Gluten-free Pumpkin Bars with Cream Cheese Frosting
A favorite fall potluck treat, these gluten-free pumpkin bars are cake-like and covered with a delicious cream cheese frosting! Just like gluten-free pumpkin cake, only in an easily hand-held version! One of the best gluten-free pumpkin desserts I’ve ever had!
Every October, I pick up a few cans of pumpkin so that I can make these yummy gluten-free pumpkin bars with their delicious cream cheese frosting. These and my gluten-free apple crisp are my two go-to fall recipes that I bring to parties and potlucks!
These spiced, cake-like pumpkin bars taste exactly the same and have the same texture as when I made them with regular flour. No one can tell they are gluten-free bars, which is always my goal in baking gluten-free.
I love that this recipe makes a large pan of treats, and I frequently make them in the fall to take to group gatherings.
I brought these each of the past two weeks to our small group meeting from our church. We have gathered with the same 5 families for several years now, every Sunday night, in a friend’s home. It is a wonderful time of fellowship, and always involves yummy food. This group of friends have always been willing to be testers of my latest baking creation. Two of the gals have to eat wheat-free, so they are glad that I’m bringing desserts they can have.
Notes on Ingredients and Substitutions for these gluten-free pumpkin bars:
- Pumpkin: You’re using a small, 15 ounce can of pure pumpkin. Not pumpkin pie filling. Not the large cans. As brands vary and pumpkins vary, you’ll find that the color of these bars can vary. If I get a particularly orange can of pumpkin, my bars are more orange. When I use Trader Joe’s organic canned pumpkin, my bars are much lighter colored. Tastes the same either way though!
- Applesauce: I use a homemade, unsweetened applesauce or store-bought unsweetened applesauce. I wouldn’t recommend chunky applesauce. If you don’t have any applesauce on hand, you can replace the amount called for with an equal amount of oil.
- As always, I only recommend baking with a good quality all-purpose gluten-free flour blend. All flour blends are not created equal! I recommend avoiding flour blends that contain any bean flours or that are primarily rice flour, as you’ll get a more gritty result. This recipe, like pretty much all of my recipes, has been tested with successful results with gfJules gluten-free flour, King Arthur’s Measure for Measure gluten-free flour blend and Authentic Foods Multi-Blend and I recommend them all.
- Xanthan gum – Most gluten-free flour blends contain xanthan or guar gum. If the flour blend you use for this recipe does have xanthan or guar, then omit the xanthan listed in the recipe. If your flour blend doesn’t have either, then you need to add xanthan gum. I order this xanthan gum from Amazon and each bag lasts me a year or more, even with as much baking as I do!
You can see in this photo, that the pumpkin bars are more orange from the canned pumpkin I used that time. Again, taste is still the same, just color can vary depending on your pumpkin can!
Can these pumpkin bars be made dairy-free?
Without the frosting, these gluten-free pumpkin bars are dairy-free already, as long as you use oil in them. I have made these with corn oil, vegetable oil, and melted butter, and have really not noticed any difference in how they turn out. So feel free to use your favorite oil, stick butter alternative, or butter.
If you need to make dairy-free pumpkin bars, you could definitely leave off the icing recipe and use your own non-dairy icing. Or simply take advantage of one of the new dairy-free cream cheese substitutes that are available! Then you would follow my icing recipe as indicated, just swapping for the dairy-free cream cheese and a butter alternative.
These pumpkin bars are made in a large rimmed jelly roll pan. Jelly roll pans come in a variety of sizes. As you use different sized pans, just be sure to watch the baking time, and check for doneness. Obviously a smaller pan will yield taller bars, and require a little longer to bake than a bigger pan that’s yielding thinner bars. The main thing is to make sure the sides of your pan are 1″ or more.
I recently bought this USA Pan half sheet pan with lid to use for this recipe and it worked very well. I loved having the raised lid on it so I could transport the treats to another house and nothing was touching the frosting. It is 17.25 x 12.25″ and I wouldn’t recommend going any bigger than those dimensions, as your bars will get very thin.
