Pumpkin Butter substitute

Substitutes for Pumpkin Butter with ratios

1. 2Apple butter

   Different taste

   Use the same amount

   Apples cooked down for hours with sugar and spice into a dark, thick, intensely apple-flavoured spread.

   What changes

   Best for

   toast, oatmeal, cheesecake swirl, cinnamon rolls, pork glaze, cake filling, cheese boards

   The nearest thing on the shelf and often shelved right next to it. The texture is a near-perfect match, thick and smooth and spreadable, and it is spiced with the same cinnamon and clove profile, so it slots into any recipe that used pumpkin butter as a spread or a swirl. What changes is that apple butter is fruitier, tangier and noticeably sweeter, where pumpkin butter is earthy, mellow and more vegetal. In a swirl or a filling that reads as an improvement to many people; in something meant to taste specifically of pumpkin it is unmistakably apple.

2. 3Sweet potato or butternut squash butter

   Close match

   Use the same amount made the same way from 1 ½ cups roasted mashed squash or sweet potato

   Roasted mashed sweet potato or butternut squash cooked down with sugar and spice exactly like pumpkin butter.

   What changes

   Best for

   toast, oatmeal, swirls and fillings, pancakes, biscuits, cheesecake

   The closest tasting substitute of all, and in a blind tasting most people could not tell butternut from pumpkin, because commercial canned pumpkin is often a squash variety anyway. Sweet potato is sweeter and starchier, so reduce the sugar by a couple of tablespoons and add an extra squeeze of lemon; it also thickens faster and can turn slightly gluey, so add a splash more cider if it stiffens too much. Roast the vegetable rather than boiling it, since boiling makes the puree watery and the butter takes twice as long to reduce.

3. 4Pumpkin puree plus spice, sugar and a thickener (5 minute version)

   Taste and texture differ

   1 cup pumpkin puree, 3 tbsp brown sugar, 1 ½ tsp pumpkin pie spice, 1 tsp lemon juice

   A quick stir-together version, cooked only briefly and thickened rather than reduced.

   What changes

   Best for

   cheesecake swirl, muffin filling, frosting flavouring, oatmeal, cake layers, dip base

   Good when you need pumpkin butter as a component rather than a spread. Warm everything in a pan for five minutes so the sugar dissolves and the raw canned taste cooks off, which matters because uncooked pumpkin puree has a distinctly tinny, vegetal edge. Without the long reduction it stays lighter in colour and less concentrated, so the flavour is milder and the texture wetter; if you need it stiffer, stir in a teaspoon of cornstarch and simmer two minutes more. Not a good option for spreading on toast, where the shallow flavour shows.

4. 5Pear butter, plum butter or lekvar

   Different taste

   Use the same amount

   Other fruit butters cooked to the same thick spreadable consistency, sometimes spiced.

   What changes

   Best for

   toast, cheese boards, pastry fillings, cake fillings, pork and duck glazes, oatmeal

   These work whenever the job is thick spiced fruit paste rather than pumpkin specifically. Pear butter is the mildest and closest in sweetness, and it takes added spice well, so a teaspoon of pumpkin pie spice stirred into half a cup gets it surprisingly close in aroma. Plum butter and lekvar are much darker, tarter and less sweet, which is excellent in pastry but obvious in a latte-style spread. All three are smoother and glossier than pumpkin butter, which has a slightly grainy, dense body.

5. 6Pumpkin pie filling from a can, reduced

   Taste and texture differ

   1 cup filling, simmered down, replaces about ¾ cup pumpkin butter

   Canned pumpkin pie mix, which is puree already sweetened and spiced, not the same as plain pumpkin puree.

   What changes

   Best for

   oatmeal, swirls, pancake topping, coffee flavouring, cake filling, dips

   A shortcut that half works. Pie mix is already sugared and spiced, so simmering it fifteen minutes to drive off water gets you something close to pumpkin butter with almost no seasoning to judge. The catch is that pie mix is formulated to set with eggs in an oven, so it is thinner and often sweeter than pumpkin butter, and the spice blend can taste flat and slightly artificial. Add a teaspoon of lemon juice and a pinch of fresh cinnamon to lift it. Do not confuse it with plain canned pumpkin, which needs the full sugar and spice added.