Pumpkin Cheesecake Brownies

Fudgy cocoa brownie on the bottom, pumpkin cream cheese swirled through the middle, and enough cinnamon in the batter to make the whole kitchen smell like October. These Pumpkin Cheesecake Brownies are best warm, with ice cream sliding off the top of them.

Pumpkin Cream Cheese Brownies With A Cheesecake Swirl

These are one pan brownies. They’re also 3 bowl brownies, and you should hear that from me rather than find out at the sink.

One bowl for the butter and sugar, one for the dry ingredients, one for the pumpkin cream cheese. All of it ends up in a single 8 by 8, so you get one thing in the oven and a counter that looks like you did something much harder.

The trade is worth it. The brownie layer is fudgy instead of cakey because there’s only ½ cup of flour in it holding up ¾ cup of butter. The pumpkin part is cream cheese with pumpkin beaten into it, so it sets like cheesecake rather than like pie filling. And there are 2 teaspoons of cinnamon in the brownie batter, which is about 4 times what a brownie normally gets. I’ve never once thought it was too much.

Then there’s the timing, which is the only place these go sideways.

You cut them cold and you eat them warm. Cut them warm and the cream cheese layer drags behind the knife, the swirl you spent 20 seconds on becomes a smudge, and you’ve produced a pan of brown squares. So the pan cools all the way down, you cut, and then you warm up the one in your hand.

Fifteen seconds in the microwave, then ice cream, then another 30 seconds of standing there doing nothing. You’ve already waited 90 minutes for the pan to cool, so half a minute more shouldn’t be much to ask, and somehow it is.

Ingredients in Pumpkin Cheesecake Brownies

• Butter (¾ cup, unsalted, melted): Melted, not softened. It’s ¾ cup of butter against ½ cup of flour, and that’s the whole reason these are fudgy.
• Sugar (1 cup): For the brownie layer.
• Vanilla extract (1 teaspoon brownie, 1 teaspoon cream cheese): Both layers get a teaspoon. Not a typo, just greedy.
• Eggs (2 brownie, 1 cream cheese): The 2 in the brownie batter get beaten until the whole mixture turns pale and fluffy. Stop early and you get a flat, dense pan.
• All purpose flour (½ cup brownie, ¼ cup cream cheese): That ½ cup is almost nothing for a pan of brownies and it’s deliberate. The ¼ cup in the cream cheese layer is there so the layer sets instead of sliding.
• Cocoa powder (½ cup, unsweetened): Cocoa, not melted chocolate. You get a deeper, less sweet brownie, and the chocolate still comes through under 2 teaspoons of cinnamon.
• Salt (¼ teaspoon): Just ¼ teaspoon, and chocolate without it tastes like a photograph of chocolate.
• Cinnamon (2 teaspoons brownie, ½ teaspoon cream cheese): Yes, 2 teaspoons. Measure it, look at it, put it in anyway.
• Cream cheese (8 ounces, softened): The block in foil, full fat. The tub kind is whipped with water and air, so your layer sets softer and sometimes gets a thin wet film on top. Softened means 1 hour on the counter, not 30 seconds in the microwave with one end going clear.
• Sugar (⅓ cup): For the cream cheese layer. Less than the brownies get, because the cream cheese layer is meant to be the tangy one.
• Canned pumpkin (½ cup): Pure pumpkin, not pie filling. You need ½ cup out of a can that holds nearly 2, which we’ll sort out further down.
• Pumpkin spice (1 teaspoon): In with the cream cheese. Homemade is cheaper than the jar and you’ll end up putting it in your coffee.

How To Make Pumpkin Cheesecake Brownies

Oven and pan: Heat the oven to 350°F. Brush an 8 by 8 inch pan with oil and line it with parchment, hanging over 2 sides so you can lift the slab out later.

Brownie batter, bowl 1: Beat the ¾ cup of melted butter with the 1 cup of sugar and 1 teaspoon of vanilla. Add the 2 eggs and beat until it’s pale and fluffy. It takes longer than you want it to, and it’s the difference between fudgy and flat.

Dry ingredients, bowl 2: Whisk the ½ cup of flour, ½ cup of cocoa, ¼ teaspoon of salt and 2 teaspoons of cinnamon together. Tip it into bowl 1 and mix until smooth. The batter should be thick enough to hold a spoon upright.

Cream cheese layer, bowl 3: Beat the 8 ounces of softened cream cheese on its own first, until there isn’t a lump left in it. Then add the 1 egg, ⅓ cup of sugar, ¼ cup of flour, ½ cup of pumpkin, 1 teaspoon of vanilla, ½ teaspoon of cinnamon and 1 teaspoon of pumpkin spice, and beat smooth. Add everything at once and you’ll chase little white lumps around the bowl for 5 minutes and they’ll still be there in the pan.

Layer it: Spread about ⅔ of the brownie batter across the bottom of the pan, right into the corners. Spoon the cream cheese batter over that and spread it gently. Dollop the last ⅓ of brownie batter over the top in blobs.

Swirl it: Drag a knife or a skewer through the top 2 layers, 4 or 5 passes, then put the knife down. More on that below, because this is where people lose the plot.

Bake: Forty to 50 minutes, until the middle is set and doesn’t wobble. Mine take the full 50 every time.

Cool, completely: On a wire rack, about 1 hour 30 minutes. Not warm. Not mostly cool. Cool.

Cut: Lift the slab out by the parchment, or cut it right in the pan. Sixteen squares. If you want edges sharp enough to photograph, give it an hour in the fridge first.

