Next Post
This post may contain affiliate links, please see our privacy policy for details.
Spiced Pumpkin Shortbread Cookies. Super simple, extra delicious, and perfectly sweet shortbread cookies made with nutty brown butter, pumpkin butter, brown sugar, and pumpkin spice. Each cookie is rolled in sweet cinnamon sugar before baking – yum! Once the cookies are baked, I highly recommend going one step further and drizzling them with chocolate. These cookies are wonderful for entertaining, but equally great for snacking. Oh, and they’re perfect for gifting too!
As we draw closer to Halloween and the end of October, I’m starting to think more and more about the upcoming holiday season. I am just SO excited. This year will be really special and I’m looking forward to sharing some yummy recipes with you all!
I’ve started planning my Thanksgiving menus and brainstorming recipes for the month. There are so many fun things to plan for, we need only the best recipes this time of year!
When it comes to Thanksgiving, one of the cookies that’s always a part of my family’s celebrations is a shortbread cookie.
As a child, my mom would spend Thanksgiving in Pennsylvania with my grandpa’s side of the family. And until we moved to Colorado, I did too. My aunt would always have her famous turkey cookies out for snacking. Mom talks about these cookies every single year!
Because mom loves those cookies so much, I always make my own shortbread cookie every year. I, however, like to switch it up.
This year, it’s these amazing, delicious pumpkin shortbread cookies! Oh my goodness, we all enjoyed these so much!
Here are the details
Step 1: brown the butter
As with many of my cookie recipes, start by browning half of the butter. But only half! For the best flavor, brown the butter, and for the best cookie texture, use softened butter.
The mix of the two is the perfect combination for this style of shortbread cookie.
Step 2: make the cookie dough
Next, mix the brown butter with soft room-temperature butter. I prefer to use salted organic European style 85% fat butter. I like using Straus, this butter gives the best flavor and texture.
Then mix in the brown sugar, pumpkin butter, and vanilla.
For the dry ingredients, add flour, pumpkin pie spice, and salt. Mix until the dough forms.
Step 3: chill the dough
Divide the dough in half and roll each into a log.
Wrap the log of dough up with parchment paper and chill in the fridge until very firm. At least an hour or even overnight. This is a great dough to make ahead of time! And wonderful to gift during the holidays too!
Step 4: slice n’ bake
Once the dough is chilled, slice it into cookies, and get baking!
I adore a slice-bake-style cookie, especially for holiday entertaining. I can prepare the dough ahead of time and then, and here’s the secret, bake the cookies while your guests arrive. Just be sure to set a loud timer!
This is the most inviting and cozy way to welcome guests!
Step 5: dip, drizzle, and dunk in chocolate
The final step is optional, but of course, I highly recommend it! Dip each cookie into melted chocolate. The chocolate tastes so delectable when drizzled over these yummy pumpkin shortbread cookies.
I use a rich dark chocolate and then add a small pinch of sea salt.
The tiny pinch of salt creates a cookie that pretty much no one can stop snacking on! Everyone will enjoy these!
They’re sweet, nutty, and buttery, with amazing pumpkin flavor. And just the right amount of chocolate, plus a tinsy bit salty too.
Yumm!! And, these are really easy! We all can love that!
Looking for other sweet pumpkin recipes? Here are my favorites:
Soft Pumpkin Spice Ginger Cookies with Brown Butter Icing.
Cream Cheese Swirled Cinnamon Pumpkin Coffee Cake
Pumpkin Butter Chocolate Chip Blondies
Pumpkin Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies
Vanilla Chai Pumpkin Latte Cupcakes
Cream Cheese Swirled Cinnamon Pumpkin Butter Bread
Pumpkin Sugar Cookies with Cinnamon Brown Butter Frosting.
Lastly, if you make these Spiced Pumpkin Shortbread Cookies, be sure to leave a comment and/or give this recipe a rating! Above all, I love to hear from you guys and always do my best to respond to each and every comment. And of course, if you do make this recipe, don’t forget to tag me on Instagram! Looking through the photos of recipes you all have made is my favorite!
Spiced Pumpkin Shortbread Cookies
Servings: 24 cookies
Calories Per Serving: 134 kcal
Nutritional information is only an estimate. The accuracy of the nutritional information for any recipe on this site is not guaranteed.
