The bottom layer of this pumpkin cheesecake is lightly flavored with lemon, while the top is pumpkin spiced; eaten together, they’re just plain heaven.
[Insert standard “this is not a fat-free recipe” disclaimer here. Geez, what was I thinking when I named this blog!]
I know most of you who celebrate Thanksgiving have already figured out your menus. I’m probably the only slacker who still doesn’t know what she’s cooking! I’m lucky, though. I’m going to my in-laws’ celebration which is essentially a huge pot-luck. We can usually count on there being some side dishes prepared vegan just for us, so I can get away with bringing just a dish or two.
At this point, I’m relatively sure that I’m making Bryanna’s Soy and Seitan “Turkey” and The Best Vegan Green Bean Casserole. But I’m absolutely positive that I will be bringing this delicious dessert.
This vegan pumpkin cheesecake is without a doubt the most delicious dessert I’ve had in a long time. The bottom layer is lightly flavored with lemon, while the top layer is pumpkin-flavored without being heavy; eaten together, they’re just plain heaven. No, it’s not fat-free, but I challenge you to find a lower-fat cheesecake that tastes this good. But I warn you–you won’t be able to stop at just one piece of this luscious cheesecake.
2017 Update
Since I first posted this recipe, it has become our traditional holiday dessert. I make it for both my husband’s and my extended families’ Christmas celebrations, and I never have leftovers to bring home.
In recent years, we’ve made this cheesecake with Kite Hill plain vegan cream cheese, which has no added oil, and it works just fine. I no longer believe you have to use Tofutti brand cream cheese for the pie to turn out right.
For more of my favorite fall and winter holiday recipes, please check out my Thanksgiving archives.
Vegan Double-Layer Pumpkin Cheesecake
Ingredients
Cheesecake
- 8 ounces vegan cream cheese Such as Kite Hill Almond cream cheese or Tofutti Better Than Cream Cheese non-hydrogenated version in the yellow container
- 12 ounces extra-firm silken tofu Mori-nu brand in aseptic package
- 1/2 cup agave nectar or sugar
- 2 tablespoons cornstarch
- 1 1/2 tablespoons lemon juice
- 1/2 teaspoon vanilla
Pumpkin
- 1/2 cup pumpkin puree canned, not pumpkin pie mix
- 2 teaspoons rum optional
- 3 tablespoons brown sugar or natural sugar
- 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
- 1/4 teaspoon ginger
- 1/4 teaspoon grated fresh nutmeg (so much better than pre-ground)
Crust
- 1 pre-made 8-inch graham cracker crust or oatmeal cookie crust
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350F.
- Put the "Cheesecake" ingredients (cream cheese through vanilla) in a food processor and puree until completely smooth. It should be silky smooth–not chalky or lumpy.
- Remove a heaping cup of this mixture from the processor and spread it in the bottom of the crust.
- Add the "Pumpkin" ingredients (pumpkin through nutmeg) to the ingredients remaining in the food processor and process until well blended. Smooth it carefully over the white layer in the crust, heaping it slightly in the middle.
- Bake until the center is almost set, about 50-60 minutes. (Insert a toothpick. If it comes out liquidy and cold, give it more time, until the center is firm.) Remove from the oven and allow to cool. Refrigerate until completely chilled, at least 3 hours. Serve to delighted guests. (Don’t tell them it’s vegan, and they won’t know!)
Notes
Nutritional info is approximate.
I hope all of you who celebrate it have a happy Thanksgiving!
Please pin and share:
Gary Loewenthal
This was fantastic. Instead of using one big crust, I made a bunch of serving-size mini-cheesecakes for a bake sale. They sold briskly and afterward drew compliments from people who bought them.
SusanV
Gary, thanks for letting me know. I’m so happy that my recipe could contribute to the bake sale!
Michelle
Susan, I just want to say I look forward to making this pie every year! I am going to a party next week and you know what I’m bringing!! My sister even brought this into a gym class once for *health week* and no one could believe it was vegan! Thanks SO MUCH for posting this recipe!!! I really appreciate it and keep blogging cause you got a big fan! 🙂
Jen
Hi Susan,
I would love to try this recipe, however my daughter is on a gluten free diet, any other crust suggestions that are gluten free that would work?