Warm one up: Fifteen seconds in the microwave, or 5 minutes on a tray at 300°F if you’re doing several. Ice cream, and then wait.

How To Swirl Pumpkin Brownies

4 or 5 passes with the knife. Then stop.

I know that’s unhelpfully short, so here’s what happens if you keep going. Pass 6 looks better than pass 5. Pass 8 looks better than pass 6. Somewhere around pass 12 you notice the cream cheese and the brownie have mixed into each other, what’s in front of you is 1 uniform brown pan, and you’ve spent 2 minutes converting a marbled dessert into regular brownies.

Keep the knife in the top half only. The bottom ⅔ of brownie batter is the floor, and if you cut down into it the squares come apart when you lift them.

An S shape works. A figure 8 works. A few long straight drags work. The pattern matters much less than stopping.

The Best Cream Cheese For The Cheesecake Layer

Full fat, block style, in the foil brick. That’s the one.

The spreadable tub kind has water and air whipped into it, which is lovely on a bagel and a problem in a layer that needs to set. You’ll get a softer set, and sometimes a thin wet film across the top.

Low fat does the same thing. There’s ¾ cup of butter elsewhere in this pan, so low fat cream cheese isn’t saving anybody anything.

Temperature matters as much as the type. 1 hour on the counter. Cold cream cheese breaks into little white pebbles that won’t beat out once the pumpkin and the egg are in there, and you’ll find every one of them later, pale, in the middle of a brown square.

Can You Use Fresh Pumpkin?

You can. The extra step is draining it, and that’s the one people skip.

Roast a small sugar pumpkin cut side down at 400°F for about 45 minutes, until a knife slides in easily. Scoop out the flesh and puree it until it’s smooth.

Then drain it. Fresh pumpkin holds a lot more water than canned, and in a cream cheese layer that extra water means a middle that never sets properly. Sit the puree in a fine sieve and give it 20 or 30 minutes.

You need ½ cup. A sugar pumpkin gives you roughly 6 times that, so you’re roasting a whole squash to fill a measuring cup ⅔ of the way up. Canned is genuinely fine here and I’d never know the difference.

What To Do With The Leftover Canned Pumpkin

This recipe takes ½ cup. The can holds about 1¾ cups. So you end up with a container of pumpkin in the fridge and about 11 days to decide what it’s for.

Here’s the exit.

That 1¼ cups is almost exactly what Pumpkin Maple Cornbread wants. Or it’s 1 cup for Pumpkin Sausage Pasta with ¼ cup spare.

If you’d rather commit properly, Pumpkin Pie Bars use an entire large can and clear the shelf, and Pumpkin Zucchini Muffins will mop up whatever’s left after that.

It keeps 5 to 7 days sealed in the fridge, or 3 months in the freezer. Freeze it in ¼ cup blocks in an ice cube tray and November gets a lot calmer.

Tips For The Best Pumpkin Cream Cheese Brownies

• Beat the eggs in longer than feels necessary. Pale and fluffy. The whole texture of the brownie layer gets decided in about 90 seconds right there.
• Cream cheese out of the fridge 1 hour ahead. Cold cream cheese means lumps, and in this layer the lumps are permanent.
• Push the bottom layer into the corners. It’s the floor of the whole pan. A thin patch is where a square breaks.
• Stop swirling. Give it 4 or 5 passes, then the knife goes in the sink.
• Expect the full 50 minutes. Check at 40 so you’re not caught out, but the middle usually wants all of it.
• Cool completely before the knife. 90 minutes. Everything good about how these look happens during that time, while you do nothing at all.

How To Serve Pumpkin Cheesecake Brownies

Warm, with vanilla ice cream, and then half a minute of patience.

15 seconds in the microwave for 1 square. Give it 5 minutes on a tray at 300°F if you’re warming a few at once.

Also good on top: caramel sauce, chocolate sauce, whipped cream, a snow of icing sugar, or toasted pecans if you want something crunchy against all that soft.

They’re also completely good cold, straight from the fridge, standing at the open door. I’ve got no interest in pretending otherwise.

Pumpkin Brownie Variations

• Chocolate chips. 1 cup folded into the brownie batter. Nobody has ever regretted this.
• Box mix. Make the cream cheese layer exactly as written and use a boxed brownie mix for the brownie part. ⅔ on the bottom, the rest dolloped on top. It works, it’s faster, and I’m not going to say a word.
• Nuts. ½ cup of pecans or walnuts in the brownie batter, or scattered over the top before it bakes.
• Espresso powder. 1 teaspoon in the brownie batter. You won’t taste coffee, the chocolate just tastes deeper.
• Maple instead of vanilla. In the cream cheese layer only.
• Double it. A 9 by 13, everything doubled, and start checking at 45 minutes.

How To Store And Freeze Pumpkin Cheesecake Brownies

There’s cream cheese in here, so these live in the fridge. 5 days in an airtight container.

They’ll be cold by default at that point, which is what the microwave is for.

They freeze for 3 months and they freeze well. Cut them into squares first, freeze them on a tray until firm, then stack them in a container with parchment between the layers. Then you can take out just 1, which is a thing people say, and at least the rest of the pan stays frozen while you think it over.

From frozen, 30 to 40 seconds in the microwave and you can eat it standing up.

Try These Recipes Next

• Brownie Recipe
• Peanut Butter Brownies
• Raspberry Pinwheels
• Red White and Blue Brownie Pizza
• Triple Bypass Brownies
• Cosmic Brownies

Recipe originally shared Oct 2012.