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Our Pumpkin Coffee Cake is made with the biggest, fattest streusel you’ll ever see. Plus, we packed in as much pumpkin as possible, giving this cake a texture that’s a cross between pie and cake – so rich and dense, perfect for fall, and totally irresistible!

I feel like this pumpkin coffee cake recipe needs a disclaimer. Let’s just get that over with right off the bat –
Warning: What you are about to see is disturbing in the best way possible. This pumpkin coffee cake is so moist and dense, much like a pumpkin pie, that you’ll wonder how life can be so magical. Your eyes will struggle to take in the gloriousness that is the humongous gobs of streusel topping. Ordinary coffee cake will never taste as good to you after eating this one.
There. Now that all the legal disclaimers are out of the way, let’s talk about this recipe.
It is, in a word, phenomenal. In fact, it’s one of my favorite recipes that I’ve developed over the years and let’s be real…I’ve created a lot of dang recipes.
I took my very favorite cinnamon swirl pumpkin coffee cake that I make year after year and I doctored it up into this glorious piece of heaven topped with magical streusel. The streusel. I can’t stop talking about it.
I used the streusel recipe from one of my favorite cookbooks – (affiliate link) Baked Explorations. The streusel comes out in thick chunks and the recipe makes a lot.
The cake itself is not like your normal cake. It’s a cross between a pumpkin pie filling and a cake, which sounds weird but is actually quite delightful. The cake, thanks to the two full cans of pumpkin, is super moist and dense, like a custard, but not quite so heavy. It’s just really, really good.
Let’s do this!
Ingredient Notes:
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Pumpkin – Be sure to use 100% pure canned pumpkin. You won’t want the can of pumpkin pie filling that has the spices and extra liquids added to it.
Cinnamon – Did you know that pumpkin itself doesn’t have a whole lot of flavor? That familiar flavor we all know and love is from the spices added. We call for plain cinnamon in this recipe, but you could also use our homemade pumpkin pie spice for even more warm, fall flavor.
Butter – We love the rich flavor of real butter in this pumpkin coffee cake and between the streusel and the cake itself, you’ll use a full pound of it. We only live once, so let’s do it right.
Streusel – The streusel ingredients are brown sugar, granulated sugar, butter, flour, and cinnamon. Easy peasy.
Glaze – We’ll whisk together powdered sugar and milk to make a simple glaze that you’ll spoon over the top of the cake.
What We Love About This Recipe:
- Streusel: I can not stress enough how good this streusel is. The pieces are huge and the layer of streusel is thick. We don’t skimp here.
- Moist & Dense: This is NOT your traditional cake! We were going for a cross between a pumpkin pie and a coffee cake and that’s what we achieved. If you’re looking for a light and airy crumb, you’ll want to find another recipe.
- Fall Favorite: This is one of those recipes that you’ll make year after year. Everyone raves about it and looks forward to enjoying it every year.
- Simple: While the ingredient list does look a bit long, the recipe comes together quite easily. There is nothing fussy about this recipe, so long as you have a bit of time to put it all together.
Tips & Tricks:
Streusel – Unlike most streusel recipes, this starts with melted butter! Makes it so easy. Because we’re using melted butter though, you’ll want to make the streusel first and then let it sit to dry a bit as you work on the cake batter.
Cake Batter – You’ll want an electric mixer for this one as we’re creaming together butter and sugar to start the cake batter. We’ll stir in the pumpkin, eggs, and flour until just combined to help keep the cake from becoming tough.
Bake – This recipe is meant to be super moist and dense, which makes the toothpick test a little tricky. A toothpick should come out mostly clean, but not fully dry. If it’s fully dry with no crumbs on it, you’ve probably overbaked your cake.
Glaze – This is totally optional, but we love a simple powdered sugar glaze. Feel free to doctor it up by adding a dash of vanilla extract or maple extract. You can’t go wrong with either.
What Readers are Saying!
“I’ve made this recipe over ten times and have it bookmarked because it is SO good. Crowd pleaser for sure. Everywhere I bring it, the people RAVE. It is moist and delicious. If you don’t like this, go get yourself checked…” – Rachel
FAQ:
Coffee cake is traditionally served with a cup of coffee, as a sweet afternoon or evening treat. We consider this pumpkin coffee cake to be dessert, thanks to the copious amounts of cinnamon streusel and the sweet vanilla glaze.
No, there is no actual coffee in most coffee cakes. These cakes are named coffee cake because they’re meant to be served with a cup of coffee.