The bars made using this pan are thinner than the bars you see pictured above as those were done in a 11×15″ pan that I have, that doesn’t have a lid for transporting. So take your pick on sizes and just adjust cooking time accordingly.
You can cut these bars to whatever size you prefer. The gluten-free pumpkin squares pictured here are actually a little larger than I usually cut them when I bring to events. I often go a little smaller, people can always come back for seconds!
Looking for more recipes that use canned pumpkin? Try my gluten-free pumpkin muffin recipe – a favorite here for breakfast! This sweet gluten-free pumpkin bread with streusel and maple glaze is decadent! This vegetarian gluten-free pumpkin bread recipe from my friend Cindy looks like one my kids would like slices of in the morning!
My favorite fall cookies are these gluten-free pumpkin oatmeal cookies. These gluten-free pumpkin spice beignets have been on my want to make list for a while now!! And how fun are these gluten-free pumpkin cake pops?!
I hope you’ll try these gluten-free pumpkin bars! Please come back and rate them and leave a comment after you try them! Enjoy!
Gluten-free Pumpkin Bars Recipe:
Gluten-free Pumpkin Bars with Cream Cheese Frosting
These cake-like spiced gluten-free pumpkin bars are frosted with a delicious cream cheese frosting.
Ingredients
- 2 cups good all-purpose gluten-free flour blend*
- 1 tsp. xanthan gum*
- 3 tsp. cinnamon
- 2 tsp. baking powder
- 1 tsp. salt
- 1 tsp. baking soda
- 4 eggs
- 1 2/3 cup sugar
- 1 small can (15 oz.) pumpkin puree (not pumpkin pie filling)Â
- 1/2 cup oil or melted unsalted butter
- 1/2 cup unsweetened applesauce
- 1/2 tsp. pure vanilla extract
Frosting:
- 1/2 cup butter, softened
- 3 oz. cream cheese, softened
- 1 tsp. vanilla extract
- 2 cups powdered sugar
Instructions
- In a small bowl, whisk together flour, xanthan gum (*if needed), cinnamon, baking powder, salt, and baking soda. Set aside.
- In the bowl of your mixer, beat the eggs, sugar, oil or melted butter, applesauce, pumpkin, and vanilla extract until light and fluffy, about 3 minutes.
- With the mixer on low, add the flour mixture. Mix just until the flour is mixed in.
- Spread in an ungreased rimmed pan, called a jelly roll pan. See note below.
- Bake at 350° for 25-30 minutes or until toothpick inserted in the center comes out with moist crumbs or clean. Cool on wire rack.
- In a small mixing bowl, use a hand mixer or stand mixer to beat together the frosting ingredients until well mixed. (I typically add the powdered sugar a half cup at a time so it doesn't all blow up in my face.)
- Frost the bars once they have cooled completely.
- Refrigerate until ready to serve.
Notes
*This recipe has been tested numerous times successfully with each of these flours: gfJules flour, King Arthur Measure for Measure Flour, and Gluten Free Mama's almond flour blend.
*If your gluten-free flour blend has xanthan gum or guar gum in it already, then omit the xanthan gum called for in this recipe.
See blog post for substitutions and notes on ingredients.
Jelly roll pans come in a variety of sizes. Just be sure it has at least 1" sides. I've linked the pan I'm using and liking below.
I’ve also got an entire board of gluten-free pumpkin recipes on Pinterest!
I hope you and your friends and family enjoy these gf pumpkin bars as much as mine!
These were unbelievably easy and delicious. My family didn’t even notice they were gluten free!
College student here, I didn’t read about how big of a pan I needed. Luckily I have a half sheet pan that worked perfectly. Now I have a ton of extras to give to my roommates and friends!
I made these pumpkins bars this afternoon. Great recipe! They are delicious. I hope there will be some left in 2 days for Thanksgiving!
Great! So glad you enjoyed them!
I want to make this for Thanksgiving where some people can’t eat dairy with meat. Is there pareve cream cheese or a different frosting you recommend?
There are dairy-free cream cheese alternatives made by several brands. I’ve tried Kite Hill brand and like it and I recently saw that Violife has one too!