Ingredients
- 1 1/2 sticks (12 tablespoons) salted butter, at room temperature
- 1/2 cup pumpkin butter
- 1 tablespoon vanilla extract
- 1/4 cup brown sugar
- 2 cups all-purpose flour
- 2 teaspoons pumpkin pie spice
- 1 large egg, beaten
- 1/2 cup coarse turbinado sugar
- 1 tablespoon cinnamon
- flaky sea salt
- 1 1/2 cups semi-sweet or milk chocolate, melted
Instructions
- 1. Add 6 tablespoons butter to a small saucepan set over medium heat. Cook until the butter begins to brown, about 3-4 minutes. Remove from the heat and transfer to a large heatproof bowl. 2. Beat together the remaining 6 tablespoons of butter, the cooled browned butter, pumpkin butter, brown sugar, and vanilla until creamy. Add the flour and pumpkin pie spice. Mix until combined. If the dough is too sticky to form a ball, add 2-4 tablespoons of flour. 3. Place the dough on a large piece of parchment paper. Divide in half and shape each ball into a log around 6 inches long. Chill 1-2 hours, or up to 5 days.4. Preheat the oven to 350° F. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper. 5. On a plate, mix the coarse sugar, cinnamon, and a pinch of salt. Unwrap the logs and place them on a cutting board. Brush with the beaten egg and roll in the coarse sugar to coat. Cut 11-12 cookies from each log.6. Arrange the cookies on the prepared baking sheet. Bake 12-14 minutes, until the edges are golden brown. Let the cookies cool on the baking sheet. 7. Drizzle the chocolate over each cookie and sprinkle with flaky sea salt. Enjoy a couple with that melty chocolate!
Notes
To Make Ahead: the dough log can be kept in the fridge for up to 5 days.
To Freeze: slice the chilled log into cookies, then rewrap the log and freeze for up to 3 months. To bake, let the cookies thaw on the baking sheet for 5-10 minutes, then bake as directed, adding an additional 1-2 minutes if needed.
These were not the shortbread consistency I would expect 🙁 like others said, they came out weirdly…wet? sad because I wanted to make these for my bf’s birthday and he loves shortbread and pumpkin, but after doing a trial run I think I’ll look elsewhere for another recipe.
Hi Allison! I’m so sorry about that! Thanks for the feedback, I will look into this! xT
Easy cut and bake cookies.
I used Trader Joe’s pumpkin butter and
Kerry gold butter. I mixed all the ingredients in the mixer. At the end I stirred in chocolate chips.(instead of drizzling chocolate at the end)
I refrigerated the dough for a couple of hours.
Easy to cut and bake. I cooked the cookies at 350 for 15 minutes.
They came out perfect.
Thank you so much Rachel! So glad you enjoyed this recipe! xT
For the effort, these are pretty “meh” (and they don’t require that much effort)! If I had the guess, I think the pumpkin butter is a bit superfluous, and actually makes them a little gummy. The spices are definitely doing the heavy lifting in terms of flavor! I agree with some of the other commenters that some more salt would help these.
Thank you for the feedback!
I agree with Margaret. The texture wasn’t great or what I normally expect from a shortbread cookie. They need salt and a little more sugar. I know shortbread is not normally overly sweet but these were barely sweet at all. Even after being rolled in sugar and dipped in semi sweet chocolate they just didn’t satisfy my sweet tooth. Most of Tieghan’s recipes are awesome, this just wasn’t my fav.
The reviews on these are WILD. When I say I exclusively use HBH recipes, I mean it. I use one dessert recipe at least once a week and main meal recipes nightly. I get RAVE reviews every single time. Every time I use one of Tieghan’s recipes, it is a success. Including this one. While the shortbread isn’t the standard texture, it’s still really freaking delicious. I dipped all of mine in chocolate and gave them to my husband to bring into work and everyone loved them. I live at sea level and the only modification I’ve ever had to make is adjustments in bake time. So use common sense. If your cookie isn’t done after 12 minutes, bake it longer. I had to bake these for 17 minutes. I had zero cooking/baking experience, I hated cooking and Tieghan has given me so much confidence in the kitchen and I’m so grateful. There are no wasting of ingredients here. It’s literally a super yummy cookie.
