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Pumpkin cheesecake snickerdoodles are a fresh take on a classic cookie! Delightfully soft and filled with tangy cream cheese, these cookies will be sure to get a “WOW!” from your friends and family!
I love any recipe that I can add pumpkin to and these cookies are no exception! If you love pumpkin as much as I do, go ahead and try some of these Muffins, this Bread Pudding, and the most Perfect Pumpkin Bread! You will go crazy for them all!
Reasons These Cookies are the BEST
- A twist on a classic: A pumpkin cheesecake snickerdoodle is a twist on your classic snickerdoodle and takes it to the next level. Filled with all of the same sweet cinnamon flavors, with the addition of a yummy cream cheese mixture in the middle, these cookies are something that you will love!
- Soft: I love a good soft cookie and these snickerdoodles are the best!
- They freeze well: Double the batch and freeze them for up to 3 months!
Soft Pumpkin Cheesecake Snickerdoodles
This recipe is perfect for an after-school snack, a game day treat, or just bringing a treat to your neighbors. Whatever you do, I suggest making more than one batch. They are so good, and they will be eaten up in no time!
Ingredients You Need to Make Pumpkin Cheesecake Snickerdoodles
This delicious ooey-gooey recipe is going to become a staple at your house. Because the base flavor is delicious cinnamon, once you add in some pumpkin and cream cheese, you are making the perfect fall treat! See the recipe card below for a list of exact ingredients.
- All-purpose flour: This combines your ingredients and helps thicken the dough.
- Baking powder: This helps the cookies to rise.
- Salt: This enhances the flavors of all of the ingredients.
- Cinnamon: You can’t have snickerdoodles without a delicious cinnamon taste.
- Nutmeg: Brings that delicious earthy flavor that we all know and love!
- Butter: It’s best to use unsalted butter that is at room temperature for these cookies.
- Sugar: Adds sweetness to the cookie dough.
- Brown sugar: This is the best type of sweetener, and the flavor can’t be beat.
- Pumpkin puree: Don’t confuse this with pumpkin pie filling!
- Egg: Use an egg that is at room temperature.
- Vanilla extract: This adds some flavor to the sweetness.
Filling Ingredients
- Cream cheese: Make sure to set your block out so that it is softened before you use it!
- Sugar: Sweetens up the tangy cream cheese.
- Vanilla extract: Adds some flavor to the sugar’s sweetness.
Cinnamon Sugar Coating
- Sugar: Adds sweetness to the spices!
- Cinnamon: Use ground cinnamon and mix it well with the other spices.
- Ginger: Ground ginger will work the best and add in an earthy flavor.
- Allspice: This is the best spice to bring out that fall taste!
Baking Tips
Since these are a bit different than your traditional snickerdoodles, I have come up with a few baking tips to help these turn out just perfectly for you! They are seriously SO good! I can’t wait for you to try them!
- Pumpkin puree: Sometimes, people think that pumpkin pie filling and pumpkin puree are the same thing… they are not! Pumpkin pie filling is mixed with spices and flavors, and you don’t want that for these cookies since you are adding those on your own. A can of pumpkin puree will be orange inside, and all that is listed on the ingredients will be “pumpkin puree.” So make sure that you are getting the right one!
- Chill: Before you ball up the dough and put it in the oven, it’s best (at least in this recipe) to chill your dough and cream cheese filling. This will help your cookies stay fluffy and not spread in the oven!
- Fresh ingredients: For the best results in your baking, make sure that all of your ingredients are fresh! This means that you should be replacing the baking ingredients in your pantry every 3-6 months. They start to lose their flavor and potency after that!
How to Make Pumpkin Cheesecake Snickerdoodles
These homemade pumpkin cheesecake snickerdoodles are easy to make! In fact, bake up a few batches at once so that you have some for later! It will be so simple, and once you see how fast they get eaten, you’ll be glad that you did!
Prep
- Whisk dry ingredients: In a medium bowl, whisk the flour, baking powder, salt, cinnamon, and nutmeg together. Set aside.
