Crunchy Pumpkin Cookies

Crunchy Pumpkin Cookies are beautifully buttery, melt in your mouth and tasting of pumpkin and cinnamon! Perfect cookie with a crunch for any occasion!

These Crunchy Pumpkin Cookies have been the labour of love! You know by now how pumpkin obsessed I am and so far I have been pretty lucky with my pumpkin puree based bakes. They all worked first time! These cookies had different idea!

The problem was that I wanted to create a crunchy cookie, one with a bit of a snap as majority of pumpkin cookies out there are the soft ones. Instead, all I was getting were cookies that were not even cakey or chewy or soft but kind of on a claggy side – not good!

Needless to say, after some experimentation I finally managed to achieve lovely, buttery, melt in your mouth pumpkin cookies with a bit of a crunch – utterly delicious!

My initial problem was down to the fact that I underestimated the level of moisture in pumpkin puree, the ratio of butter to flour for that buttery, melt in the mouth consistency and also the role that oven temperature and timings play here. I got there in the end though and couldn’t be happier with these little pumpkin cookies now! They are a doddle to make and the dough itself is a pleasure to work with. It isn’t sticky at all and rolls out and cuts beautifully!

Tips for baking Crunchy Pumpkin Cookies!

• Make sure that pumpkin puree you are using is really dry (I couldn’t stress it enough)! Even though I’m a huge advocate of making your own puree it might be safer to use tinned version here. Although if you can get your hands on my favourite Hokkaido Pumpkin you should be ok with homemade version (read my tips and tricks on making your own pumpkin puree here).
• Chilling the dough is quite crucial as it is with majority of buttery cookies/biscuits. 30 min is an absolute minimum but if you can spare it more time please do.
• Make sure you stick to the ratio of flour to butter and don’t try to make these “skinny” as they will simply not work. Trust me, I’ve tried it!
• These work best when baked at slightly lower temperature of 170C/325F/Gas Mark 3 and for slightly longer (approx 20 min). Most of us know our ovens well though and as they can be tricky beasts at times, make sure you start watching your cookies from 15 min on to prevent them from getting too coloured.
• As soon as they’re cold transfer them into a tin/box/jar to keep them as fresh and as crunchy as possible for longer! They will keep their crunch for a couple of days but after that they will slowly start going a bit softer (still lovely and melt in your mouth though).

Couple more tips…

This recipe will give you approx 37 cookies (that’s what I got with my pumpkin cutter) and they were gone within a day! Feel free to use any cutter you fancy. We will be making some more of these to share out on Halloween and ghost, bat and witch’s hat are waiting at the ready.

Feel free to decorate these with some icing if you want to! It could be a nice rainy afternoon project with your kids. My lot will not touch any iced cookies or biscuits hence we decided to leave these plain.

How to make Crunchy Pumpkin Cookies?

• Put all the ingredients in a bowl of food processor and pulse gently until they turn into smooth and silky, orange dough. Turn out onto the kitchen counter, divide dough in half and shape into two flat disks. Wrap them in cling film and put in the fridge for minimum 30 minutes or longer if you can.
• If you don’t have food processor simply sieve your flour, icing sugar and cinnamon into a large bowl and add cold and cubed butter. Rub the butter and flour mixture together with your fingers until they start looking like breadcrumbs. Add remaining ingredients and mix them in with your hand, kneading gently until you reach smooth and silky, orange dough consistency. Proceed as per instructions above.

• After the dough has had time to chill, take it out of the fridge and onto the floured kitchen surface. Roll it out to the thickness of pound coin and cut the cookie shapes using the cutter of your choice. Re-roll the remaining dough and repeat until you’ve used up all the dough.
• Bake your cookies on the baking sheet lined with baking parchment in the oven preheated to 170C/325F/Gas Mark 3 for approx 20 min (keep an eye on them from 15 min on just in case your oven is slightly unpredictable).
• Transfer baked cookies onto cooling rack and repeat with the remaining ones. Wait for them to cool and enjoy!

Print Pin

5 from 7 votes

Crunchy Pumpkin Cookies

Crunchy Pumpkin Cookies are beautifully buttery, melt in your mouth and tasting of pumpkin and cinnamon! Perfect cookie with a crunch for any occasion!

Course Biscuits / Cookies, Snack, Treat

Cuisine International

Keyword biscuits, cookies, crunchy cookies, halloween, pumpkin puree

Prep Time 10 minutes

Cook Time 20 minutes

Chilling dough 30 minutes

Total Time 30 minutes

Servings 37 cookies

Calories 83kcal

Author Jo Allison

Ingredients

Metric - US Customary

• 300 g plain flour/ white rye flour/ white spelt flour more for dusting your work surface
• 200 g unsalted butter cold and cubed
• 100 g icing sugar
• 137 g pumpkin puree see notes below
• 2 egg yolks
• 1 tsp cinnamon
• zest of 1/2 orange optional

Instructions

• Put all the ingredients in a bowl of food processor and pulse gently until they turn into smooth and silky, orange dough. Turn out onto the kitchen counter, divide dough in half and shape into two flat disks. Wrap them in cling film and put in the fridge for minimum 30 minutes (a bit longer would be even better).
• If you don't have food processor simply sieve your flour, icing sugar and cinnamon into a large bowl and add cold and cubed butter. Rub the butter and flour mixture together with your fingers until they start looking like breadcrumbs. Add remaining ingredients and mix them in with your hand, kneading gently until you reach smooth and silky, orange dough consistency. Proceed as per instructions above.
• After the dough has had time to chill, take it out of the fridge and onto the floured kitchen surface. Roll it out to the thickness of pound coin and cut the cookie shapes using the cutter of your choice. Re-roll the remaining dough and repeat until you've used up all the dough. 
• Bake your cookies on the baking sheet lined with baking parchment in the oven preheated to 170C/325F/Gas Mark 3 for approx 20 min (keep an eye on them from 15 min on just in case your oven is slightly unpredictable). 
• Transfer baked cookies onto cooling rack and repeat with the remaining ones. Wait for them to cool and enjoy!

Notes

• Calories are approximate and per cookie/biscuit.
• Make sure you use really dry pumpkin puree for this bake. The less moisture the more crunchy and melt in your mouth final result.

Nutrition

Nutrition Facts

Crunchy Pumpkin Cookies

Amount Per Serving (0 g)

Calories 83 Calories from Fat 36

% Daily Value*

Fat 4g6%

Saturated Fat 2g10%

Cholesterol 22mg7%

Sodium 1mg0%

Potassium 18mg1%

Carbohydrates 9g3%

Fiber 0g0%

Sugar 2g2%

Protein 1g2%

Vitamin A 725IU15%

Vitamin C 0.2mg0%

Calcium 5mg1%

Iron 0.5mg3%

* Percent Daily Values are based on a 2000 calorie diet.

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