These pumpkin pie cake bars are like two desserts in one. Cake like bottom topped with a moist pumpkin pie top sprinkled with powdered sugar. Perfect for Thanksgiving!
As I type this I’m sitting in Gina’s living room drinking wine and watching Save the Last Dance.
Good lord I love this movie. Before tonight I had not seen it since high school. I always wanted to come into a club and dance around the haters. But, in reality I really dance Uncle Buck. You know the scene – where John Candy is dancing around with the neighbor. He is holding out his arms and just sorta shuffling from side to side.
Yeah, that’s me.
I will never pop into a club and be able to get down (and actually look cool) to a Ice Cube song. But I will play said Ice Cube song on repeat and pretend to dance amazingly in my living room. With the shades closed. Obvi.
Oh and did you remember Kerry Washington was in this movie? It dawned on me right before we started to watch. She goes from teen mom/dancing enthusiast to Olivia Pope extraordinaire.
How is that for a change.
So what does a pair of 32 year old girls do while drinking wine and watching movies that were popular during our high school years? Eat, obvi #thisis32.
I brought over some of these pie bars because my husband happens to be out of town and I knew that if I left them at home I would just sit and eat them by myself. Real life yo.
These bars are pretty unique since they combine a bit of a cakey bottom mixed with a pie texture top. It’s the perfect combination of fall flavor for your face.
Pumpkin Pie Cake Bars
These pumpkin pie cake bars are like two desserts in one. Cake like bottom topped with a moist pumpkin pie top sprinkled with powdered sugar. Perfect for Thanksgiving!
Yield: 8x8 pan
Prep Time: 20 minutes1 hour
Cook Time: 1 hour
Total Time: 1 hour 20 minutes
Ingredients:
For crust:
- 1 cup all purpose flour
- 1/3 cup dark brown sugar
- 1 teaspoon baking powder
- Pinch kosher salt
- 1/2 teaspoon vanilla bean paste
- 1 large egg
- 4 tablespoons browned butter
For filling:
- 4 ounces cream cheese, room temperature
- 1-1/2 cups pumpkin puree
- 2 large eggs
- 1/2 teaspoon vanilla bean paste
- 4 tablespoons browned butter
- 3/4 cup dark brown sugar
- 1 teaspoon pumpkin pie spice
Directions:
Preheat oven to 350 degrees and line a 8x8 pan with parchment paper.
For crust:
In the bowl of a mixer add flour, sugar, baking powder and salt. Give it a little mix to combine.
Add in vanilla bean paste, egg and browned butter. Mix until the dough sticks together and can be pressed together. When you first start mixing it will be very crumbly looking. Just keep mixing and it will come together.
Take dough and press into the bottom of the prepared baking pan.
Rinse out mixer bowl to use for the filling.
For filling:
In your mixer bowl add cream cheese and pumpkin puree. Mix until smooth and combine, about 1 minute.
Add in eggs, vanilla bean paste and browned butter. Mix until combined.
Finally, mix in dark brown sugar and pumpkin pie spice.
When the mixture is smooth and combined pour into the pan with the crust.
Bake for about 1 hour until the center is just slightly jiggly.
Let cool until room temperature, cut into bars and sprinkle with powdered sugar.