- Beat butter, eggs, and sugar: In a mixer with a paddle attachment, beat together the butter and sugars on medium-high speed until fluffy, about 2-3 minutes.
- Blend and mix together: Blend in pumpkin puree, beat in egg, and then add vanilla. Slowly add dry ingredients on low speed just until combined. Cover and chill the dough for an hour.
- Make the filling: To make the cream cheese filling, blend cream cheese, sugar, and vanilla together. Chill for an hour.
- Prep and baking sheets: Preheat oven to 350 and line your baking sheets with parchment paper. In a small bowl, combine the sugar and spices for the coating and set aside.
Bake
- Make cookies: To make the cookies, take a tablespoon of the cookie batter. Flatten it like a pancake and place a teaspoon of the cream cheese in the center.
- Add cream cheese mixture: Form another tablespoon of the cookie batter into a flat pancake shape and place on top of the cream cheese. Pinch the edges together, sealing in the cream cheese, and roll into a ball. Roll in the cinnamon sugar coating and place on the prepared baking sheet 2 inches apart.
- Flatten dough: Repeat until the dough is gone, and flatten the cookie dough balls with a heavy-bottomed glass or measuring cup.
- Bake and cool: Bake the cookies for 10-15 minutes or until the tops start to crack. Let cool on the baking sheet for 5 minutes and transfer to a wire rack. Enjoy! These pumpkin cheesecake snickerdoodles are the best!
Storing Leftovers
If you have some pumpkin cheesecake snickerdoodles that didn’t get eaten all at once, here is how you can store them for later! That way, you can eat them all week long!
- Refrigerator: Because these cookies have cream cheese in them, don’t store them on your counter. Place your cooled cookies into an airtight container and leave them in your fridge for up to a week!
- Freezer: Store your cookies in a sealed, airtight container or freezer ziplock bag. Label the bag with the date, and then you can store them for up to 3 months! Just thaw them in the fridge before you want to eat them.
More Delicious Pumpkin Desserts to Try
If you loved these pumpkin cheesecake snickerdoodles, then it’s your lucky day! I have come up with a few more pumpkin desserts that I think that you will love as well! They are all amazing to add to your Autumn pumpkin recipes.
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Pumpkin Cheesecake Snickerdoodles
Ingredients
- 3¾ cups all-purpose flour
- 1½ teaspoons baking powder
- ½ teaspoon salt
- ½ teaspoon ground cinnamon
- ¼ teaspoon freshly ground nutmeg
- 1 cup unsalted butter, at room temperature
- 1 cup granulated sugar
- ½ cup light brown sugar
- ¾ cup pumpkin puree
- 1 large egg
- 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
Filling Ingredients:
- 8 ounces cream cheese, softened
- 1/4 cup sugar
- 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
Cinnamon-sugar coating:
- ½ cup granulated sugar
- 1 teaspoons ground cinnamon
- ½ teaspoon ground ginger
- dash allspice
Instructions
- Whisk the flour, baking powder, salt, cinnamon, and nutmeg in a medium bowl. Set aside.
- In a mixer with a paddle attachment, beat together the butter and sugars on medium-high speed until fluffy, about 2-3 minutes.
- Blend in pumpkin puree, beat in egg, and then add vanilla. Slowly add dry ingredients on low speed just until combined. Cover and chill the dough for an hour.
- Blend cream cheese, sugar, and vanilla together to make the cream cheese filling. Chill for one hour.
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit and line your baking sheets with parchment paper. In a small bowl, combine the sugar and spices for the coating and set aside.
- To make the cookies, take a tablespoon of the cookie dough. Flatten it like a pancake and place a teaspoon of the cream cheese in the center. Form another tablespoon of the cookie batter into a flat pancake shape and place it on top of the cream cheese. Pinch the edges together, sealing in the cream cheese, and roll into a ball. Roll in the cinnamon sugar coating and place on the prepared baking sheet 2 inches apart.
- Repeat until the dough is gone and flatten the cookie dough balls with a heavy bottomed glass or measuring cup.
- Bake the cookies for 10-15 minutes or until the tops start to crack. Let cool on the baking sheet for 5 minutes and transfer to a wire rack. Enjoy!
