It’s no secret I’m a pumpkin pie hater. I usually make an Apple Pie, or our Pumpkin Cheesecake for Thanksgiving, but I was intrigued by this one because it’s not a pumpkin flavored cheesecake- it’s a regular cheesecake with toffee bits, topped with a pumpkin pie. I learned I can totally handle pumpkin pie when it’s mixed with creamy cheesecake. The best of both worlds! So if you’ve got some haters and some lovers in your Thanksgiving group this year, give this one a shot; it just might please everyone!
Ingredient and Equipment Notes
- Cream Cheese – Regular or full fat is fine. Avoid fat free.
- Springform Pan – If you don’t own a springform pan, now is the time to get one!
- Use Room Temperature Ingredients – One trick when making any kind of cheesecake is to have all of your ingredients at room temperature, or even slightly warm. Soften chilled cream cheese in the microwave until you can easily stir it with a spoon. Place your eggs in a bowl of warm water for 5-10 minutes to take the chill off. That way everything will blend together; if you add cold eggs to semi cold cream cheese, you get a big bowl of lumps. Admit it; you’ve been there.
- Toffee Bits – Make sure when you’re at the store you grab regular toffee and not the chocolate covered ones. Not that chocolate covered toffee can really ever be a bad thing, but, ya know…
How to Make a Layered Pumpkin Pie Toffee Cheesecake
- Start with the crust, which is your basic butter and graham cracker crumb mixture. If I have to choose between regular pie crust and graham cracker crust, the graham wins every time.
And press it into the bottom of a springform pan.
2. That goes in the oven to bake for a few minutes, and while it does you can mix up your cheesecake layer.
When your cheesecake layer is all mixed up (cream cheese, sugar, eggs, and vanilla) you’ll mix in some toffee bits.
3. Spread the cheesecake layer over the baked crust and set it aside.
4. Give the bowl you were working in before a quick rinse and then whip up your pumpkin pie layer. In goes pumpkin, eggs,
cream, sugar,
and a few spices.
Then very carefully, and slowly pour the pumpkin layer over the cheesecake. You want to avoid pouring it all out in one big gush because it will mess up your layers. It actually works best to pour it out of the side of the bowl, not from the spout as you see me doing here. (Do as I say not as I do).
5. And that baby goes into the oven for 2 hours. Yes, two. We’re cooking low and slow here folks. When the edges are set, but the center is still a little jiggly, just turn off the oven and crack the door, but leave the pan in the oven for about 30 minutes. If you have little ones at oven height, you can leave the door shut. Just walk by and crack it periodically during the 30 minutes to let a little heat out.
After it comes out and cools completely, run a knife around the edge of the pan, but leave it in the pan. Cover it with plastic wrap and chill for at least 6 hours or preferably overnight. You could probably even freeze this. I know because I didn’t have 6 hours so I popped it in the freezer and it mostly froze! I left it at room temp for a few minutes before serving and it was great.
6. When you’re ready to serve it, plop some whipped cream on top. I’m generally a proponent of using fresh sweetened whipped cream for this sort of thing, but you could also use Cool Whip, or the kind in a spray can.
Not gonna lie, I totally got my spray-can on with this one.
Inside you’ll be all set up to have a bit of 50/50 cheesecake and pumpkin pie.
Pretty good combo if you ask me!
Related Recipes
Looking for other Turkey Day desserts? Check out some of these Our Best Bites favorites:
Pumpkin Cheesecake with Pecan-Gingersnap Crust
Easy Pumpkin Crumble
Classic Apple Pie
Crumb-Topped Apple Pie
Apple Pie Ice Cream
Caramel Apple Bread Pudding
FAQs
Can I make this ahead of time? Yes! Make this up to two days before, simply wait to top/ decorate until right before serving. It would likely even be great if frozen and then thawed.
Did You Make This?
I’d love to hear from you! Snap a picture and tag me on Instagram, and then come back and give this recipe a rating!
