Pumpkin Pie Spice Cookies

These cute little pumpkin cutout cookies are chock-full of pumpkin spices and capture the tastes of fall in every bite!

I really dislike pumpkin pie. This time of year it is found everywhere! I’ve discovered that it is truly the pumpkin I dislike though- not the spices. These cookies offer all the yummy spices of pumpkin pie without a hint of actual pumpkin… plus they are cute as can be! These cookies can be cut into any shape you like and decorated accordingly. I had a hard time not eating them all up before  I decorated them- so use frosting…or don’t…. maybe just cut them in circles and add a few sugar sprinkles to make them really easy!

Here’s how we made the cookies- and how we decorated them. (printable recipe)

INGREDIENTS:

• 2 sticks (1 cup) unsalted butter (softened)
• 1 1/2 cups of granulated sugar
• 2 eggs
• 1 teaspoon of vanilla
• 1 teaspoon of butter flavoring
• 3 cups of flour
• 1 teaspoon of baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon of salt
• 2 Tablespoons of pumpkin spice seasoning

DIRECTIONS:

• Preheat oven to 350F degrees.
• In a large mixing bowl, cream together butter and sugar until smooth.
• Add eggs, vanilla and butter flavoring and mix well.
• Add all dry ingredients and mix until able to knead into a firm ball of dough (add additional flour if necessary).
• Roll out on a floured counter with a flour coated rolling pin to desired thickness.
• Cut using a large (I used a 6″) round cookie cutter
• Use a knife or pizza cutter to divide circle into even triangle “pie” pieces.
• Place cookies on ungreased cookie sheets and bake at 350F degrees for 8 to 10 minutes.
• Slide baked cookies onto parchment paper to cool completely.
• To decorate, use royal icing (so it will harden into a firm shell) my recipe for that is here.
• Use thicker icing to outline the shape of the cookie and then flood the inside of the outline with thinner icing.

• Allow icing to harden up and then make the “crust” by using royal icing colored to match the cookies and swirling a loose “m” pattern across the end of each cookie.
• Use a star tip to add a little white icing as “whipped cream”

Note: I wanted to add some cute factor to these yummy cookies and saw sugar cookies done as slices of pie on a REALLY fun blog called sweetsugarbelle.com. She does a GREAT job of showing the decorating process step-by-step, and I highly recommend you visit her site if you decide to make these cookies in slice form. The hardest part is the crust. I’m NOT a cake decorator and I really had to practice to get the crust to look acceptable. Her pictures and instruction were a big help! Plus the rest of this site is so addictive. Beautiful creations! Love it!

My thoughts: YUM. Seriously yummy cookies. If you are up for a challenge make them into pie slices, but if you just want some simply delicious and EASY cookies just cut these into fun fall or Christmas shapes and sprinkle with a little colored sugar. Don’t omit that butter flavoring- you can find it with other flavors and extracts at the grocery- it adds such a yummy flavor!  Hope you get a chance to try these!!! Enjoy! ~r

Other fun Thanksgiving recipe ideas~ click on a photo to see the recipe: