Pumpple Cake

The massive pumpple cake has apple and pumpkin pies baked into vanilla and
chocolate cake, respectively. One slice is 1,800 calories and can feed four people.

TODAYshow.com
updated 10/25/2010 11:39:51 AM ET 2010-10-25T15:39:51

Is it a cake or a pie? It’s both, and it’s 1,800 calories a slice. ‘Pumpple cake’ is a hybrid of pumpkin pie, apple pie and cake.

You’ve heard of turducken, now get ready for the dessert equivalent — the pumpple cake.

While the turducken, a chicken stuffed into a duck stuffed into a turkey, once seemed over-the-top, the pumpple cake is even more decadent. One Philadelphia bakery dreamed up this ultimate fall dessert: pumpkin and apple pies baked in chocolate and vanilla cake, fused together and surrounded by buttercream icing.

This oversize creation weighs in at a whopping 15 pounds and measures more than a foot tall. And at 1,800 calories a slice, it's not for the faint of heart.

The Flying Monkey, located in Philadelphia’s famous Reading Terminal Market, bakes this dessert-lover’s fantasy from scratch over the course of two days. It starts with the pies, which it par-bakes. The half-cooked pumpkin pie is dipped into chocolate cake batter and baked. The apple pie and vanilla cake get the same treatment and are baked on top of the chocolate cake. Its massive size means that it spends hours in the oven. Homemade buttercream is then — literally — the icing on the entire cake.

“We only opened about a month ago and started making the pumpple cake a week later,” said Elizabeth Halen, the owner of the Flying Monkey. “Now we are making the cake daily and selling out. I told friends about it through my Facebook page and Twitter feed and word has spread like wildfire from there.”

With their mouths full, they gushed over the massive sweet treat.

“That is obscene — that is delicious,” Gifford said.

One slice of this hybrid is enough to feed four and sells for $8, but if you are planning a large gathering or feeling extra-hungry, a whole cake can be ordered with 72 hours notice and sells for $75. If a whole cake is just too much for your family’s stomach, the Flying Monkey also makes a smaller version — the pumpplet.