powdered sugar, milk, and vanilla. Oh yeah, and a lil something I like to call... gel food coloring. This is really the only way to get intense colors in your food. Liquid does NOT work... especially with reds. The best you will get with liquid will be hot pink. However, I wanted a subtle orange glaze, not a neon syrup. 

All you need to do is to dip a fork into the tub and pull it straight back out. No scooping required. You can get quite vibrant colors with small amounts of the gel. 

So... you know that whole thing how I said I didn't NEED the pumpkin mold?... Yeah never again. Protip: Buy. The. Mold. This was ALOT of trouble. 

Trying to get a poury picture.

Also... the pumpkin mold has a built in stem. Bundt pans have a giant crevasse to fill. What the frick am I going to use to make a stem??... 

Oozy drippy awesomeness.

I ended up with three layers of glaze.

At this point of the night I had been staring at it for much too long and it was hideous at every angle. I took a couple hour break to ponder stemming this stupid piece.

Lowpoint. You can tell because my diet pop is making the picture. At this moment... the cake had been disassembled for further shaving.

Stroke of genius hit, and it was back to work. 

Yep, an ICE CREAM CONE. Ta Da!

Just coat it with some chocolate and voila. 

I added a few flourishes to make it a little more festive.... courtesy of my mom's wreath hanging on our front door. All for a good cause mom, I promise.

Melissa and I did something special this year... WE STUFFED THE TURKEY!! Well, I stuffed the turkey. She rubbed on the dry rub afterwards. This turkey was intense. It was brined overnight and then slowcooked for 6 hours. Seriously guys? Worth the effort. But back to the cake. Enough of this turkey nonsense. 

Complete with makeshift stem.

We had the missionaries for Thanksgiving dinner so I was hoping that my newest creation wouldn't be overshadowed. Unfortunately, one of our missionaries was lactose intolerant. Pfft. But the other Elder was impressed to say the least. Melissa ate it... and there was no cream cheese! I'm getting better every time. It was really delicious and put us all in the holiday mood. I love the comforting aroma and taste of pumpkin spice. And the chocolate marbling? Le manifique. I'm not a huge fan of sugar icings... but it was a necessary evil to obtain the presentation I was gunning for. Besides, a helping of Chantilly Cream will do just fine. 

After dinner, me, my sister and my mom took the dogs and my niece on a short walk in the crisp autumn night. It wasn't as cold as I would like, nor was there snow on the ground. But when we stepped out that door something magical happened: I saw the very first set of Christmas lights illuminate a house on our street. It doesn't get much better than that ladies and gents. Happy Thanksgiving!