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Celebrating autumn pumpkins with these easy Soft Pumpkin Sugar Cookies with Cinnamon Brown Butter Frosting. Made with maple, spiced pumpkin butter, double the vanilla, and a little bit of chocolate. These cookies are soft, pumpkiny, and perfectly sweet with wonderful pumpkin spice flavor. They’re generously glazed with a sweet, thick, and creamy cinnamon brown butter frosting. The secret is simple – pumpkin butter. It keeps these cookies incredibly flavorful. Fun to bake, delicious to eat, these cookies make for a great homemade gift!
Cookie season is upon us and I’m starting a little early. It’s crazy to me that Tuesday is November 1st, but since I can’t slow time down, I’m embracing the season! I can already feel the holiday craze – cookies are needed!
It seems I say this every year, but it feels like Thanksgiving is often overlooked. I get it, Christmas is my thing too. But I try my best to at least have fun with Thanksgiving recipes. So we’re starting just a few days early with these cookies!
These are the perfect November cookie – though they’re great for Halloween too!
I made these just this weekend. If you follow daily, you know that we’ve had lots of cozy weather – and snow, so baking was welcomed. As with most of my holiday desserts, I always fear they might not turn out. But it’s the sweets that I make on a complete whim that I often end up loving most!
Sometimes not thinking too hard about an idea and just acting on the excitement is the best course of action. And that’s what I did with these. I had a lot of fun with them, and well, they’re pretty delicious too. I made them with my favorite pumpkin butter, which truly makes these cookies extra special.
The steps
Thankfully, if you want to bake these up tonight or this weekend for your Halloween parties, they’re easy.
As usual with most cookies, start out by beating the butter and sugar together. I love to use brown sugar for an added depth of flavor. Next, beat in the maple and pumpkin butter, lots of vanilla, and an egg.
Next comes the dry ingredients the cinnamon and nutmeg are key. Once you mix everything in you’ll have yummy pumpkin sugar cookie dough.
Roll out the dough, cut, and bake. There’s absolutely nothing fancy here.
Whenever I make any kind of cut-out cookie, I always like to roll out the dough, cut the cookies, and then freeze the cut cookies on a baking sheet for a few minutes. This ensures that the cookies hold their pumpkin shape.
Also, If you don’t want to roll out the dough, drop tablespoon size amounts of dough onto a baking sheet and bake away.
Now the frosting, it’s beyond delicious, and easy to make. Just butter, powdered sugar, cinnamon, and salt. Simple, yet delicious.
Drizzle the frosting over each cookie, then, if you like, decorate with chocolate and cinnamon sugar. Doesn’t get easier, but looks so cute once finished!
Make these tonight, for Halloween weekend, and then, again for Thanksgiving. The perfect sweet, soft pumpkin cookie!
Looking for other sweet pumpkin recipes? Here are my favorites:
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
Lastly, if you make these Soft Pumpkin Sugar Cookies with Cinnamon Brown Butter Frosting, 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!
Soft Pumpkin Sugar Cookies with Cinnamon Brown Butter Frosting
Servings: 32 cookies
Calories Per Serving: 204 kcal
Nutritional information is only an estimate. The accuracy of the nutritional information for any recipe on this site is not guaranteed.
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Ingredients
Pumpkin Cookies
- 2 sticks (1 cup) salted butter, at room temperature
- 2/3 cup brown sugar
- 1/4 cup maple syrup
- 1/2 cup pumpkin butter
- 1 tablespoon vanilla extract
- 1 egg
- 3 cups all-purpose flour
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- 1 teaspoon cinnamon
- 1/4 teaspoon nutmeg
- 1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
Brown Butter Frosting
- 1 stick (1/2 cup) salted butter
- 2 cups confectioners sugar
- 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
- 1/4 teaspoon cinnamon
- melted chocolate, for decorating
- cinnamon sugar, for sprinkling
Instructions
- 1. In a bowl, beat together the butter, brown sugar, and vanilla until light and fluffy, about 3-5 minutes. Add the maple and beat to combine, then beat in the pumpkin butter. Add the egg and mix until combined. Add the flour, baking soda, cinnamon, nutmeg, and salt, beating until combined.2. Flour your work surface. Divide the dough in half and flatten each half into a disk. Roll out the dough to 1/3 inch thickness. Make sure you are using enough flour or your dough will stick. Cut out the cookies into your desired shapes. Transfer the cookies to a parchment-lined baking sheet. Place the baking sheet in the freezer for 15-20 minutes, until firm. Roll out the leftover scraps, and repeat with the remaining dough.3. Preheat oven to 350°. Bake the cookies 10-12 minutes (for soft cookies) or until golden. Cool on the baking sheet. 4. To make the frosting. Melt the butter in a skillet. Allow the butter to brown lightly until it smells toasted, about 2-3 minutes. Remove from the heat and let cool 5 minutes. Whisk in the powdered sugar, 1 tablespoon water, the vanilla, and cinnamon until smooth, adding 1 tablespoon of water to thin the frosting as needed. If the frosting gets too thin, just add a little more sugar, and if it gets too thick, add a splash of water. The frosting should be thin enough to drizzle. 5. Frost each cooled cookie. I used melted chocolate to draw on the pumpkin "leaves". Sprinkle lightly with cinnamon sugar. Store in an airtight container for up to 4 days.
