This delicious pumpkin dessert is known around the internet as “dump cake.” Hailed for it’s ease, it can be whipped up in mere minutes and tastes like a sweet pumpkin pie topped with buttery crumble topping. I love that it can be served either warm, room temperature, or cold. You can also cut it into nice tidy squares, or scoop it rustically into a bowl with ice cream (my preference). Any way you serve it- this fun dessert is as great for a fancy holiday meal as it is for a weekend treat.
Note: If you’ve been around long enough, you know I used to have a variation of this recipe here with part of the topping being used as a crust. With the ever changing sizes of cake mixes, this recipe got complicated so I’m editing it back to it’s original (easier!) form and giving it a needed update!
Ingredients Needed
- Boxed cake mix – I recommend Duncan hines, yellow, white, or spice
- Butter – I suggest unsalted butter because otherwise it may come out too salty for your tastes. That being said, I like my food on the saltier side and I usually just use regular salted butter because that’s what I have on hand!
- Canned pumpkin – plain pumpkin puree, not pumpkin pie filling.
- Eggs
- Sweetened condensed milk
- Cinnamon
- Pumpkin pie spice
- Ginger
- Cloves
- Nutmeg
- Salt
- Chopped pecans
How to Make Pumpkin Crumble
- Make pumpkin layer: mix canned pumpkin, eggs, sweetened condensed milk, and spices until smooth. Pour this mixture into a 9×13 baking pan.
- Pour a standard boxed cake mix over the top of this layer and spread out evenly. This can be pretty much any flavor! I’ve made this countless times and I will say my preferred brand is Duncan Hines. Spice Cake or Yellow Cake are my family’s favorites.
- Sprinkle chopped nuts over the cake mix. If you have an allergy or aversion to nuts, you can skip them, but I love the crunch it adds!
- Pour 1 cup of melted butter over the top of everything. It’s okay to see dry cake mix still. It will take care of itself in the oven!
- Bake and serve!
You can see I left nuts off one end for one of my nut-free kids!
Serving, Storing and Other Tips
- You can serve in a variety of ways. It’s great warm with ice cream, it’s also great cut into squares at room temperature, and it’s delicious cold out of the fridge!
- It’s sweet enough on its own, but a drizzle of caramel sauce over the ice cream is extra delicious.
- For best results, store leftovers, tightly covered, in the refrigerator and eat within 3-4 days.
This photo shows a slice made with a spice cake mix. Spice cake is my favorite, but my family all prefers the yellow cake mix!
Frequently Asked Questions
Yes! Any cake mix should work. We love yellow and spice, but white, gingerbread, even chocolate is delicious.
I’ve never tried it, but I imagine you could swap out the cake mix for your favorite gluten-free mix. If you try this, let me know!
You can certainly prep the pumpkin layer in advance, cover, and store in the fridge for up to 24 hours. I would prep the topping fresh, right before you’re ready to bake!
Dump Cake Variations
You can use this trick for any sort of filling. Instead of pumpkin pie on the bottom, you can layer canned pie filling. We love cherry pie with chocolate cake mix, too!
Easy Pumpkin Crumble
Ingredients
Pumpkin Layer
- 15 ounces canned pumpkin puree (one can) not pumpkin pie filling, one standard can
- 14 oz can sweetened condensed milk one standard can
- 2 eggs
- 1½ teaspoon cinnamon
- ¾ teaspoon ginger
- ¼ teaspoon cloves
- ⅛ teaspoon nutmeg
- ½ teaspoon salt
Topping
- 1 standard boxed yellow, white, or spice cake mix I prefer Duncan Hines
- ¾ cup pecans, chopped
- 1 cup unsalted butter I use salted butter, but if you're sensitive to salt you may want to stick with unsalted!
- Whipped cream or vanilla ice cream for serving optional
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350℉. Coat a 9×13 pan with a light coat of nonstick spray.
- Mix pumpkin, sweetened condensed milk, eggs, spices, and salt until smooth. Pour into prepared pan.
- Sprinkle the dry cake mix evenly over the top. Sprinkle on nuts.
- Drizzle melted butter all over the top of the dry cake mix. You will still have dry cake mix peeking through and that's okay.
- Bake at 350℉ for about 45 minutes. The topping should be lightly golden brown and set. A skewer put in the pumpkin should come out with no batter attached.
- You can eat it warm, at room temp, or chilled. Whipped cream or vanilla ice cream are optional, but delicious.
Notes
- This makes a dessert about an inch thick or less. That’s because I like a high topping-to-pumpkin ratio. If you’d like it thicker, use a large can of pumpkin and double the rest of the filling ingredients (Eggs, sweetened condensed milk, and spices). Leave the rest of the recipe the same.
- Here’s a little something I learned after making the dump cake a gazillion times. Cake mixes all have different amounts in them! Different brands, different flavors, etc. Each one is slightly different in volume. I found one mix to have almost double the normal amount. Measuring the amount of cake mix you’re sprinkling on top will help you get the perfect topping ratio in the last step.
- For best results, store leftovers, tightly covered, in the refrigerator and eat within 3-4 days.
Questions & Reviews
This was a total hit around our house. Loved it! However, I was really upset when my son decided to add butter flavored popcorn seasoning to 1/4 of the pan before I ran over to stop him. Not a good combination. I guess I'll have to make another one.
We learned about dump cake from a sweet old lady neighbor of ours when I was a kid. It is my family's ultimate favorite cake, especially for birthdays. Here's the version we learned:
1 can cherry pie filling
1 can crushed pineapple (including juice)
1 box yellow cake mix
1 cup coconut
1 cup chopped pecans
1 cup butter, sliced in pieces short-wise and laid out over the cake
I'm trying your pumpkin version for Thanksgiving dinner with my family. We are really excited!
I understood what you were saying Bonnie, and ya, that works just fine if you don't already have all of the spices on hand! When I made this recipe I did it to taste and when it needed a little extra flavor boost at the end, the addition of the pumpkin pie spice did just the trick without figuring out how much more of each spice to add. (Because they are not always in equal proportion in the pie spice bottle). I'm glad you figured out something that worked for you and liked it- You can't really go wrong with any combination of those spices!
I didn't ask my question clearly. Instead of using pumpkin pie spice at all, why not just increase the proportions of the individual spices rather than having to buy an additional one. I made it an omitted the pumpkin pie spice. I increased the cinnamon to 1 1/4 tsp, the ginger to a heaping 1/4 tsp, the nutmeg to 1/4 tsp. and 1/16 tsp. of allspice. It turned out great!
Oh, and Jana and Kelly- thanks for the nice comments, I'm so happy you liked it!
Heather, you can definitely make it without the nuts. And honestly I can't tell you about specific cake mixes, I've made it a gazillion times so I don't really remember which is which! I do know the last time I fooled around with it I had a Duncan Hines French Vanilla and I'm *thinking* that was the one that had more than normal- but I could be totally wrong.
I just made this last night for a girls night out we're having tonight. I had to try a bite-just to make sure it was okay to serve to them, of course 😉
Oh my goodness, this is SO good! I think my mouth said, "Hello, Fall!" when I took my first bite. It is exactly what this time of year demands from a dessert! Yum!
which cake mix has more in it? and can you make this without the nuts?
Sara,
I made this today for a ward potluck tonight and just had to sneak a piece ahead of time! This is wonderfu! Thank you for sharing with us!
Yes it is Bonnie, but I wanted more flavor and in different proportions. It's a different flavor result than just adding more pumpkin pie spice.