Dana
Susan, you are a godsend! I am so excited about the recipes you have posted that I can make for Thanksgiving!!! I have to make the rest of my family “normal”, non Vegan food, HOWEVER, I now can make myself some yummies as well!!!!
I love your “Fat Free Vegan Kitchen” website!!!! Happy Holiday Season to all!
Dana
Federica
Hi,
I have a suggestion for Jen or any other person interested in gluten-free options. I don’t remember where I get this recipe from, but I have used it often with very good result.
Crust:
1 cup superfine sorghum flour
½ cup arrowroot powder
½ cup pecans, finely ground
1 to 2 teaspoons cinnamon
¼ teaspoon sea salt (link)
4 tablespoons coconut oil (room temp)
5 tablespoons water
1 tablespoon maple syrup
Enjoy!
Katie
This recipe is AMAZING!!! My vegan and non-vegans loved it. I love how creamy it is. I’ll definitely be making this one again. Thank you SO much!!!
Kelly
Hi! I am thinking of trying this recipe as individual cheesecakes, using a muffin pan ( and making my own graham cracker crust for the bottom layer). Any suggestions on how I should bake them? I am worried about over or under cooking. Thanks!
SusanV
Start checking them for doneness very early, maybe even after 15 minutes, and do the toothpick test when they look done. My biggest worry with using a muffin pan with crust only on the bottom is getting them out. I’m afraid you might have trouble keeping them intact.
Michelle
Hi,
I just made a gluten free graham crust for this. Do I bake the crust prior to filling it?
Thank you,
Michelle
SusanV
Yes, I would bake it first.
Jennifer
If I use your oatmeal crust, should I cook it first?
SusanV
Yes, but take it out a couple of minutes early, before it starts to brown around the rim. It may begin to get too brown when you’re cooking the cheesecake, so be prepared to put a ring of aluminum foil around the edge if it seems to be browning too much. Please let me know how it comes out.
AmyLu
Susan,
Thank you for all the great recipes! I had to laugh when I read your comment, “What was I thinking when I named this [fat-free] blog?” But I love, love, love your fat-free recipes. They fit so well with the nutritarian style of eating, and you do such a great job with them! Thank you for all your great recipes and happy holidays to you and your family!
eireguitar
I can’t do agave or sugar, but can do brown rice syrup, coconut sugar and dates. Any ideas for how much to substitute for the agave?
SusanV
I would use the same amount as in the recipe of either/both brown rice syrup or/an coconut sugar. You can taste it before you bake to see if it’s sweet enough and add more if necessary.
Cindy
I used soaked medjool dates for both the sugar and the agave. Super good.
Sixfingered
I made this last night. I’ll have to wait until Thanksgiving to give my review of the taste. However I do have advice for anyone who ended up with extra filling like myself. I had maybe a 1/3 or a 1/2 cup of filling left that I didn’t know what to do with, so I added a banana, vanilla almond milk and ice to the blender and made what turned out to be a really delicious smoothie 🙂
scott herkaler
Hi making this double layer cheesecake today, do I have to press the Tofu?
SusanV
No, but you need to use silken tofu–the Mori-Nu brand in the aseptic package works best. Drain off any water and use the tofu straight from the package.
April at Kitchen Blender Reviews
Hi Susan,
I made this pie for Thanksgiving dinner and it was fabulous. The pie had much better flavor after baking than the batter.
It looked like I’d have too much batter for one little graham cracker pie crust, so I poured it into two pie crusts. That gave me one pie to sample and the other to present after dinner. It was excellent. Those who did not know, didn’t realize it wasn’t dairy. 😉
Lindsay
This cheesecake was super amazing. The whole (omni) family loved it. I will definitely be making this again and again.
Fiona
I made this for Thanksgiving yesterday and it was great! For a fairly low-fat cheesecake it has great flavor! When compared to full-fat desserts containing dairy it was still one of the best desserts there. I made this cheesecake with the graham cracker crust from Colleen Patrick-Goudreau’s the Joy of Vegan Baking. I celebrated at my future in-laws house yesterday and they had a family friend visiting for Thanksgiving who was lactose intolerant. If I hadn’t made this pumpkin cheesecake he wouldn’t have had any dessert! I was very glad I had made it because he got something to eat for dessert and also because I had a chance to recommend some vegan baking cookbooks to him (as well as this site, where I got this recipe of course!). The others who tried it liked it too so I will make it again. I had cracks in my cheesecake though, which I think is from over mixing the batter so maybe next time I’ll mix it in a bowl rather than a food processor. My two layers stayed separately intact so for people who have issues with the layers blending, just be very careful to spoon a small amount at a time over the first layer and don’t heap a bunch all in one spot at once. Thank you for your wonderful recipe!
