Pumpkin Cheesecake Bars with Salted Caramel Swirls
These pumpkin cheesecake bars with salted caramel swirls are the ultimate decadent fall dessert. Creamy, flavorful pumpkin cheesecake on graham cracker crust swirled with sweet and salty salted caramel sauce. These fall dessert bars will impress your friends!
Servings: 12 Bars
Calories: 544kcal
Ingredients
Salted Caramel Sauce:
- 1 cup sugar
- ¼ cup water
- ¾ cup heavy cream
- 1 TBSP vanilla extract
- ¼ cup butter
- ½ tsp kosher salt
Cheesecake Bars Crust:
- 1 cup butter melted
- 2 cups graham cracker crumbs
- 1 ½ cup brown sugar
- 2 TBSP cornstarch
- pinch salt
Cheesecake Bars Filling:
- 1 egg
- 6 ounces cream cheese at room temperature
- ½ cup sugar
- ⅓ cup pumpkin puree not pumpkin pie filling
- 2 ½ tsp pumpkin pie spice
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
- 2 TBSP flour
- ⅓ cup salted caramel sauce recipe below
Instructions
Salted Caramel Sauce:
- In a medium saucepan with tall sides, combine the water and sugar.
- Heat over medium-low heat until the sugar dissolves, stirring occasionally.
- Increase the heat to medium-high and bring the mixture to boil without stirring.
- Being very very careful, use a wet pastry brush to wipe down the sides of the pan, removing any sugar crystals stuck there (these could make your sauce grainy).
- Boil the mixture 5-6 minutes, until a deep amber color.
- Remove the pan from heat and very carefully whisk in the cream (adding the cream will cause the mixture to bubble vigorously.)
- Whisk in the vanilla (it will bubble again).
- Stir in the butter and salt.
- Transfer to a glass jar with a lid and allow to cool (it will thicken as it cools).
- Store in the fridge for several months, if it lasts that long!
Cheesecake Bars:
- Preheat oven to 350F.
- Line an 8x8 pan with foil and spray with cooking spray.
- In a medium bowl, mix together the ingredients for the crust.
- Press evenly and firmly into the bottom of the pan.
- In a medium bowl (you can use the same bowl as before! yay for less dishes!) combine the ingredients for the filling (ommiting the salted caramel) and beat with an electric mixer until combined. Don't over mix.
- Pour the filling over the crust.
- Drizzle the salted caramel sauce in several parallel lines over the filling.
- Use a knife to draw lines perpendicular to the caramel (go first one way, then the other) to create the swirls.
- Bake for 40 minutes, or until the center is set with a tiny bit of jiggle and a toothpick inserted into the middle comes out mostly clean.
- Cool the bars for 1 hour on a wire rack.
- Place the bars in the refrigerator to cool for 2 hours or up to overnight before slicing into bars and eating!
Nutrition
Serving: 1g | Calories: 544kcal | Carbohydrates: 65g | Protein: 3g | Fat: 31g | Saturated Fat: 19g | Polyunsaturated Fat: 10g | Trans Fat: 1g | Cholesterol: 97mg | Sodium: 398mg | Fiber: 1g | Sugar: 54g
