Pumpkin Spice Whoopie Pies with Vanilla Cream Cheese Filling
Tender, cakey pumpkin spice whoopie pies are filled with a creamy vanilla cream cheese frosting. They’re the perfect fall dessert and are great for potlucks!
With Thanksgiving right around the corner (how does it sneak up on us every time?!?) I’m going to post a few Thanksgiving recipes here and there. This shouldn’t be a surprise, but I’m not really a Thanksgiving traditionalist at all. Yes, of course I want turkey, dressing, pecan pie, and the likes, but I also want things like these pumpkin spice whoopie pies. What I like most about these is you don’t need a stinkin’ whoopie pan. The kitchen these days is crowded enough and the last thing I need is a unitasker taking up some valuable real estate. These whoopie pies are so tender and soft, and as someone said at the meeting I brought these to, they seem to just melt in your mouth. And whenever I eat them, I can’t seem to fight the instinct of closing my eyes as I bite into them…it just feels like I’m sinking into a cloud of pumpkin spice heaven. Oh, and I almost forgot, these can be made ahead of time and stored in the fridge, which is a very valuable trait around Thanksgiving time.
Start by making a spiced whoopie pie batter and dolloping big mounds onto parchment.
Bake until tender and soft.
Let the whoopie pies cool , then sandwich the whoopie pies together with cream cheese filling in the middle.
Mmm…so fluffy and creamy.
Enjoy!
Pumpkin Spice Whoopie Pies with Vanilla Cream Cheese Filling
Ingredients
- 15 oz all purpose flour, by weight (3 cups, measured)
- 3/4 tsp salt
- 1 tsp baking powder
- 1 tsp baking soda
- 2 tbsp ground real cinnamon
- 1 tbsp ground cloves
- 1/2 tsp ground nutmeg
- 1/2 tsp ground allspice
- 3 cups pumpkin puree chilled (I did canned, but up to you)
- 13 oz dark brown sugar, by weight (2 cups, packed)
- 1 cup vegetable oil
- 2 extra large eggs beaten
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
For the vanilla cream cheese filling:
- 3 cups confectioner's sugar
- 1/2 cup unsalted butter, softened
- 8 oz block cream cheese softened
- 1 tsp pure vanilla extract or if you're feeling fancy, the seeds of 1 vanilla bean
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Line two baking sheets with parchment paper.
- In a large bowl, whisk to combine the flour, salt, baking powder, baking soda, cinnamon, cloves, nutmeg, and allspice.
- In another bowl, whisk to combine the pumpkin, brown sugar, and oil. Whisk in the eggs and vanilla. Little by little, add in the dry mixture until fully incorporated.
- Using a #40 1.5 T disher, portion out little mounds onto your baking sheet. These don’t spread much, so you can put them fairly close together. Space them about 3/4 inch apart.
- Bake for 15 minutes, until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean. In the meantime, keep the rest of the batter chilled in the fridge until you’re ready to do the second batch.
- Let the whoopie pies cool completely on a wire rack.
- To make the filling, beat all filling ingredients together until smooth and combined.
- Assemble the whoopie pies by dolloping little scoops of the cream cheese filling onto half the cookies, and topping it with another sandwich half. Refrigerate the whoopie pies for at least 30 minutes before serving, and you can refrigerate them for up to 4 days. Enjoy!
Nutrition
Nutrition is estimated using a food database and is only intended to be used as a guideline for informational purposes.