Notes
Pumpkin Butter: if you don’t have pumpkin butter, use 1/3 cup canned pumpkin puree, but blot away any excess water/moisture with a paper towel to remove the added moisture.
Flour: if the dough is feeling too sticky to touch, add 2-6 tablespoons additional flour.
Not crazy about The Frosting. Cookies are good but not great (compared to all the other delicious recipes from you!)
Hi Ronnie,
Thanks for giving these cookies a try and sharing you feedback, so sorry to hear they were not enjoyed. xx
Ok friends, after trying these a few times, I figured out how to make these work. What can I say? I like a challenge, haha. Once I did, they were great! Sorry Tieghan, I love basically all of your recipes, but this one needed some adjustments. I hope the following helps others!
First, definitely add the additional 6 tbsp of flour. I also added a lot more spices – I used more cinnamon and nutmeg than called for and also added some ginger, cloves, allspice, and a touch of mace. This helped with flavor of the cookie.
After you add the additional flour, the dough will still be quite sticky – too sticky to roll out, but if you add even more flour, the cookies will have less flavor. So take the dough and divide it in thirds. Put each third in some plastic wrap and flatten into a thin-ish disk. Put in the fridge for about an hour, or in the freezer if you have less time. This will help the butter firm up again so that it’s easier to roll out.
Once firm, roll out on a well-floured surface and move pretty quickly. I had to put the scraps back in the freezer while I worked with the other disks of dough or else it was really sticky. I put the cut out cookies on the baking trays in the freezer as directed but only for about 10-15 minutes. They baked great at about 10 minutes in the oven and were nice and soft.
The frosting also needed some help. Adding water just made the glaze kind of curdly and separated. I added a few splashes of whole milk and that’s when things started to come together well. So definitely add the milk rather than water to get it drizzle-able. After that, it drizzled on great and the cinnamon sugar added a nice touch. I did not find that the glazed cracked or fell off – I think the milk helped with that.
So these are a great, tasty little cookie that are really fun for a celebration! Just plan accordingly with your time so that the dough can firm up again before working with it. And add some more spices for flavor.
Hey Katrina,
Amazing!! I love to hear that this recipe was enjoyed, thanks so much for giving it a try! Thanks so much for sharing what worked well for you and the tips:) xx
I was really excited to make these and had the recipe saved to make for Thanskgiving. I made the cookies last night and was greatly disappointed. I wish I would have read the reviews first because I experienced all the same things… dough was too wet to work with, not much flavor to the baked cookie, the frosting tastes salty and sweet, and the frosting broke. I added about an extra cup of flour just to work with the dough, hence the reason they don’t taste like anything. I even added an extra teaspoon of cinnamon and pumpkin pie spice. The frosting didn’t come together with the ingredients listed, so I must have added at least 6 teaspoons of milk or more to get it to a drizzle consistency. The cookies look cute, just like the pictures, but don’t taste like much with a salted, sweet frosting that is confusing to the palate.
Hi Cheryl,
Thanks so much for giving these cookies a try, so sorry to hear you had so many issues. If you would have just pop the dough into the fridge for a bit, this might have really helped. Again, sorry for the trouble! xx
Could you brown the butter that goes into the dough, like your Christmas cutout cookies from last year? I loved the depth of flavor that added and would be curious if it works on these! Thanks!!