Fiona
Oh, also, I found it interesting that April at Kitchen Blender Reviews thought there was too much batter because I felt the cheesecake could have been even better with more batter (but that might have been because I had a thick, flavorful crust that slightly overwhelmed the cheesecake part). However, double the batter seems like too much and one a half times the batter would leave me with a half used container of cream cheese and silken tofu so I’ll prob still stick with the original amount of batter.
Susanne Swisher
try doubling only the cheesecake layer, and then place it in a 10 inch deep dish crust! Yummy!
Lindsay from Another Almost Vegan Blog
I have been making this recipe for years and never had a single problem until this year. And I think I know why. I used a different kind of vegan cream cheese because Whole Foods was out of Tofutti. Vegan Gourmet IS NOT THE SAME, does not taste the same and does NOT bake the same. Use the Tofutti or scrap the recipe.
SusanV
Thanks so much for that tip, though I hate that you had to discover it the hard way. All we have around here is the Toffuti, so I’ve never tested it with any other vegan cream cheese. I’ll have to add a note to the recipe specifying Tofutti brand.
Alice
Made this last night, it was a big hit! delicious!
Melinda Maarouf
Susan, girl, you have done it again!
This fabulous thing has now taken its place as an official Thanksgiving tradition at our house. This year I tried it with your oatmeal crust with a handful of vegan chocolate chips added to the dough. The result was off the charts delicious! The only change for next year will be to make two. I cut myself a tiny sliver, turned my back , and the entire cheesecake was gone. So much for leftovers! Thanks for a wonderful recipe.
Gloria
Thank you for this recipe. The one slice I was able to have was fantastic.
My daughter insisted that no one eat more than one slice so she could take it back with her to college.
LINDA
HI!
I made this for Thanksgiving and offered a piece to my 82 year old mother. AND she liked it!
I added some toasted pecans to the homemade graham cracker crust and decorated the top with them too.
Every bite of the creamy bottom layer and the spicy top layer made me take a unscheduled trip to a forest of brightly colored leaves covered trees.
This made my first vegan Thanksgiving meal! Thanks so much for sharing.
Lindsay
Hey, I made this for thanksgiving and it was great.
I have to eat gluten-free as well, so I made a gingerbread cookie crust out of some store-bought GF and Vegan Gingersnap cookies! (Mary’s Gone Crackers Brand) The entire thing was delicious and my whole family loved it.
Thank you!
Laury @thefitnessdish
I made this on Thanksgiving, will be posting about it tomorrow…just wanted to tell you that it was AMAZING!!! Also, just like you said..no one could tell it was vegan!! There was hardly any left!!!
gisela
I just made this for Christmas and everyone loved it–even my omni parents & b/f! My dad is very anti-tofu but he had no idea this contained tofu so he happily ate it. I followed the recipe to a t except I omitted the lemon & upped the amounts of cinnamon & ginger because I like it spicy. Also, I didn’t want to dirty my food processor so I just used my electric beater & it still came out smooth and creamy. Definitely an awesome dessert that I will keep making!
Sixfingered
Made this for both Thanksgiving and Xmas this year, my first year of being vegan. It was a hit both time. I will definitely be making this again.
Elizabeth Reed
This recipe looks delicious! My husband and I recently ate at a vegan restaurant in Portland ME called Green Elephant. The best part of the meal was the dessert—pumpkin cheese cake. I have been dreaming of making it since and cannot wait to try this recipe. Thank you!
Ruby
Hi Susan,
Your blog has turned a mediocre cook to a fabulous one. So thank you for that!
Can this recipe be made in a microwave? For that matter, would cooking your oven-based recipe in a microwave ruin it?
Best
SusanV
That’s so nice of you to say! About the microwave, I just don’t know. It’s hard to say how long or on what power to cook it since I’ve never tried before. You would be taking a risk of ruining it.