Video
Notes
Nutrition
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
Can you let these chill overnight? Or will the dough become too tough?
No I think it would be just fine. 🙂
I just made this recipe, and they are unbelievable!!! Absolutely delicious even if they were a wee bit messy to assemble 🙂
So I made these this weekend and they taste more like a biscotti and were not gooey and creamy like yours – what did I do wrong!?! I put what I thought was a lot of cream cheese into them and they made HUGE cookies and all the cream cheese was gone – where did it go once it was cooked? My only thought is maybe I cooked them too long? I’m not sure so any pointers would be appreciated. And how do you stuff these? I tried doing it like you said by making two flat cookies, spreading the cream cheese and sticking the edges together, but that really didn’t work well… I want mine to look like yours – help! They do taste good even as a thicker biscotti type cookie and my co-workers loved them with coffee!
I’m sorry that they didn’t turn out! They are amazing. If they were really gooey and basically eating the cream cheese… Your batter was probably too thin. I would had added a little more flour. I’m glad they still liked them though!
did you use self-rising flour instead of all purpose flour?
Don’t spread cream cheese. Just leave it as a dollop off spoon. I made these today they are big, but good. I didn’t find the cookie batter that sticky after refrigerated. Next time I plan to roll all of dough (1 Tbsp each) to make sure I have even number. Flatten half, put a dollop of cream cheese on all, flatten other half 1 at a time put on top of other half with fill on it, pinch edges really well toss in sugar mix & put back on cookie sheet. I did this with last pan this time, and I put them on cookie sheet as I did this. Yes is time consuming, definitely one I would also work get help with.
Could this dough be frozen do you think, maybe in balls, then just make the filling when you’re ready to make them? I’d like to make these for thanksgiving but it’s gonna be busy that day. Maybe they could be frozen with the filling.? That would make things even easier. I don’t do a ton of baking so I don’t know much about what you can and can’t freeze.
Hi!
I just tried to make these as a half batch.when I pulled them out of the fridge they were very sticky pretty much impossible to work with. I tried adding some flour and refrigerating them for a little longer but they remained very sticky and very difficult to make flat without them sticking to my hands or any surface. I don’t know what I could have done differently as I follow the directions and the ingredients and the only difference I made was cutting everything in half. Do you have any suggestions? I really want to make these for the holidays.
thank you in advance!
Hmmmm sorry about that. Mine were still pretty sticky too and I am assuming it is because of the pumpkin. I just worked with a little flour in my hand to flatten them out and they did turn out amazing!
I have always found Snickerdoodle dough sticky & difficult to work with…but definitely worth it in the end!
Same. After the first few, I started pressing them onto parchment paper, which helped a little; I scooped them off with spatula.
Add a little more flour to your batch next time and a little powdered sugar to the filling then refridgerate half the time and freeze the second half and you should be fine.
im am so trying these !!! they look amazing ..
As if snickerdoodles aren’t tasty enough on their own, you go and add pumpkin and cheesecake?! These won’t last an hour in my house! 🙂
I made these for the first time today and they are delicious. I didn’t put enough cheesecake filling in though so you got the cheesecake flavor but not the visual. I’ll do better next time! They were delicious though and I think they’d be yummy even without the filling!
Same here. These cookies are delicious but I didn’t get the big visual on the cream cheese in the middle. I’ll try a 2nd batch soon. Also, mine were sticky too. The refrigeration helps a lot and between batches I refrigerated cream cheese and cookie batter. Also, I added flour to both hands and the spoons, so it helped a lot. Mine were huge, but still a very tasty cookie! Love them.
Could i refrigerate the ingredients overnight? And make them in the morning?
Yeah I am sure that would be just fine!
Can I store these in an airtight container or do they have to be refrigerated because of the filling? They are amazing, by the way. I just made some and they’re half gone 🙂
I am currently making these cookies .. is the dough supposed to be of a sticky consistency before putting it into the fridge, or should I add more flour ?
