Butternut Squash and Sara Lee

The Butternut Squash Cake from Greenpoint Coffeehouse is damn good.

Though I'd never tried squash-based cake, given how well carrots and beets work, I figured such a pleasant squash couldn't be all that bad as a cake-base. But it turned out to be ten times better than I expected—super moist and not too sweet with a faint whisper of the squash's virgin flavor. Yet, as tasty as the cake was, the frosting...oh, the frosting.



When I was a kid, my mom often bought freezer-case Sara Lee Carrot Cake. I generally prefer (and always have) cake over frosting, but the glorious icing on that Sara Lee cake was pure bliss to my little taste buds. Given that, it's a little odd that it's been nearly two decades since I've had one of those cakes—so long in fact that, even though I've seen it often in freezer cases over the years, I had forgotten all about the taste I loved so much.

But memory works in mysterious ways, and after just one bite of the GPCH cake, it all came flooding back. I've made plenty of the standard heart-attack cream cheese frosting—sticks of butter, blocks of cream cheese, a snow storm of powdered sugar and a splash of vanilla—which is all well and good, but that Sara Lee frosting...well, it's hard to beat.

So, thank you to the baker who made the Greenpoint Coffeehouse cake for reminding me of what my perfect cream cheese icing should taste like. Now, I just need to find the recipe...