Pumpkin Swirl Cake With Vanilla Maple Cream Cheese Glaze

• Preheat your oven to 350°F.

Vanilla Batter

• In a medium mixing bowl, stir together all of the vanilla cake batter ingredients until well incorporated.
  1 Betty Crocker white cake mix, 4 eggs, 1 cup sour cream, 3/4 cup avocado oil, 1 tbsp vanilla extract
  
• IMPORTANT!!! Remove 1 1/2 cups of the vanilla cake batter, setting it aside in a separate bowl. This will be used to make the pumpkin cake batter. 

  Then remove an additional 1 cup of the vanilla batter and set aside in another bowl. This will be poured over the top of the cake before baking. 
• Pour the remaining vanilla batter into a sprayed 9 x 13 cake pan.
  
• Spread the vanilla batter into an even layer using a spatula/spoonula. Set aside until you’ve prepared your other components and are ready to swirl your cake. 
  

Pumpkin Cake Batter

• Add the pumpkin, pumpkin pie spice, cinnamon, ginger, and clove to the 1 1/2 cups of vanilla batter you had previously set aside. Stir until all ingredients are well incorporated. Set aside while you make your spiced cinnamon crumble.  
  1½ cups vanilla cake batter, ½ cup pure pumpkin, ½ tsp pumpkin pie spice, ¼ tsp cinnamon, 1 pinch ginger, 1 pinch clove
  

Cinnamon-Spiced Topping

• Combine the brown sugar, cinnamon, and pumpkin pie spice together in a small bowl.
  ⅓ cup light brown sugar, ¼ tsp cinnamon, ¼ tsp pumpkin pie spice

Assembling & Baking the Cake

• As a reminder, at this point, you should have your base layer of vanilla cake batter in the bottom of your 9 x 13 pan. In 3 separate bowls, you should have your pumpkin cake batter, cinnamon-spiced topping, and vanilla batter to drizzle on top.
  
• Now, drizzle your pumpkin cake batter across your base layer of vanilla batter in any kind of swirl/figure eight pattern you’d like. Do not cover the vanilla cake evenly- this is not meant to look perfect. 
  
• Spoon your cinnamon-spiced crumble onto the pumpkin layer, following the same pattern as the batter. 
  
• Top the pumpkin batter and cinnamon-spiced crumble with the remaining vanilla batter, ensuring that the layers below are able to peek through the top layer of vanilla. 
  
• Using a knife or spatula, gently swirl the layers. Being gentle is key here. You don’t want to actually mix the different batters together- you just want to get that swirl effect. 
  
• Bake your pumpkin swirl cake at 350°F for 26-28 minutes, until the top is golden and a toothpick inserted into the cake comes out clean. 
  

Vanilla Maple Cream Cheese Glaze

• Place the cream cheese and butter in a small, microwave-safe bowl. Microwave in 20-second increments, stirring in between, until smooth enough to combine. 
  3 oz cream cheese, 3 oz salted butter
• Place all ingredients (cream cheese, butter, vanilla extract, almond extract, powdered sugar, milk, and maple syrup) into a medium bowl. Mix on medium/high speed with a hand mixer until well combined and smooth.
  ½ tsp vanilla extract, ¼ tsp almond extract, 1¼ cup powdered sugar, 4 tsp milk, 1 tbsp maple syrup
• Drizzle over the pumpkin swirl cake while it’s still warm, then enjoy!