Yes it will be sticky because of the pumpkin. Putting them in the fridge should make them harden up and easier to work with. 🙂
Taste great, assembly is terrible. Too, too sticky to work with and after 1 pan I was ready to throw it all away. That’s when I came back to look at the sight for suggestions and all I found was looks yummy and these would be great. Did anybody actually make the darn things? I can’t stand when people comment on how great and yummy these would be, but never actually make the cookies. I can’t be the only one to have had issues with it sticking all over my hands and having a mess. After finding nothing here to help me, I thought I would try to just at least use the cookie dough and try to get it to roll for snickerdoodles without filling.
I have had some people comment and say that they used a little flour on their hands so that it isn’t quite so sticky. But they have been turning out great for others.
Mine turned out sticky as well but I found that when it cools in the fridge it does get better. I used powdered sugar on my hand to keep it from sticking to me and just added a bit more to my hands after each cookie I rolled out and that worked great. The warmer the dough and the more you work with it the stickier it gets; so after the first batch I put the dough and filling back in the fridge for awhile to let it re-harden.
I agree. These were a lot of work, pretty messy, and the end result was very cake-like and heavy. Not a good cookie. I’ll stick with my regular snicker doodles and my cream cheese stuffed pumpkin cupcakes.
I am sorry that you didn’t like them! This is one of my favorite cookies.
I had the same problem today…just got done making them! I, in no way, could make the pancakes described. They were just sticky globs…and that was with the first cookie. I ended up making 5 GIANT ones with the cream cheese in the middle and experimented with different ways to do the rest. I didn’t come up with anything good, so I was hoping to find a way to decrease the stickiness as I prepare them…more flour maybe? Make it like a sugar cookie consistency?
The consistency will be more on the sticky side because you are working with pumpkin. But not overly sticky that you can’t work with them. I also made these with caramel and they turned out fantastic. This is one of my favorite recipes.
Spray oil on your finger tips, so it won’t be as difficult to work with
I had a sticky mess also. I don’t know what I did wrong but the cream cheese filling just absorbed into the cookie dough. I was expecting it to ooze out of the middle when you bit into them. Wondering what I did wrong?
It’s meant to be sticky, you did nothing wrong. I just made these yesterday, and I got slightly frustrated, but I powered through it and they turned out wonderful. I ended up using a few spoons to help contain the mess. You can try some oil spray on your hands or using some flour on your hands. 🙂
You want to work quickly with the dough as soon as you take it out of the refrigerator I found when i first started it was easy to work with but after it started to get warm it became pretty messy. Luckily you can just pop the dough back in the refrigerator to stiffen it up a bit when that happens!
they stuck all over me too! so, I sprayed my hands with a touch of Pam and it worked great! no sticking! did have to reapply a couple of times. I also found the amount of dough quite large. I stopped measuring and just went with instinct.
I just tried making them and yes I had the same problem with the dough being too sticky. I threw my whole batch away…i think more flour is needed. Idk if they are yummy or not.
I found them sticky to work with as well. I suggest adding just a tad more flour to the batter, powdered sugar to the filling and freezing both for at least half the time (half hour fridge/half hour freezer) and that should work. My biggest complaint is I can’t taste the filling in the cookie 🙁
I happened to have wax paper at home, so after I rolled them into a ball, I would just use the wax paper to flatten them out. Helped a ton. Stuck the batter back in fridge after I put the cookies into the oven. Not sure if I did something wrong with cream cheese filling though, because it’s not as gooey and lush like in the picture 🙁
I love how you stuffed these, I’ve never done it this way but love trying new ways! Such a great idea!
OMG, I just tried Pepperidge Farms Pumpkin Cheesecake cookies this past weekend and was looking for a recipe very similar and I think I just found it. These beauties look amazing and I cannot wait to try them out this weekend.
These look delicious. Do you have to refrigerate them if you have leftovers (only 2 of us) and can they be shipped in vacuumed bags to ship to Alaska for family.
They might not be able to be shipped because the cream cheese makes the cookies soften after a day or so. 🙂
BUT, do they require refrigeration?
Incredible!! YUMMY!
These look awesome! Pinning for later. 🙂