Pumpkin Bars with Cream Cheese Frosting
Pumpkin bars are a fall staple recipe, with rich pumpkin spice flavor and the best ever cream cheese frosting. These bars are incredibly moist yet sturdy enough to hold (no fork needed).
Servings: 24 bars
Equipment
- 10x15" baking sheet pan
Ingredients
Pumpkin Bars
- 2 cups all-purpose flour
- 1 cup light brown sugar packed
- 1 cup vegetable oil
- 15 ounce can pure pumpkin puree unsweetened and unflavored
- 1 tablespoon pumpkin pie spice
- 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- 1 teaspoon baking powder
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 3 large eggs
- 1 cup finely chopped walnuts optional but recommended
Cream Cheese Frosting
- 8 ounces full-fat cream cheese room temperature
- ½ cup (1 stick) butter, softened
- 3 cups powdered sugar also called confectioners’ sugar
- 1 ½ teaspoons vanilla extract
- ¼ teaspoon orange zest packed
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease or line a 10x15” baking sheet pan with parchment paper (if you’d like to lift bars out of pan).
- Whisk together flour, pumpkin pie spice, baking soda, baking powder, and salt until well combined.
- In a separate bowl, mix together brown sugar, vegetable oil, pumpkin puree, vanilla and eggs.
- Add dry ingredients to wet ingredients, and mix until just combined. Fold in finely chopped walnuts.
- Spoon batter into lined or greased pan, spreading into an even layer. Bake for 22-27 minutes until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.
- Remove from oven and let cool completely right in the pan. Once the bars have been cooling at room temperature for 15 minutes, you can finish cooling them in the fridge to speed up the process.
- For the frosting, beat together cream cheese and butter in a mixer on medium-high speed until creamy and whipped (1-2 minutes). Add vanilla, orange zest, and powdered sugar. Start mixer on low so the sugar doesn’t fly, and then increase the speed to medium-high until frosting is creamy and whipped (1-2 minutes).
- Use a spatula or cake knife to frost pumpkin bars. I use all of the frosting.
- Serve as-is cut into squares, or decorate with more finely chopped walnuts, holiday sprinkles, orange zest, or pumpkin pie spice.
Video
Notes
- These bars are delicious served room temperature or chilled.
- Store them in the fridge, covered, for about a week.
- Pumpkin Pie Spice blend can typically be found right in the grocery store, or on Amazon! To make your own pumpkin pie spice if you can’t buy it pre-made: 1 tbs cinnamon, ½ tsp allspice, ½ tsp ground cloves, ½ tsp ground nutmeg mixed together. Then measure out 1 tablespoon for this recipe and save the rest for my Homemade Creamy Pumpkin Spice Latte!
Nutrition
Serving: 1bar | Calories: 304kcal | Carbohydrates: 35g | Protein: 4g | Fat: 17g | Saturated Fat: 4g | Polyunsaturated Fat: 8g | Monounsaturated Fat: 4g | Trans Fat: 0.2g | Cholesterol: 32mg | Sodium: 269mg | Potassium: 119mg | Fiber: 1g | Sugar: 25g | Vitamin A: 2912IU | Vitamin C: 1mg | Calcium: 68mg | Iron: 1mg