I have a quick question. I’m not eating apples or bananas (I’m doing a Low FODMAP diet) at the moment – can I skip the apple sauce or add some coconut milk (not a lot) to it to make up the additional moisture? Thanks!
Yes, just use oil to replace the applesauce – any flavorless oil like corn oil, vegetable oil, light tasting olive oil, etc.
These look amazing! Do you know which cream cheese brands are gf? I bake gf goodies when the neighbor comes over, but haven’t used cream cheese in any of my recipes yet because she’s told me that cream cheese isn’t gluten free. Thanks so much!
I’ve never come across plain cream cheese with gluten. Never heard of a single brand with it. I buy Philadelphia or store brand.
These are excellent. I made them for a family function and people LOVED them. They had no idea they were GF! Haha!
So glad to hear they were loved by all! Yay!
So I made the pumpkin bread part and it was amazing. Couldn’t tell at all that it was GF. I decided to make muffins because its just more practical for ua for morning snack. I cut the time in half for cooking to 15 min. It made 24 muffins.
My only comment is that mine turned out far more airy and fluffy and much less moist than what your pictures look like. :/ Not sure why.
Hi Lisa
Could be the conversion from bars to muffins, I’m really not sure! You can try them again as bars and see what you think! I do also have a pumpkin muffin recipe on the site that’s amazing – the snickerdoodle pumpkin muffins. You’ve got to try those! So good!
I wonder if it would work to substitute additional pumpkin instead of applesauce?
I’m not sure. The applesauce is there to replace additional oil, to cut that a bit. I don’t think the pumpkin would be liquidy enough.
DELICIOUS!! Made in a 9×13 pan and baked a little longer, so moist and yummy:)
Great to hear that worked out just fine for you! Thanks for the commend and 5 star rating Melissa!
Your receipt just says “pumpkin” Is it Pumpkin Puree or Pumpkin Pie filing?
Its puree. Only ever use pumkin pie filling for pie like goodies.
What is the correct pan size? The recipe calls for 15x10x1 but in you write up it has 18x13x1 mentioned twice. Both sizes were also called jelly roll pans.
These pumpkin bars are amazing!!!! Every time I make them no one believes that they are gluten free and can’t get over how yummy they are. I was wondering if the recipe would still come out yummy if I halved it and baked it in a quarter baking sheet. Will this make any difference to the yumminess? Thank you so much for this delicious recipe!!!!
Made these today using Bob’s Red Mill Gf baking flour. I used butter flavored coconut oil and 1/2 brown sugar and 1/2 regular cane sugar. I also halved the recipe and baked in an 8×8 pan. Oh my goodness….these are so yummy!!! Incredibly moist….almost melts in your mouth. Would never guess they are GF and even DF (well, not the frosting) 🙂 Thank you for sharing this recipe. This one is going in the book!!! 🙂
So, delicious. I just made these and could not wait for after dinner to try. My family is coming for thanksgiving and it gives me a great treat while they have pumpkin pie. I think that they will want the squares too.
Fabulous recipe – I have made it with all purpose GF flour and with regular flour depending on who is eating it. Both recipes are equally great. The frosting is delicious as well. We enjoy these pumpkin bars anytime of the year.
Do you use sweetened or unsweetened applesauce? Thank you!
Bev, I use unsweetened applesauce, and recommend that! Enjoy!
I bake for my family all gluten free, even tho it’s just my dad with the intolerance
These sound amazing but I have a problem, I need to make them tonight and can’t run to the store, my brother ate all the apple sauce ( tho I told him not to, ugh boys) and so I am stumped….any suggestions?
Sierra,
Totally fine to just substitute the same amount of oil for the applesauce! So, you’ll end up using 1 cup of oil. That’s how the original recipe was, I just like to cut the fat and up the nutrition by subbing in applesauce!
Hope your family enjoys these! You are sweet to bake for them all, even that silly brother! 😉
I really had given up on gf cooking after my celiac diagnosis and after trying numerous recipes that absolutely flopped! But your rolls and these bars are amazing and I can’t wait to try your baked donuts. Thank you so much for your website. Such a blessing!
Stephanie, I’m just now seeing this comment and it absolutely made my day! Thank you!