Hey Shirey,
Sure, that would work, you will just want to allow the butter to cool before using it. I hope you love this recipe! xx
These cookies are amazing!! I was out of pumpkin butter so I subbed in apple butter. Absolutely delicious!!
Hey Ashley,
Happy Sunday!🌾🌽 I love to hear that this recipe was enjoyed, thanks so much for making it and sharing your feedback! xx
I made the basic cookie recipe as drop cookies, and they turned out so delicious! Thank you for an usual take on a sugar cookie. 🙂
Hey Allison,
Happy Tuesday!! Thanks a lot for making this recipe and sharing your feedback, I love to hear that it turned out tasty for you! xT
Really great and flavorful, kinda wet dough. So I rolled in sugar and then did the peanut butter cookie fork thing and baked, came out great once I switched strategies. Highly recommend
Hey Holly,
Happy Sunday!! I truly appreciate you giving this a try and sharing your feedback, so glad it was enjoyed:) xx
I was excited to find a recipe with maple and pumpkin butter but these cookies didn’t taste like anything, despite following the recipe and adding an additional 1/2 teaspoon of pumpkin pie spice along with the cinnamon and nutmeg. The dough was really wet too, so much that I had to add additional flour and refrigerate it prior to rolling it out. Won’t be making these again.
Hi Emily,
Sorry to hear these cookies were not enjoyed, please let me know if there is anything that I can do to help! xx
This sounds awesome. How would you store the cookies? I always have trouble storing my baked goods when it has that type of frosting.
Thank you!!!
Thanks so much Jenn!! I just store in an airtight container on the counter. Please let me know if you have any other questions! xT
SO GOOD!!!
Hey Hannah,
Happy Friday!!🌻 I am so glad to hear that this recipe was enjoyed, thanks so much for trying it and sharing your review:) xT
Hi! I made these delicious cookies by exactly following this recipe. LOVE THEM!
However, I want to use all the extra pumpkin butter to make more cookies for Thanksgiving. Do I freeze the dough, cut out the cookies and freeze before baking, or cut out and bake and then freeze?
Thanks for such a great recipe that makes absolutely beautiful cookies!
Hey Cynthia,
Amazing!! So glad to hear that this recipe turned out well for you, thanks so much for making it and sharing your review:) I would freeze the dough! xT
They are absolutely delicious and worth the work. They are however labor intensive. I would recommend dividing the dough in thirds, wrapping each disk in Saran Wrap and freezing for 5-10 minutes prior to rolling it out. Dust a SilPat non-stick silicone mat with a generous amount of flour before you rollout, then freeze again for approximately 10 minutes.
Hey Peggy,
Happy Sunday!! So glad to hear that this recipe turned out well for you, thanks a lot for giving it a try! xT
Hello,
I have pumpkin puree that I need to use in our freezer from our punpkins, could I substitute the pumpkin butter with the pumpkin puree?
These look really good!
Hey there,
So sorry, you are going to want to stick with the pumpkin butter for this recipe, the pumpkin puree is going to contain more moisture resulting in a different cookie dough. Please let me know if you have any other questions! xT
I just made these using puree. I went through several paper towels but they came out perfect. I started with this step and blotted alot and then left on paper towels until ready to add. I also noticed my original 1/3 cup was less as I blotted out the excess water and ended up using 3/4 of a 15 oz can of puree to get 1/3 cup puree. Good luck. These cookies are deelishous😋
Hey Brenda,
Happy Monday!! 🍁 Love to hear that this recipe turned out well for you, thanks a bunch for making it! Thanks for sharing what worked well for you! xT
These cookies were so delicious!!! I made them and everyone that tried them went crazy for them, even the non-pumpkin lovers lol. I didn’t have a pumpkin cookie cutter so I just used the regular round cookie frosted the top with an even layer, and then made little pumpkins out of melted chocolate on top. Still came out so cute!
Hey Jenny,
Wonderful!! I love to hear that this recipe was enjoyed, thanks so much for giving it a try! xx
I really struggled with this recipe. The dough was super sticky, even after an overnight in the fridge and freezing twice to cutout and bake. The frosting/glaze broke, too. The end result is tasty, but just not worth the time and effort in my opinion. I will not bake these again.
Hi Lisa,
Thanks for giving this recipe a try and sharing your feedback. So sorry to hear they were not enjoyed. Please let me know if there is anything that I can help with! xT