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The Batter Thickens

A food blog balancing sweet treats & healthy eats.

Pumpkin Milk Bar Pie Bars

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A few years ago, in 2021, I had a pretty great October 30. I flew across the country from LA to NYC on a JetBlue redeye. Which was not the fun part. But that evening, I went to see Harry Styles perform a Halloween show at MSG! Truly a concert to remember. And also a trip to remember, because I spent my just-over-24-hours in NYC walking around and trying as much food as I could. That included trying the Pumpkin Milk Bar Pie from Milk Bar. I had just recently stopped working at Milk Bar, and they had JUST introduced it as a seasonal item. So it was well-timed for me to pop into the NYC flagship and try it. I ate it in Central Park, and it was delicious.

But there are no recipes for this Pumpkin Milk Bar Pie anywhere on the internet! There’s a lot of results about the “Milk Bar Pumpkin Pie,” which is an elaborate take on a pumpkin pie that one of their test kitchen cooks made. But there’s no recipes posted for Pumpkin Milk Bar Pie. (It would be so much easier if it were still called crack pie, because saying “milk bar pie” makes this a confusing distinction.)

However, it’s been four years, so I knew I needed to try my hand at a dupe recipe. This doesn’t exactly nail the pumpkin milk bar pie I had four years ago, but, dare I say… it actually may be an improvement?

I was going to replace two of the egg yolks with pumpkin puree. But I took a bit of a risk, because I was out of eggs entirely. And since I was making this the day before leaving for a week for Thanksgiving, I wasn’t going to buy more. So I substituted in pumpkin for all of the egg yolks. This risk paid off though! Because while it may not have the exact same texture as classic Milk Bar Pie, it has an extra boost of pumpkin flavor, and it slightly less gooey (a plus in my book).

I baked them in bar form because frankly, that’s easier to serve than a pie. But it could easily be converted to a pie tin if you want to take this to a get together.

My family raved out these. I just asked my family to reiterate what they said so I could write it down for this post, and my sister just said “I think I said the Pumpkin Milk Bar Pie Bars were excellent and exquisite, right? Something like that?” My dad probably called them a triumph. And frankly, they were.

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Pumpkin Milk Bar Pie Bars

  • Author: Audrey
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Ingredients

For the graham cracker crust

  • 1 ¼ cup graham cracker crumbs (approximately 10 full sheets or one sleeve from a box of graham crackers)
  • ¼ cup granulated sugar
  • 5 Tablespoons butter, melted
  • ⅛ teaspoon of sea salt

For the pumpkin Milk Bar Pie filling:

  • ¼ cup granulated sugar
  • ¾ cup packed light brown sugar
  • 1 tablespoon milk powder
  • ¼ teaspoon salt
  • ½ cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, browned, cooled slightly
  • 6 ½ tablespoons heavy whipping cream
  • ½ cup pumpkin puree
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
  • Powdered sugar, for dusting

Instructions

For the crust:

  1. Preheat oven to 350°F.
  2. Line a square pan with parchment paper. (Use binder clips to hold paper to the pan if you like.)
  3. Combine crumbs, sugar, salt, and cinnamon if using in a large mixing bowl.
  4. Drizzle melted butter over the crumb mixture and stir until it resembles damp sand.
  5. Pour into the pan and press into place.
  6. Bake at 350°F for 7 to 10 minutes or until golden brown.
  7. Let cool for a little bit while you prepare the filling.

For the filling:

  1. Mix together the granulated sugar, brown sugar, milk powder, and salt with a paddle attachment at low speed.
  2. Add the melted butter and mix until all ingredients are wet. Scrape down the sides of the bowl.
  3. Mix in the heavy cream and vanilla and beat for 2 to 3 minutes until fully incorporated, scraping down the sides as needed.
  4. Keep the speed set to low as you add in the pumpkin. Mix this until the mixture is glossy, about 3 minutes.
  5. Pour the filling on top of the graham crust.
  6. Bake at 350 for 15 minutes.
  7. Reduce the oven temperature to 325°F and bake for 15 more minutes. The filling should be fairly brown on top. It may still be a little jiggly. If it is very jiggly, give it 5 more minutes.
  8. Remove the bars from the oven and place the pie pan on a cooling rack and allow it to cool for 30 minutes. Then wrap it with tin foil and place it in the freezer for at least 2 hours, or overnight. Move the bars from the freezer to the fridge 1 hour before you are planning to serve it.
  9. Dust bars with powdered sugar before serving.

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