The perfect way to celebrate the coming of Fall is with a nice pumpkin dessert. Pumpkin pie is great but pumpkin cheesecake is even better. You don’t have to take a trip to the Cheesecake Factory to sink your teeth into a slice of creamy and cinnamon-y pumpkin cheesecake, when you can make your own at home with this easy recipe.
Ingredients
Crust:
- 1 tablespoon sugar
- 1 1/2 cups crushed graham crackers
- 5 tablespoons of melted butter
- 1 teaspoon cinnamon
Filling:
- 1 cup sugar
- 1/2 cup brown sugar
- 3 packages of cream cheese (8 oz. per package)
- 1 tablespoon vanilla extract
- 1 can puree pumpkin (15 oz.)
- 3 eggs
- 1 teaspoon cinnamon
- 1 teaspoon pumpkin pie spice
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 1/4 teaspoon nutmeg
Directions
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
Crust:
- To make the crust, combine graham cracker crumbs, melted butter, cinnamon, and sugar in a medium bowl. You can also combine the ingredients in a food processor and pulse until it gets crumbly. Be sure not to over mix or you will have a graham cracker paste.
- Press the graham cracker mixture into the bottom of an 8-inch springform pan. Place foil around the pan, bake the crust for 5 minutes and set aside.
Filling:
- For the filling, combine cream cheese, sugar, brown sugar, vanilla, and eggs in a large mixing bowl and mix with an electric mixer until smooth. Then, add pumpkin puree, cinnamon, pumpkin pie spice, nutmeg, and salt and mix well.
- Pour mixture into the pan and bake for 1 hour, or until the top of the cheesecake has a slightly dark color.
- Remove the cheesecake from the oven and let it cool. Once the cake reaches room temperature, place it in the refrigerator. After the cake has chilled, take it from the refrigerator and remove the pan sides.
Pumpkin Cheesecake Remixes
- You’re not limited to using the recipe above. Feel free to play around ingredients to craft a remixed version of plain pumpkin cheesecake. For example, swap out the graham crackers for ginger snaps for a gingersnap crust. Also, drizzle on some homemade caramel sauce — all you need is brown sugar, half and half, butter, vanilla, and salt. Simply enough, right?
- You can also take your cheesecake baking skills to the next level with a double layer pumpkin cheesecake. On the top you have a cinnamon and pumpkin flavored filling and at the bottom is a plain creamy cheesecake filling. Yum!
- If you want to impress your friends at your next Fall party or gathering with pumpkin cheesecake bites. For these, press the crust mixture in the bottom of a cupcake liner, add filling, bake for 20 minutes, and top with whipped cream.
