Decorated Pumpkin Cookies with Buttercream Frosting
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Tis the season for pumpkins! While we may be used to pumpkin flavored bakes, it is also fun to bake something delicious that looks like a pumpkin.
These decorated pumpkin cookies are the perfect beginner-friendly sugar cookie to decorate.
Of course, if you are completely new to decorating buttercream sugar cookies, I invite you to check out my online Christmas cookie decorating class. It is absolutely game-changing for those wanting to decorate sugar cookies (not to mention, they are all Christmas themed, who doesn’t love that!?)
But okay, back to these super-cute pumpkins. If you are wanting to decorate sugar cookies for any fall event, really, these pumpkins should be a go-to design.
They are super quick and stand alone well or compliment any fall theme.
I’m going to give you the step-by-step photo series tutorial and video tutorial for these beautiful sugar cookies. You will be confident enough to make these yourself and no one will know how easy they were.
You will only need a few decorating tips if you are new to the hobby, otherwise you likely already have what you need.
Alright, let’s get started on these decorated pumpkin cookies!
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Part 1: Gathering the Supplies for the Decorated Pumpkin Cookies
To decorate these pumpkin sugar cookies with buttercream frosting, you will want to gather:
- 2 Icing bags
- One Wilton #4 tip and one #12 tip
- Two couplers
- Pumpkin cookie cutter
- Orange gel food dye and brown gel food dye
- Ingredients for a crusting buttercream & sugar cookie dough – found below in recipe card
Part 2: Baking the Cookies and Setting up the Icing Bags
- Roll, cut out, and bake your cookies according to the recipe. Allow them to cool completely before frosting them.
- Make your buttercream icing according to the recipe card below. Then, pull out about a half cup of frosting and dye that brown. Dye the remaining frosting orange.
- Set up your icing bags in this manner:
- Place a coupler into each of the icing bags and fill one with the brown buttercream and one with the orange. Go ahead and place the tip #4 on the brown bag and the tip #12 on the orange bag.
Part 3: The Decorated Pumpkin Cookies
I have included both a video tutorial and a step-by-step photo series tutorial for these decorated pumpkin cookies. I recommend watching the video first to get an overall feel for the steps and then watching the photo series when it comes time to decorate.
- Using the brown bag of icing with the tip #4, pipe the pumpkin stem. I moved my hand back & forth quickly to create a textured appearance, but it’s up to you on what you’d like to do. Do this for all of the cookies before moving to step #2.
- Using the orange back of buttercream with the tip #12 on it, pipe the pumpkin’s shape. Here are a few tips to do this correctly:
- Start at the bottom of the cookie and hold the tip close to the cookie. You want to squeeze out flat-ish layers of wide buttercream in order to get the right shape, not logs of buttercream.
- As you move the buttercream up from the bottom of the cookie to the stem, squeeze out more frosting than the width of the size #12 piping tip. This helps to fill space. You can move faster as you get nearer to the stem so that the width isn’t as wide.
- Work symmetrically. For example, pipe one line on the left side of the cookie edge, then pipe a line on the right edge of the cookie and work your way in to the middle.
- For the middle and last line, start at the top of the pumpkin rather than the bottom.
- Remove/rinse/dry the tip #4 from the brown buttercream and attach it to the orange. Place dots/bumps all over the pumpkin, as little or as much as you need. You can get really bumpy if you want!
Aren’t these decorated pumpkin cookies so fun? I am so excited for you to try them out and show off your skills to all your friends and family.
I made a mix of white and orange pumpkins but you can also do green, blue gray, black, however many pumpkin colors there are out there.
These pumpkins also pair wonderfully with my sunflower sugar cookie tutorial.
Besides looking amazing, you will love how soft and buttery these taste. Seriously, so good! Enjoy!
Beginner-Friendly Decorated Pumpkin Cookies with Buttercream Frosting
Equipment
- Stand Mixer with Paddle Attachment
- Rubber Spatula
- Measuring cups and spoons
- Medium Sized Mixing Bowl
- Lined aluminum cookie sheet parchment paper or silicone baking sheet
- Rolling Pin
- Pumpkin cookie cutter
- 2 Icing bags
- Wilton tip #4 & Wilton tip #12, plus two couplers
Ingredients
Buttercream Frosting
- ½ cup room temperature unsalted butter 4 ounces
- ½ cup room temperature salted butter 4 ounces
- 4 cups powdered sugar
- 1 tbsp. vanilla extract
- 1-3 tbsp. whole milk
- yellow, brown, and black gel food dye
Sugar Cookies
- 1 cup cold salted butter cubed
- 1 cup granulated sugar
- 3 cups all purpose flour measured with the scoop & level method
- 2 tsp. baking powder
- 1 egg
- 1.5 tsp. vanilla extract
Instructions
- Remove all of the butter from the refrigerator. You will make the sugar cookies first but the butter for the frosting needs to come to room temperature before mixing.
Sugar Cookies
- Preheat the oven to 350℉ and prepare an aluminum cookie sheet by placing either parchment paper or a silicone baking mat on it.
- In a medium sized mixing bowl, combine the flour and baking powder and mix together. Set this aside.
- Cube a cup of salted butter and then, in a stand mixer with the paddle attachment, combine the cubed butter with the granulated sugar. Mix until creamed together well.
- To the stand mixer, add in the egg and vanilla extract and mix until combined.
- Slowly add in the dry ingredients in the mixing bowl to the stand mixer.
- Roll the dough out to 3/8" thick and use the cookie cutters to cut out the cookies. Place the cookies onto the prepared baking sheet and bake for 9-11 minutes or until the tops of the cookies no longer look wet. When baking the cookies, only bake 6-8 cookies at a time to leave proper space between each cookie to cook without spreading. Overcrowding the cookie sheet will cause spread.
Buttercream Frosting
- In a stand mixer with the paddle attachment, add the room temperature salted and unsalted butter and mix on high until light and fluffy.
- Mix in the powdered sugar little by little. Add in the vanilla extract and milk about halfway through adding the sugar to help the frosting come together. Start with one tablespoon of milk and work up to three if needed, depending on the consistency you want. I like to aim for a peanut butter consistency or thinner.
- Pull out a half cup of buttercream and dye it brown. Color the remaining buttercream orange.
- Place couplers into the two icing bags and fill one with the brown buttercream and one with the orange. Place the tip #4 on the brown bag of icing and the tip #12 on the orange bag.
Decorating the Pumpkin Sugar Cookies
- Attach the tip #4 to the brown frosting and pipe the stems for all of the pumpkin cookies.
- Use the orange frosting to pipe the pumpkin's shape. You can find more detailed instruction and tips in the step-by-step photo series instructions above the recipe card.
- Remove/rinse/dry the tip #4 from the brown bag of icing and place it onto the orange. Pipe dots for the bumps.
Notes
Make sure to follow me on YouTube for more cookie tutorials as well! You can also find more of my fall inspired buttercream sugar cookie tutorials here.
Save the Tutorial for These Decorated Pumpkin Cookies
Use the image below to pin this tutorial for decorated pumpkin cookies to your cookie decorating board on Pinterest. Alternatively, use any of the social share icons on the top of the page to share it to your favorite social media site.
