Pumpkin Snickerdoodles are the perfect fall cookie. They are easy to make, perfectly chewy and packed full of flavor. What do you get when you combine soft, chewy snickerdoodles and the ever popular pumpkin pie spice? Amazing cookies, that’s what! Pumpkin spice gives this classic cookie a delicious and perfectly seasonal twist. If you are looking for a pumpkin cookies that is not cakey, but chewy instead, you’ve found your recipe!
These easy pumpkin cookies have become a favorite with my friends and family. Like any good snickerdoodle, they are soft and chewy. While I love pumpkin flavor, I don’t always love the cakey texture pumpkin can give cookies. I promise you, no cakey cookies here! This recipe is the perfect combination of a chewy snickerdoodle and fall’s favorite flavor, pumpkin spice.
Pumpkin Snickerdoodles Recipe
While I’d like to think that my recipes are the result of creative inspiration, the truth is that many recipes, like this one, are more the result of my disorganized life. Do you know what you need when you make snickerdoodles? You need sugar.
Guess what this girl was almost out of? SUGAR. Yes, that would be me! On any given baking day I’m probably out of butter, sugar or flour, you know, the big three of baking. So sometimes you just have to improvise.
These are technically brown sugar pumpkin spice snickerdoodles. They are based on my traditional soft and chewy snickerdoodle recipe, which I love, but with a bit of fall flair.
Making Snickerdoodles With Brown Sugar
Just in case you are wondering, yes, you can swap brown sugar for granulated sugar in your snickerdoodle recipe. Or you can combine the two. In fact, I kind of feel like you should.
Brown sugar worked out quite well with these cookies. It helps give them a fantastic chewy texture. Once I realized I was going to have to make these with brown sugar, I decided to also mix up the spices, and add pumpkin pie spice to the mix.
Pumpkin Cookies That Are Not Cakey
Here’s the thing with pumpkin… it doesn’t have a tremendous amount of flavor. Most of the fall-themed pumpkin flavor that we all love is more from the pumpkin spice than the actual pumpkin.
I love pumpkin, and I love it in breads, cakes and pies, but I’m kind of neutral on pumpkin in cookies. It can make them really cakey due to it’s high moisture content. It can work, and there are some great cookies out there that use pumpkin. One of my favorites is this chewy pumpkin cookies recipe. For this recipe I wanted a pumpkin cookie that was NOT cakey in any way.
Cute Pumpkin Spice Mug Can Be Found Here
Pumpkin Spice Cookie Ingredients:
At a glance, full printable recipe below.
- Flour
- Baking soda and Baking Powder
- Cream of Tartar
- Pumpkin Pie Spice
- Butter
- Sugar
- Brown Sugar
- Eggs
- Milk
- Vanilla
Instead of cakey pumpkin filled cookies, these are flavored with pumpkin spice. You can really pack in the pumpkin flavor by simply using pumpkin spice. These cookies have pumpkin spice added to both the dough and the cinnamon sugar coating on top.
A note about these cookies, they aren’t over the top on the pumpkin flavor. Instead they have just the right addition of pumpkin flavor from the pumpkin spice. It’s a fabulous fall snickerdoodle recipe is you ask me!
More Great Pumpkin Recipes To Try:
- Pumpkin Brownies
- Pumpkin S’mores Cookies
- Starbucks Pumpkin Bread
- Soft Pumpkin Cookies
- Pumpkin Blondies
- Pumpkin Snickerdoodles
- Chewy Pumpkin Cookies
- Pumpkin Bundt Cake
- Pumpkin Pie
- Pumpkin Cupcakes
- Caramel Pumpkin Cookies
- Pumpkin Pancakes
- Pumpkin Poke Cake
- Find all of my Pumpkin Recipes
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Pumpkin Snickerdoodles
Ingredients
- 4 cups flour
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- 1/2 teaspoon baking powder
- 1 teaspoon cream of tartar
- 1 teaspoon pumpkin pie spice
- 1 cup butter 2 sticks
- 3/4 cups granulated sugar
- 1 cup firmly packed brown sugar light or dark
- 2 eggs
- 1/4 cup milk
- 1 teaspoon vanilla
Topping
- 6 tablespoons sugar
- 1 teaspoons cinnamon
- 1 1/2 teaspoons pumpkin pie spice
Instructions
- For the dough:. In a bowl, sift together the flour, baking soda, baking powder, 1 teaspoon pumpkin pie spice and cream of tartar. Set aside.
