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This easy to make pumpkin crisp has a creamy pumpkin pie filling and a crumbly, crisp, streusel topping. It’s perfect for fall and a great addition to your Thanksgiving dessert table!
Are you more of a pie or crisp person? Personally I tend to like a crisp better, unless we’re talking about a cream pie, like this chocolate drizzled strawberries and almond cream pie. Then I’m a pie person.
I love the filling in pies, but I’m not big on crust. I’d much rather have a sweet, buttery crumble or crisp topping than pie crust.
This always becomes an issue at Thanksgiving since I love pumpkin pie. I find myself either scraping the pumpkin filling out of the crust or if I’m the one making it, I usually just make a crustless pumpkin pie.
This year I finally came up with a solution, pumpkin crisp! It’s got the same delicious pumpkin filling you find in traditional pumpkin pie, but instead of baking it in a pie crust, there’s a crisp topping. It’s the best of both worlds!
Ingredients For Pumpkin Crisp
- pumpkin purée
- half and half
- eggs
- maple syrup
- vanilla bean paste or extract
- pumpkin pie spice and ground cinnamon
- cinnamon
- rolled oats
- flour
- dark brown sugar
- unsalted butter
- pecans
How To Make Pumpkin Crisp
To make the pumpkin crisp make sure your ingredients are at room temperature except for the butter. This will help them combine together easier. Preheat the oven while you make the filling and topping.
Whisk the eggs in a large bowl. I like to make sure they’re broken up and well combined before adding in the other wet ingredients. To the eggs, add the pumpkin purée, half and half, maple syrup, vanilla, and cinnamon. Whisk until everything is combined and you don’t see any streaks of egg.
In a separate bowl, stir together the flour, oats, brown sugar, cinnamon, and pecans. Cut the cold butter into small pieces and use your hands or a pastry cutter to work the butter in until you have small crumbles.
Spray a 9 inch cast iron skillet or similar sized baking dish with cooking spray and pour in the pumpkin filling. Sprinkle the oat crisp topping evenly over the filling and bake at 375° F. for approximately 40 minutes or until the filling is set. Let it cool for 10 minutes before serving.
How To Make Pumpkin Pie Spice
Pumpkin pie spice is found in almost all grocery stores these days, but if you can’t find it or just prefer to make your own, here’s how.
There are many ways to make pumpkin pie spice and you can easily adjust the amounts to suite your taste. The spices you’ll need are cinnamon, ginger, cloves, nutmeg, and allspice. The predominant spice you will use is cinnamon.
The blend I make uses 3 tablespoons ground cinnamon, 2 teaspoon ground ginger, 1 1/2 teaspoons ground nutmeg, 1 teaspoon ground allspice, and 1 teaspoon ground cloves. Mix all the spices together in a small bowl and then store them in a jar so you’ll have pumpkin pie spice any time you need it.
What To Put On Pumpkin Crisp?
Whipped cream or vanilla ice cream are my top two choices to serve with pumpkin crisp. Usually I just add vanilla bean paste to my whipped cream, but I also love to flavor it with cinnamon or bourbon.
Caramel sauce would be another great option to drizzle on top and for a dairy free option, either coconut whipped cream or your favorite vegan vanilla ice cream.
Frequently Asked Questions
To make this recipe gluten-free, substitute the flour in the crisp topping with an equal amount of all purpose gluten-free flour. You can also substitute the flour with almond flour like I did with this apple pear cranberry crisp.
For a richer pumpkin filling, substitute with heavy cream. You can also use evaporated milk like many traditional pumpkin pie recipes call for. I don’t recommend using non-fat milk as this will produce a runnier, less creamy filling.
To make this recipe dairy-free, substitute the half and half with an equal amount of full fat canned coconut milk. Replace the butter in the crisp topping with an equal amount of vegan butter or melted coconut oil.
If you don’t have maple syrup use an equal amount of granulated sugar or coconut sugar.
More Pumpkin Desserts
- Creamy Pumpkin Pie Bars
- Pumpkin Chocolate Chunk Cake
- Chocolate Dipped Pumpkin Macaroons
- Paleo Pumpkin Pie Bites
- Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Cheesecake Egg Rolls
Pumpkin Crisp
Ingredients
Pumpkin Filling
- 15 ounces pumpkin purée
- 2/3 cup half and half or cream
- 3 eggs
- 1/3 cup maple syrup
- 1 teaspoon vanilla bean paste or vanilla extract
- 1 1/2 teaspoons pumpkin spice
- 1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
- 1/4 teaspoon salt
Topping
- 1 cup rolled oats
- 1/2 cup white whole wheat flour, all purpose or gluten free flour
- 1/3 cup dark brown sugar
- 2 tablespoons chopped pecans
- 1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
- Pinch
- 1/4 cup cold unsalted butter, cut into small cubes
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350° F. and spray a 9 inch cast iron skillet or similar sized baking dish with cooking spray.
- In a large bowl, whisk together the eggs until they're broken up and and combined. Add in the remaining filling ingredients and whisk together until well combined. Pour the filling into the prepared skillet or baking dish.
- Wipe out the bowl and add in all of the ingredients for the topping except the butter. Stir together until combined. Add the small cubes of butter to the topping and use your hands or a pastry cutter to work them into the mixture until it's crumbly.
- Sprinkle the topping evenly over the pumpkin filling and place the skillet onto the middle rack of the oven. Bake for 40 minutes or until the filling is set. Remove from the oven and let it cool for 10 minutes before serving. Serve with whipped cream or vanilla ice cream.
Nutrition
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
