This Frosted Pumpkin Cookies recipe delivers soft and chewy pumpkin-spiced cookies with the perfect blend of cinnamon, nutmeg, and cloves. All topped with a light maple flavored frosting for a full of Fall flavor!
Including pumpkin puree as well as spices adds a twist to the usual Pumpkin spice desserts with a batch of these having a lightly soft sugar cookie center that is complimented with the maple syrup flavored buttercream.
Why you'll love this
Soft cookies
The cookies are soft and a little buttery and light without being cakey.
Full of Fall flavors
Thanks to the pumpkin and spices in the cookies and the maple frosting these cookies are a taste of Fall in a bite.
Ingredients and substitutions for Frosted Pumpkin Cookies
- Butter: Unsalted butter is used for the cookie, but if all you have on hand is salted, that works as a fine substitute, just leave out any salt suggested in the recipe.
- Sugar: Confectioners or icing sugar dissolves into the buttercream and the superfine or caster sugar adds to the sugar portion of our cookies creating a nice balance without making them overly sweet.
- Eggs: The room temperature egg binds and adds structure to our cookies resulting in that soft interior that compliments the sugar and butter.
- Pumpkin: We used canned pumpkin here as it has less moisture than homemade mashed pumpkin. We want to wrap our pumpkin in paper towels or a clean tea towel to remove some of the moisture. We need to do this to ensure our cookies are nice and buttery without being cake. This will also take the overall weight of our pumpkin down from 122 grams / ½ cup to 85 grams / 5 ½ tablespoons of pumpkin puree.
- Flour: Plain or all purpose flour is best for a nice light cookie crumb.
- Baking powder: This helps our cookies rise so they are not stodgy.
- Ground spices: The ground spices all help to heighten and give depth of our cookies as well as complimenting the pumpkin.
See recipe card for quantities.
How to make Frosted Pumpkin Cookies:
Preheat your oven to 180C/350F and line a baking tray with greaseproof paper.
Place the butter and sugars into a bowl and beat until pale and fluffy, approximately 4 minutes.
Add in the egg and beat until well combined and fluffy.
Add in your pumpkin puree and beat until combined and smooth.
In a separate bowl, place the flour, baking powder, ground spices and salt and stir.
Toss into your pumpkin butter mixture and beat until just combined and smooth.
Scoop up a portion of dough and place onto your baking tray with 1 ½ inches between each cookie.
Bake for 10 minutes, remove from the oven and press the center with the back of a cookie scoop or a flat bottomed glass.
Return to the oven for a further 4 minutes until the cookies look matt all over.
Remove and allow to cool for 5 minutes on the tray before placing on a cooling rack.
For the frosting, place the butter, sugar, maple syrup and milk into a bowl and beat on medium until the mixture is smooth.
Spoon a tablespoonful into the center of your cookies and smooth out with an offset spatula.
Set aside to allow the frosting to set.
Serve up alongside your favorite hot beverage.
Enjoy.
Variations
You can definitely change up the dish by changing the following:
Sweet potato - you could substitute the canned pumpkin with sweet potato puree.
Chocolate frosting - instead of maple syrup in your frosting, add some melty chocolate (20 grams / 2 tablespoons chocolate chips or chunks melted) or 14 grams / 2 tablespoons cocoa powder sifted into you frosting mixture.
Storage
The cookies are best consumed within 3 days of baking and should be kept covered in a container to keep them nice and soft.
You could also freeze the cookies without frosting for up to 2 months.
Equipment needed to make this
Greaseproof paper: Lining your baking tray will make getting the soft cookies off easy.
Hand or stand mixer: To whip the butter for the dough and that buttercream, this is best done with a mixer.
Mixing bowl: You’ll need two medium mixing bowls to mix the cookie dough and buttercream.
Ice Cream Scoop: The scoop used here creates medium cookies with a diameter of 5 centimeters 1.97 inches scoop was used for putting the icing into the center of our biscuits.
Offset spatula: A small offset spatula will help you smooth out the buttercream nice and evenly. A butter knife or back of a tablespoon will also do the trick.
More pumpkin recipes you'll love
Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Cookies
Print
Frosted Pumpkin Cookies
- Prep Time: 15 minutes
- Cook Time: 14 minutes per batch
- Total Time: 44 minute
- Yield: Makes 16 medium cookies
- Category: Cookies
Description
Pumpkin sugar cookies with a little spice and topped with a fluffy maple flavored frosting gives you a taste of Fall in one bite.
Ingredients
Pumpkin Sugar Cookies
150 grams / 5.3 ounces butter, softened
65 grams / ⅔ cup confectioner’s/icing sugar
50 grams / ¼ cup superfine/caster sugar
55 grams / 1 large egg, room temperature
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
122 grams / ½ cup canned pumpkin, slightly dried (see ingredient section)
282 grams / 1 ¾ cups plain flour
2 grams / ½ teaspoon baking powder
¼ teaspoon sea or kosher salt
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
½ teaspoon ground cardamom
½ teaspoon ground nutmeg
Maple Frosting
30 grams / 2 tablespoons butter, softened
145 grams / 1 ¼ cups confectioner/icing sugar, sifted
30 grams / 1 ½ tablespoons maple syrup
¼ teaspoon sea and kosher salt
Instructions
Pumpkin sugar cookies
- Preheat your oven to 180C/350F and line a baking tray with greaseproof paper.
- Place the butter and sugars into a bowl and beat until pale and fluffy, approximately 4 minutes.
- Add in the egg and beat until well combined and fluffy.
- Add in your pumpkin puree and beat until combined and smooth.
- In a separate bowl, place the flour, baking powder, ground spices and salt and stir.
- Toss into your pumpkin butter mixture and beat until just combined and smooth.
- Scoop up a portion of dough and place onto your baking tray with 1 ½ inches between each cookie.
- Bake for 10 minutes, remove from the oven and press the center with the back of a cookie scoop or a flat bottomed glass.
- Return to the oven for a further 4 minutes until the cookies look matt all over.
- Remove and allow to cool for 5 minutes on the tray before placing on a cooling rack.
Maple frosting
- Place the butter, sugar, maple syrup and milk into a bowl and beat on medium until the mixture is smooth.
- Spoon a tablespoonful into the center of your cookies and smooth out with an offset spatula.
- Set aside to allow the frosting to set.
- Serve up alongside your favorite hot beverage.
- Enjoy!
Notes
Recipe by Roamingtaste
Nutrition
- Serving Size: 1 cookie
- Calories: 221 calories per serve
Keywords: pumpkin cookies, fall baking, fall cookies
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