Thanksgiving seems to represent the "bookend" of pumpkin season. Pumpkin recipes begin showing up on menus in August and then are non-stop through September and October in the form of breads, rolls, and soups and, finally, it ends with pumpkin pie on Thanksgiving. But there are variations on pumpkin. It doesn't always have to be a pumpkin pie.
Wow, I tell you, if you wanted a twist on the traditional pumpkin pie for Thanksgiving this recipe might be worth a look. I love these! This recipe for mini sugar cookie pumpkin pies gives your palette the best of all worlds. We made some of these using 5-gallon sugar recipe (quartered) and an adaptation of a Betty Crocker recipe.
🎂 What Do The Amish Have For Thanksgiving Desserts?
We've talked about how the Amish celebrate Thanksgiving and how food is a huge part of the traditions. While turkey, stuffing, gravies, salads, and such are traditional staples, dessert is where Amish cooks often really get creative, from pies to sweet confections like dump cakes.
In addition to these traditional desserts, some Amish communities also make unique desserts for Thanksgiving. For example, the Amish in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, are known for their shoofly pie, which is a molasses-based pie topped with a crumb topping. The Amish in Holmes County, Ohio, are known for their apple dumplings, which are made with apples, dough, and cinnamon and are often baked in a slow cooker.
Other regions incorporate local taste traditions into recipes, like the Amish in Florida might celebrate with Grapefruit Pie or the Amish in Montana will incorporate seasonal huckleberries onto their dessert menu.
📋 Step-by-Step Mini Pumpkin Pumpkin Sugar Cookie Pies
This is a three-step dessert consisting of cookies, filling, and frosting. And while it is a bit labor-intensive of a creation, your guests will thank you once they get done eating all of these!
ABOVE: The light creamy frosting is what really binds the different parts of the recipe together. Yum!
The end result is a really cool pumpkin pie-meets sugar cookie crust creation. You can use any sugar cookie recipe. I will say that a lot of the Amish (and Rosanna's would be included in the same mold) sugar cookies tend towards the lighter, cakier versions so the "crust" of these were sort of cakey (which I loved), but these might also work better with a denser, thinner, chewier sugar cookie recipe.
This is a superb "cookie pie", where you follow the sugar cookie recipe as usual, but make them into mini "pies" in muffin tins, fill with filling, and then top with frosting. Absolutely superb. And my guess is that if you wanted to "cheat" you could probably buy pre-made sugar cookie dough and use that.
🎃 More Amish Pumpkin Recipes
🖨️ Full Recipe
Mini Sugar Cookie Pumpkin Pies
Ingredients
Cookies
- ½ cup sugar, plus ⅛ cup sugar
- ¼ teaspoon baking soda
- 1 egg
- 1 teaspoon baking powder
- 6 tablespoons butter
- 1 teaspoon vanilla
- ½ cup lard or shortening
- 2 cups flour
- 3 oz (¼ cup plus ⅛ cup) milk
Filling
- 4 oz cream cheese
- ½ cup canned pumpkin
- ¼ cup sugar
- ½ teaspoon cinnamon
- ¼ teaspoon nutmeg
Frosting
- 4 oz cream cheese
- ½ teaspoon vanilla
- 2 cups powdered sugar
Instructions
Cookies
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
- Cream together the sugar, butter and lard.Add eggs and beat.
- Mix soda and vanilla into milk.
- Mix baking powder in with flour.
- Add milk and flour alternately to creamed mixture.
- Chill dough for approximately an hour (or overnight) before rolling ½” thick.
- Reserve dough until you are done with the filling below and follow instructions.
Filling
- Mix cream cheese until soft and smooth then add sugar and pumpkin and mix until well combined and lump free
- Line muffin pan with cupcake liners, and shape cookie dough into mini "pies". A
- Add filling to center of pies and bake 13-15 minutes at 350 until cookies are lightly golden and filling is set.
Frosting
- Mix until smooth, put in a Ziploc bag with the corner cutoff, and squeeze on top of the pies to look like whipped cream
Dianne
I made the Mini Pumpkin Pies and they were delicious but your directions leave out a few steps like actually making the cookies and when to add cinnamon and nutmeg. I also let mine cool completely before adding the dollop of frosting. I just rewrote it and went from there. Thank you so much for all these great recipes!!!
Kevin
Dianne, all good points, thanks for the feedback!
Mary
I couldn't print the entire recipe for the sugar cookie mini pumpkin pies because the stuff at the bottom of the page covers the lower part of the recipe before it goes to the next page.
Mary
I was trying to print the recipe for the Mini Sugar Cookie Pumplkin Pies, but couldn't print the entire recipe because all of the writing at the bottom of the page covers it up.