Pumpkin Bars. I’m in love with this recipe! I came up with this idea on the fly, wanting something super delish and ultra-pumpkin. The goal: pairing two incredible flavors and textures: butter shortbread and pumpkin pie custard. I’m sharing this recipe with the gluten-free option. These pumpkin bars are so good, they’re actually Thanksgiving-good.
Tomorrow is my God-daughter’s 25th birthday party. I’m hosting at my home for her and her invited guests. One of my all time best friends is her mom. This sister of mine LOVES pumpkin. She absolutely adores my pumpkin cake, especially with the recent recipe tweak I made to add even more pumpkin into the recipe. But these . . . I can hardly wait for her to come over and try them! They are a masterpiece.
The sweet-balance here is just-right. These taste barely sweet. The texture and flavors together are the best recipe I’ve ever created with pumpkin. I’m sure that these exist somewhere. I honestly haven’t searched. I just came up with it for my bestie, and was so pleased with the result, that despite how busy I am getting this party and my work-orders for the morning together, I had to take a moment to sit down and share this recipe. So let’s do this!
First thing we need to do, is get our tools and ingredients together. We need bake the shortbread crust bottom for these bars first. You can go to my shortbread recipe link, or you can go with the flow with me here and I’ll take you through it.
I like using a tart pan for cut-out bars and brownies, but you can use whatever pan you wish. If you dust-properly with butter or spray, and use parchment paper, you’re golden and anything can be released easily. Because we’re making bars, I went for my rectangular shape tart pan to lay out the shortbread. My pan is 9″x13″ inches and I have doubled my shortbread recipe to completely cover the bottom.
Mili’s Pumpkin Bars
Ingredients
Shortbread (This is a double recipe to fit a 9"x13" pan.)
- 16 tablespoons (two sticks) salted butter cut into pats and melted
- 2 and 1/2 cups all purpose flour or to make gluten-free, switch out for 1:1 ration gluten free, all purpose flour. If you're going for gluten free, add an entire extra cup of flour, so 3 and 1/2 total cups of gluten free flour to this recipe.
- 6 tablespoons granulated sugar
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
Pumpkin Custard
- 4 eggs
- 2 cups granulated sugar
- 1/2 cup cornstarch
- 2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
- 3 teaspoons ground cinnamon
- 1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg
- 1/4 teaspoon ground ginger
- 1/4 teaspoon ground cloves
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 4 cups pure pumpkin puree same as large can of pumpkin puree for making two pumpkin pies
- 1 and 1/2 cups evaporated milk
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Prepare baking sheet or pan: with spray or butter, parchment paper bottom and flour. Prepare shortbread: Melt butter. In one bowl, add the melted butter to the rest of the ingredients in the recipe.
- Mix shortbread ingredients until combined.
- Use your hand to combine. It will be pliable and easily manipulated onto the bottom of your prepared baking sheet or pan.
- Once you have it covered, use a fork to poke little holes throughout the dough. Bake dough for 10 minutes. While it bakes, prepare the pumpkin pie custard.
- This can all be hand-whisked in a single bowl. First, place the sugar, cornstarch and salt in a bowl, and top with the eggs and pure vanilla extract.
- Whisk these ingredients together until smooth.
- Add the cinnamon, nutmeg, ginger and cloves and whisk.
- Add in all that glorious pumpkin.
- You guessed it. Whisk it all together.
- Last, add the evaporated milk and whisk.
- The pumpkin custard batter will be smooth and ready to pour.
- Pour all of the batter onto the top of the pre-baked shortbread.
- Bake at 350 for 45-50 minutes, or until it has baked-through and your tester comes clean at the center. It will not crack. It will not deflate. It will maintain the beautiful height and firmness.
- Once the pan has completely cooled, use a sharp knife and cut bars. Keep at room temperature for the day, or my suggestion is to refrigerate. Serve as-is, or with whipped cream. These will be good for up to four days, but good luck keeping them around for that long!
- The cornstarch is the ingredient that allows for the firmness without compromising flavor or texture. What we have here is basically pumpkin pie to-go. Enjoy!
So there you have it my friends. Some of you have already tried this recipe and I’m happy to share that you’ve had the same, amazing results. Only the baking-time for the pumpkin custard could need a little adjustment, depending on how your home oven bakes. I’m making this recipe a second and third time before this month is over. I’m excited!