Layered Pumpkin Pie Toffee Cheesecake
Ingredients
- CRUST
- 2 cups cinnamon graham cracker crumbs just short of 2 sleeves
- 1/2 cup 1 stick butter, melted
- CHEESECAKE LAYER
- 2 8- oz packages cream cheese softened
- 1/2 cup sugar
- 1 teaspoon vanilla
- 2 eggs at room temperature
- 1 bag toffee bits reserve half for topping
- PUMPKIN PIE LAYER
- 1 15- oz can pumpkin or use homemade, it's 1 3/4 cup
- 3/4 cup whipping cream
- 2/3 cups sugar
- 1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
- 1/4 teaspoon pumpkin pie seasoning
- 1/8 teaspoons salt
- 3 eggs
- FOR SERVING
- Cool Whip or sweetened whipped cream
- reserved 1/2 bag toffee bits
Instructions
- Heat oven to 300 degrees. Spray a 9 or 10" springform pan with cooking spray. In a small bowl, mix crumbs and butter. Press in bottom of pan. Bake 15 minutes. Remove from oven and set aside.
- In large bowl, beat cream cheese, 1/2 cup sugar, and vanilla until smooth. Beat in 2 of the eggs. Stir in 1 cup of the toffee bits. Spread over crust. Clean out your bowl (or by all means grab another one).
- Mix pumpkin, whipping cream, 2/3 cup sugar, cinnamon, pumpkin pie spice, salt and remaining 3 eggs just until blended. Slowly and carefully spoon over cheesecake layer.
- Bake for 2 hours or until edge of cheesecake is set at least 2 inches from edge of pan but center still jiggles slightly when moved. Turn oven off; open oven door at least 4 inches. Leave cheesecake in oven 30 minutes. Run spatula around edge of pan. Cool 30 minutes. Refrigerate 6 hours or overnight. Run spatula around edge of pan; remove side of pan. Pipe whipped topping or whipped cream around edges of cheesecake; sprinkle with remaining toffee bits.
Notes
Questions & Reviews
I would love tips/tutorials on how to not crack your cheesecake/ pumpkin pie tops. I’ve never cooled for 30 min after in the oven, so I will give that a try. Also tips on waterbaths would be great too. I know this is a silly question, but can water get in through your spring-form into the cheesecake? Thanks.
Not a silly question April, you should always wrap the outside of your pan in a couple layers of heavy duty foil just in case!
OK, so never mind about my oven issue. Apparently I can’t read. I used a 29-oz. can of pumpkin. No wonder it took an extra 1/2 hour. But it still turned out great! LOL
Haha, well good to know it still worked!
I totally cracked up about the shopping lines. I have quite a few checkers that I will not use – I’m too impatient but some of them are so ridiculously slow, it is painful. There’s also one that I avoid because she asks extremely personal questions!
So anyhow. I made this dessert last night and we had it with lunch today. We had family over so I had an excuse to make it. It was awesome!!! My oven isn’t very good to me when it comes to baking at low temperatures, so I actually needed to bake mine for an extra half hour. But it turned out fantastic!
Made a “test run” of this recipe yesterday so I’ll be prepared to take it to the in-laws on Thanksgiving. It is DELICIOUS! Thanks to your in-depth walk thru, it turned out beautifully. I may never make plain pumpkin pie again…
Can we say YUM? Man this looks SO GOOD…I can’t wait to try it…even though we are a family of pumpkin pie LOVERS…what could be better…cheesecake with it…
Thanks for this recipe…
Last year, we made your individual pies in jars as Christmas gifts for our family members and they were a HUGE HIT…thank you for that…I also made recipe cards for your peppermint fudge cake that you prepare in the jar too…sorry the name is escaping me right now…I wonder…have you done any experimenting with cheesecakes in the jars? I would LOVE to make those maybe next year…and if they could be frozen, that would be a bonus!
