Easy Mini Pumpkin Cheesecakes - Happy Halloween!

We're big fans of cheesecake and pumpkin pie, so we wondered how the two of them could be combined together to form one delectable dessert.

Add in Dad's mini cheesecakes in which he would use Oreo cookies as the base and we've got ourselves one easy and addictive Halloween sweet treat.

Ingredients (makes 1 dozen mini pumpkin cheesecakes):

12 cupcake wrappers
6 Oreo-type cookies 

1 package cream cheese

1/2 cup brown sugar

1 Tbsp flour (forgot to add it in the photo!)

1/4 cup pumpkin puree

1/2 tsp cinnamon (another absentee in the photo!)

1/2 tsp vanilla extract

1/8 tsp salt

1 egg

Directions:

1. Take all ingredients out so that they've warmed to room temperature.

2. Preheat oven to 350F.

3. Twist the cookies in half as the crust for each mini cake.

 

4. Mix together cream cheese and sugar. 

 

5. Add the pumpkin puree.  Love how the color changes from a nice tan to a warm orange.

6. Add the cinnamon, vanilla extract, and salt.

 

7. Add the egg and mix the batter.

 

8. Add the batter to each cup.  Turn the oven down to 300F and bake the mini pumpkin cheesecakes for 45 mins.  Let the mini cakes cool for about 2 hours (we just left them in the oven with the heat turned off)

We were going to chill the mini pumpkin cheesecakes overnight, but truthfully, we ate about half of them soon after while the photos were taken.  They had the nice spice and fragrance of pumpkin pie with a thicker cheesecake texture.  The cookies made for an easy crust - we're thinking that other types of cookies would work as well (vanilla creme, ginger flavored, etc.).

Happy Halloween!