- In a separate bowl, cream the butter and sugars until fluffy. Add the eggs, milk and vanilla. Mix well.
- Stir in the dry ingredients. Stir until just combined.
- Cover bowl (or remove dough from bowl and wrap in plastic wrap) and chill for 2+ hours. You can chill for up to 24 hours if you have time.
- When ready to bake, Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Form the dough into 1 inch balls. Mix cinnamon, pumpkin pie spice and sugar in a small bowl and roll each ball of dough through the cinnamon and sugar mixture to coat well.
- Place on a greased baking sheet or a cookie sheet covered with wax paper or silicone baking mat.
- Bake 8-9 minutes. Do not overbake. Allow to cool on baking sheet for at least ten minutes before transferring to a wire cooling rack.
Video
Nutrition
Disclaimer
Nutrition information is estimated as a courtesy. If using for medical purposes, please verify information using your own nutritional calculator. Percent Daily Values are based on a 2000 calorie diet.
Check out all of the cookie recipes on this site!
I hope your family enjoys a batch of these delicious pumpkin snickerdoodles on a fall day sometime soon!
If you want even more snickerdoodle flavor, check out these Snickerdoodle Bars from Carlsbad Cravings. Tastes of Lizzy T has a delicious Snickerdoodle Pie recipe. Our Best Bites has a Snickerdoodle Ice Cream recipe that I really need in my life.
SNICKERDOODLE ALL THE THINGS!
Originally published September 2017
Jennifer says
Wow. These were amazing! Let me tell you, I bake a lot of cookies and these were fantastic! I did not change or altar the ingredients or instructions, perfect as written! Thanks for a great recipe!!!
Christi Johnstone says
Jennifer, I’m so glad you enjoyed these!
Roz Lewis says
I made these and everyone loved them. They were so soft and chewy! Definitely make these for Thanksgiving. Thank you!!
Dana says
Yummy, but I think they could use just a little bit of salt.
Christi Johnstone says
Absolutely free free to add some! Salt is a very polarizing thing, some people LOVE it (like me – I literally carry travel salt in my purse) then others passionately hate it. Since it’s literally just a matter of taste, always feel free to add salt, or more salt, to a recipe. If I actually instructed people to add my level of salt love to recipes, my complaint list might be a bit too long. #allthesalt #evenwiththesweet
Julie says
Salted or unsalted butter? I never can remember which you’re supposed to use when baking.
Christi Johnstone says
Julie, whichever you prefer. For those sensitive to salt, I say go unsalted. I however actually really prefer a salt with sweet, so I’ll go salted, and add more salt in addition.
Vanessa says
Thanks for sharing! Do they keep long?
Christi Johnstone says
Hi Vanessa, for a few days like any other cookie would. I always suggest storing cookies in a container (or freezer bag) with a slice of sandwich bread to help keep them soft. I personally really like my cookies FRESH, so if you want more than a few days out of them, I suggest letting them cool completely, then putting them into a freezer bag and freezing them, thawing when needed.
Suzanne says
This looks so good! What a great way to spice up a classic! Does the snickerdoodle recipe work without pumpkin addition?
Christi Johnstone says
Hi Suzanne, if you would like, here is the non-pumpkin version of my Snickerdoodles!
Melissa Griffin says
I’m not seeing pumpkin in the ingredients list. Is it right in front of me and I’m just overlooking it?
Christi Johnstone says
No, these are just pumpkin spice. As mentioned in the post, because of the high water content in pumpkin, it tends to make cookies very cakey. So for these pumpkin cookies, I omitted the pumpkin and went with just the pumpkin spice, which really is what lends the flavor that we think of when we think of pumpkin. If you want a cookie with pumpkin, I have 3-4 of those on the site as well, so this is just something different to try. That said, these are my favorite!
Christina says
What is a serving size? 1 or 2 cookies?
Christi Johnstone says
The nutritional program in my recipe card that does the calculations considers each item (so cookie) a serving. Hope that helps.
Rick says
Made these… simply delicious!
Very addictive… though. Go to eat one and the whole tray is gone.
Marcie says
Can’t wait to try these! Do you know where I can get the mugs ? So cute!
Christi says
Marcie, I think I found the mug randomly on Zulily. I believe the brand was Sweet Water Decor.
Heather says
Perfect for this time of year! Can’t wait to try. Yummo. Thanks!