Thanks for all the great recipes…I really love your site.
C~
I made this last night for our Ward activity and it was a BIG hit. I didn’t have any leftovers. It was so yummy!!
I[ve looked in Maceys and Harmons for the Heath toffee bits. Where can I find them? Many thanks for any help in locating these.
It really depends on the area I guess. I buy them at Walmart and Albertsons in my area.
I commented above as well…but, I found them last night at a local Associated Foods grocery store in UT, called Kohlers.
*hope (it really is late)
Here I sit at 2 am because I didn’t read through the instructions completely before making this! I started at 11 pm when I realized it needed to be refrigerated for 6+ hours and I am making it for a party that is in 18 hours! But still I don’t notice that it bakes for over 2 hours. My first “homemade” cheesecake….I hope it tastes fabulous since I have actually given up sleep to make it lol. And thus I am reminded why I don’t bake very often. It looks amazing and smells wonderful! Let’s home it tastes as good!
Oh how I totally agree with everything that you said about check out lines. You must have been reading all us mothers’ minds! I too have 3 kids…4 1/2 and under. There should be a checkout lane just for us. They have self-checkout, speedy checkout, and regular, and handicapped parking. But what about US??? 🙂 This looks delicious! Definately going to try this out.
I tasted this tonight at Book club. Our friend loves your recipes and made it as a treat to share. I was delicious! My thighs thank you.
This recipe looks fabulous,and combining cheesecake and pumpkin sounds heavenly to me.
Question: I don’t have a springform pan (or even know what it is), is that essential? Would it work in a glass pyrex pan?
Kristi, a springform pan is one with removable sides, like this: http://www.amazon.com/Kaiser-Bakeware-Noblesse-Non-stick-Springform/dp/B00004RC47/ref=sr_1_7?s=kitchen&ie=UTF8&qid=1320641226&sr=1-7
They are fairly inexpensive and can be found at places like Target, Walmart, or Bed Bath and Beyond. I would recommend it for this recipe, I don’t think it would fit in a regular pie plate.
I don’t have a springform pan either, and I made mine in a 9″ round cake pan. It BARELY fit, but turned out great. The only hard thing will be serving it, but it will taste good no matter how it looks, i’m sure.
(this is the pan i used http://www.williams-sonoma.com/products/usa-pan-traditional-finish-round-cake-pan/?pkey=ccake-pans )
I made this last night. Just tried it. It’s good, but not exceptional. I’ve got some questions…
First, my layers mostly blended together. I tried to be really careful when adding the pumpkin layer on top… poured slowly out the side of the bowl, etc. Layers are still kaput (only 1/4-1/2 an inch of cheesecake visible on the bottom, rest is all blended). Would maybe putting the cheesecake + crust in the fridge for 5 minutes to cool it off/firm it up a bit help?
Secondly, my pumpkin pie on top cracked. I made a regular pumpkin pie on Monday and that one did not crack. This one though, did… It looked fine when I shut the oven off and opened the door, but by the time I took it out, it was cracked.
Lastly, I don’t have any Pumpkin Pie spice on hand (I always add in individual spices to my pie: ginger, cloves, cinnamon, some nutmeg), so I used my usual spices. I think that the spice might have overwhelmed the whole thing. Is using the pumpkin pie spice a milder flavor?
Any suggestions?! Thanks 🙂
Kate-
Chilling could possibly help. I didn’t chill and I like how my layers turned out. I would try slowly spooning it on with a spoon rather than pouring.
Mine didn’t crack either so I can’t help ya there! Perhaps you could cook it in a water bath next time, or decrease the baking time.
Lastly, pumpkin pie spice is a blend and it’s not equal amounts of each individual spices. Since I don’t know what ratio you added to yours, and how much of it, I’m not sure how it compares to the actual recipe. You’d have to try it to find out!
Thanks Sara!