Wow thank you SO much for this comment Casey! So sweet of you! I really appreciate your positive feedback! 🙂 xT
I appreciate this review a lot. I haven’t made these yet. Was just reading the reviews as I was trying to decide between a couple different ideas. I’m really grateful for Tieghan and the work she puts into this blog still. She puts out so many new recipes every week. I follow a lot of bloggers who don’t do that after several successful cookbooks and other projects. I also didn’t like cooking anymore and hadn’t baked in AGES. Now I use her recipes successfully while making them gluten free all the time. She’s brought joy back to my GF cooking and baking and my family is also really thankful.
Hi Rachel! Aw thank you so so much for your sweet comment! Love to hear this! xT
I made these for halloween and I love the concept for thesr cookies! I really like using your recipes as starting points and experimenting with them. Personally, I didn’t call this a shortbread when I shared it with friends, I just said it was shortbread inspired since I figured it used a similar method. I’m hoping to try making it again by upping the pumpkin spice and maybe cooking down the pumpkin butter to get it really thick and concentrated. Either way, I’m super excited to keep playing with the recipe and sharing your recipes with family and friends.
Thanks so much Iman!! Love to hear that you are able to make the recipes your own:) I appreciate you giving this a try and your feedback! xT
I think I am going to have to give up trying to bake with HBH’s recipes. Everytime they don’t live up to expectations. Something always goes wrong with the texture or it ends up underbaked. I made these, following the recipe exactly, several times as I love shortbread cookies. These were very chewy and the flavor was just..”off”.
Teagan, I live at sea level and I am suspecting that the issue lies in the fact that the recipes must not be adjusted for altitude since you live up so high in the mountains. That’s the only thing I can think of as I am following the directions very closely. Could you consider adjusting the recipes for those of us that live at sea level please? I would love to keep baking from your recipes but I’m tired of wasting all of these expensive ingredients for a subpar product.
Thank you,
Wendy
These are fine. I agree with another rating that the dough does needs some salt. So if you are planning to make this recipe definitely add some salt to the dough mix. The salted butter and salt sprinkle on top isn’t enough in my opinion. I used demerara sugar instead of turbinado because i didn’t have it in the pantry and it worked great. Slight crunchy edge. I threw a lot of the cinnamon sugar mix away because i a lot of excess after coating the logs. Nice idea but I’ll stick to traditional shortbread cookies.
Hey Jenny! Thank you so much for the feedback!
These are kinda just OK. I think there needs to be a teaspoon of salt added to the dough; without it, the flavors are kind of flat. I added some, but I don’t think it was enough.
Thanks for letting me know Lisa! xT
These are delicious! I used my own homemade pumpkin butter. The chocolate drizzle and the sea salt at the end make the flavors pop. Also, I was careful not to overmix the flour (for others re: texture etc.).
So glad you loved these cookies Penny! xT
Disappointing. The texture was slightly too dense and chewy for a typical shortbread, which should have a bit of a crunch and then melt in your mouth. The flavor was a 5 out of 10. I measured exactly. I used Kerrygold butter and Trader Joe’s pumpkin butter. I refrigerated for approximately 20 hours before baking . I baked one batch for 12 minutes, one for 13, and one for 14 with the same results. I routinely verify my oven temperature with a separate thermometer.
As is often the case, the recipe is slightly difficult to follow in that the ingredients are not separated out by step or stage (i.e. cookie ingredients, then egg, sugar and spice for rolling, and then chocolate for dipping) This requires that you are referencing the directions and the ingredients, and the narrative (and sometimes the photos 🙂) making it easy to miss a step or incorrectly mix ingredients.
Tieghan, when a recipe doesn’t work or is missing an ingredient or has multiple comments indicating either confusion or disappointment in an outcome, I wish you would respond in a way that does not result in the baker believing they done something wrong; Your typical responses of ‘Are you sure you followed all the steps? Did you measure carefully? Did you use the right temperature?” Or “Sorry it didn’t work out for you.” are not kind or helpful when it is clear that the recipe needs some reworking. I enjoy many of your recipes but always feel a bit frustrated with the frequency with which they fail or results in a waste of time and ingredients.
My intent is not to be unkind, and there are very few comments yet, so this recipe is not one where the comments indicate consistent failure, but given that it didn’t work for me despite all my excellent endeavors, I am providing feedback that your fans and followers deserve a little more sometimes.
