This recipe comes from the blue Whispering Pines (Honea Path, SC) cookbook, and I believe it’s the second one they made. There are 2 recipes out of this cookbook that are among my favorite recipe collection. The other recipe contains cream cheese too!

I’ll give you the original recipe, and then the crust change that I did on it this time.

Pumpkin Cheesecake Bars

1 c. flour
1/3 c. brown sugar
5 T. butter
1/2 c. finely chopped nuts
1 – 8 oz cream cheese, softened
3/4 c. sugar
1/2 c. pumpkin
2 eggs, beaten
1 1/2 tsp. cinnamon
1 tsp. allspice
1 tsp. vanilla

Combine flour and brown sugar in medium bowl. Cut in butter to make crumb mixture. Stir in nuts. Set aside 3/4 cup of crumbs. Press rest onto a 8x8x1.5″ baking pan. Bake in 350° oven for 15 minutes. Cool. Combine cream cheese, sugar, pumpking, eggs, spices and vanilla. Blend until smooth. Pour over crust. Sprinkle rest of crumb mixture on top. Bake for 30 to 35 minutes at 350°. Cool before cutting.

I love ginger snap cookies, and especially love it combined with pumpkin desserts. So I made this one with 1 1/2 cups ginger snap cookies, finely chopped (in mini food processor), 1/4 c. brown sugar & 5 T. softened butter.

It was easy to blend with a whisk. Bake the same length of time as the original recipe.

I haven’t made regular cheesecakes very often but one tip I learned from my mom about them is to not beat the eggs hard once you add them to the rest of the stuff. Just enough to blend it together.

And a regular cheesecake, it may crack if you cool it too fast.This recipe is not very critical. I put it in the fridge within 20 minutes of taking it out of the oven with no issues.

The original crust recipe is very delicious too!! And it can be made without pecans. I think this is actually better a day or 2 after it’s made. Just need some chai (or coffee if you’d prefer) to go with this piece!

Happy baking!