Mine cracked too! I’m a pastry chef but I like to follow recipes before I figure out how to fix them. Of course, maybe I should have tried this before I wanted to serve it for Thanksgiving! Oh well! I’m sure it’ll still taste good. Next time I’m just going to take it out and not let it sit in the oven after cooking.
Just tried this recipe and when I turned the oven off and cracked the door open, it cracked in the middle. Why would that happen?
Not sure Karen, but that’s what whipped cream is for! 😉
Love this pumpkin pie/cheesecake. Being a caramel addict I drizzled it over The whipped topping also. Yummy
Wow, it looks so yummy! I’ll be making this for my own birthday in December and people are gong to ask me where I got this recipe. Best Bites, of course!
I would love to win all these new recipes, and to be able to see them every month! My birthday’s in November — turkey month!!
I have never been a huge fan of pumpkin pie but I will definitely try this!
Born in May. Live by Calenders. Crossing my fingers.
I would love one of your calanders. My birthday month is April!!
January!
I would love to have this for my January Birthday!
How did you keep your top from cracking!?! I usually lift my springform pan into a larger roasting pan and put an inch or so of water in the roaster to keep the top from cracking, but another idea occurs to me – you cook till edges are just set and the top is still jiggly – I cook till my top puffs up a little bit and that’s probably why it cracks – what’s your experience?
Peggy – cook it until the center is still jiggly – not wet on top, but still a little moveable when wiggled – then leave the oven door cracked (with the oven off) for 30-60 minutes like she said in the instructions. It helps the center set without getting dried out and cracked. For sure take out cheesecakes before they puff up at all. Once they puff, they’ll be dry. Kind of like taking out cookies when the edges are just barely golden and the center is still a little wet, but then letting them cool for a few minutes on the cookie sheet – the centers finish cooking without the whole cookie getting overdone. 🙂
I also generally do cheesecakes in a waterbath to ensure even baking, but I asked about that above and Sara said that the pumpkin layer helped protect the cheesecake from getting dried out. If anything, the pumpkin layer was close to not being done. (comment #30). Good luck!
Thanks so much for the detail – it’s usually pumpkin pie that splits on me – I cover the top of my cheesecakes in so much cherry filling you’d never know if the thing was cracked or not! Thanks again!
KJRISTI –
I’m trying it today. Times THREE! I am making one for my family’s Thanksgiving, one for my husband’s family, and one for the open house we have on Thanksgiving Saturday. I have followed the instructions to the T so far and they’re now in the oven – wish me luck!
I just read this and I know it was months ago, but if you test doneness on your pumpkim pies or cheesecakes with a knife, that alone can cause it to crack. There are sometimes other factors too, but if you always check it with a knife and it always cracks, that could be why. Just a thought.
Wow! Can I just tell you amazing this looks? Is it wrong that I kind of want to lick the computer screen? Also, I’m glad I’m not the only one who despises shopping with my children but treats the trip like a mini vacation when they’re not with me!
Ditto to everything, Sara. Check out lines, pumpkin pie, everything.
The other day when I had to wrangle the grocery store with not only my 4 kiddos, but one extra friend, just for fun, we totally walked out of the store with a STOLEN bag of Skittles that my 2-year-old had nabbed from that blasted bottom shelf while I wasn’t looking. I had to send my 8-year-old back into the store to give the candy back while my 2-year-old SCREAMED “candy candy candy” and wriggle to avoid his carseat buckle.
Love your blog!
This dessert sounds and looks fabulous. I’ll be making this for FHE next week. Thanks for the great idea!
Looks interesting…worth a try, I think.
The pumpkin cheesecake looks de-lish! Can’t wait to make it for Thanksgiving. Love your website!!
This looks soooo good. I’m not a huge pumpkin pie fan. It looks delicious layered with cheesecake and toffee!! Yum Yum. May have to volunteer to make this pie for Thanksgiving. 🙂
Wow. Layer after layer of goodies. Much better than old pumpkin pie!