Thank you for listening.
Update: after letting the cookie sit out for another hour or so after cooling to, hopefully,crisp up, I would downgrade the flavor to a 2 out of 10. There’s a bitterness, or maybe a lack of sweetness. Also, maybe it would be more helpful if there were a specified thickness rather than the number of layers to divide each roll into…? . Maybe use powdered sugar…vs. brown sugar…?Just not the right texture or flavor. Hopefully, others enjoy it more than I did.
Thanks, Gemma, for your very informative review!
I was thinking of making these, but lately, I’ve been very wary of any of Teegun’s recipes. They are full of typos which indicates a real lack of professionalism. (Yes, I know how to spell her name but she is so careless in everything she writes and posts, maybe this will get her attention to proofread carefully!)
And typos aside, ingredients are missing, mislabeled, not in the right order, cooking times are off, etc. Everyone is busy, and when I want to take the time to make something, the recipe should be spot on!
Gemma, I really appreciate your very thought out critique of these cookies, and also I very much appreciate your experience as a cook/baker–it shows in how you tested these cookies varying the baking times, etc.
Unfortunately, Tiegun couldn’t find it within herself to respond to your comment. She often says she appreciates constructive comments, but she clearly can’t handle it. And even worse, her die-hard supporters attack the slightest constructive comments with vicious commentary. They’re the real “haters” here as T likes to point out.
Please know your comment was welcome and appreciated by me and probably many others–you saved me from trying what would have been another failed recipe from HBH.
You are very rude. Why are you here if there’s “so many failed recipes”, “typos”, etc.? Your comment and Gemmas are rude, not constructive. I don’t really follow Tieghan, but I have made her recipes and enjoyed them. To generalize and use sweeping criticism of her recipes always “failing”is unfair and untrue. She works hard creating new recipes and they are beautifully photographed. If she is not your cup of tea, move on. I’m sure she doesn’t need to be taught or scolded by random strangers on the internet. Build women up, not tear them down. This unfortunately reeks of jealousy. Do better, yikes!
L.T., where on earth did you see anything rude or any “scolding” in Gemma’s comment? That was the kind of in-depth recipe review I see on many food blogs and I came here to leave a similar one after these cookies failed for me.
Granted I don’t follow this blog closely or know who Tieghan is so I don’t know what kind of “drama” happens here (Lori’s comment about die-hard fans seems to have some truth to it…) but I would much rather see actual recipe reviews like Gemma’s than random comments that say things like “you’re just jealous” in a recipe comment section.
Help, please! The ingredients list an egg but the directions don’t include an egg.
i thought so too & thought i’d read it thoroughly, but it is there as an egg wash. i haven’t made shortbread for awhile, & although an egg didn’t make sense to me i second guessed & added it to the dough. which meant extra flour was needed. the dough logs are chilling so i guess we’ll see if they are salvageable 🫤 i should have read all the way through one more time😔
See step 5
Hi Lenore! So sorry for any confusion, the recipe calls for one beaten egg! xT
If you click on the words “pumpkin butter” it takes you to her recipe
Hi Tieghan I’m excited to try your pumpkin short bread cookies! I’m wondering what pumpkin butter is though -do you mean a pumpkin nut butter or a fleshy pumpkin butter like apple butter?! Wondering where I can get either or do you make your own.
Thank you!! We love your recipes 😊
Hi there! Pumpkin butter is pumpkin puree cooked with warm fall spices! xT
Lenore, the egg is used to brush on the roll to help the sugar and cinnamon stick to the cookie edges prior to baking.😉
Can I use pumpkin puree instead of pumpkin butter? Trying to make sure I use all that I have in my pantry if I can . . . I have all the other ingredients.
Hi there! Yes, that should be fine! You cookies just might come out a little bit more cakey! xT
Trader Joe’s sells pumpkin butter. It’s very popular there.
What is pumpkin butter? Is it pumpkin purée?
Hi Jean. It is sweetened pumpkin puree seasoned with warm spices. Click on the link in the recipe to take you to the recipe for pumpkin butter. You can also buy store bought pumpkin butter if you don’t want to make it. You should also check out apple butter if you like pumpkin butter.
Hi Jean! It’s pumpkin puree cooked with spices to make a sort of jam/butter! xT