While some coffee cakes will do fine on the counter for a few days, our pumpkin coffee cake packs in so much pumpkin that you’ll really want to store it in the fridge for maximum freshness.
More Fall Favorites!
- Chocolate Chip Pumpkin Bread
- Maple Glazed Donuts
- Crockpot Apple Butter
- Apple Cobbler
- Pumpkin Bars with Cream Cheese Frosting
Pumpkin Coffee Cake with Streusel
Ingredients
For the streusel
- 1 cup brown sugar
- 1/2 cup granulated sugar
- 1 1/2 tablespoons cinnamon
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 1 cup butter melted
- 2 1/2 cups flour
For the cake
- 3 cups all purpose flour
- 1 1/2 teaspoons baking soda
- 1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
- 1 tablespoon cinnamon
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 1 cup brown cup sugar
- 1/2 cup granulated sugar
- 1 cup butter, room temperature
- 2 large eggs
- 2 15 ounce cans pumpkin puree
For the icing
- 1/2 cup powdered sugar
- 1 tablespoon milk
Instructions
To make the streusel:
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Spray a 9×13 baking dish with non-stick spray.
- Stir together the sugars, cinnamon, salt, and melted butter in a medium mixing bowl until well combined.
- Stir in the flour. Set aside while you prepare the cake batter.
To make cake:
- Add the flour, baking soda, baking powder, cinnamon, and salt to a large mixing bowl and whisk to combine.
- Add the sugars and butter to a medium mixing bowl and beat with a mixer until light and fluffy.
- Beat in the eggs and pumpkin until just combined.
- Add the pumpkin mixture to the flour mixture and stir until just combined.
- Spread cake batter into prepared pan.
- Take the streusel topping in your hands and press together to form large crumbs. Top the cake with the streusel. It will seem like too much, but use it all for the best streusel experience.
- Bake for 50 minutes or until a tester inserted in the middle comes out mostly clean.
- Cool completely.
To make the glaze:
- Whisk together the powdered sugar and milk to make the glaze. Drizzle over the top before serving.
Courtney says
I usually make my pumpkin pies from scratch. Could I use real pumpkin instead of canned? I’m assuming I would prepare my pumpkin just like I do for pie right?ย
Karly says
Should work fine, so long as the pumpkin isn’t too watery. That’s always my problem with fresh pumpkin. ๐
Vicky says
I used gluten free all purpose flour and it came out amazing!!
Karen beaver says
This looks soon yummy, can’t wait to try it. ย A few questions first can you do it without pumpkin? ย Or is there a substitute for pumpkin to keep so moist? ย What about cream cheese? Nor do you have similar every moist crumb cake recipe that is moist as this looks??? ย Thanks. ย I love crumb cake and would love an awesomely moist recipe for regular cc. ย Will definitely keep the seasonal pumpkin version too!!! Thanks for sharing. ย
Karly says
You could swap in a couple of bananas or mashed sweet potatoes, but I do not think leaving those out entirely would work. Applesauce MIGHT be an option, but I haven’t tried it myself.
Here’s another excellent coffee cake recipe, though it’s not as moist as this one. http://www.bunsinmyoven.com/new-york-style-coffee-cake/ The pumpkin coffee cake takes on the texture of a pie a bit, so it will be hard to achieve that without pumpkin. ๐
Lisa says
I made this over the weekend, it was absolutely delicious. I did just realize that I forgot to make the icing but I don’t think anyone noticed. I am glad I read in the comments that the cake was kind of a pie/cake hybrid since the cake itself seemed kind of “undone”. Once you bit in you knew. It was soooo good. Will definitely be making this again.
Karly says
Glad to hear you enjoyed it!
Chris says
I want to make this for a holiday event with roughly 40 people, so I have a few questions…
1) how many do you recommend I make for 40 servings?
2) how would you adjust the recipe so it can be made in disposable foil continers?
3) does the baking time change when two are baked simultaneously?
4) what steps could be done together for all the cakes to economize time/fridge space?
The event is in about 3 weeks, so I hope you respond in time.
Thanks!
Karly says
This cake bakes in a 9×13 pan, so you can cut it into as large or as small of pieces as you prefer. You shouldn’t need any adjustments for baking in foil pans. I haven’t baked two simultaneously, so I can’t answer that, but I would just recommend keeping an eye on them and adjusting as needed.
Ashley Boyd says
Made this for a “pumpkin potluck” party! TO. DIE. FOR. !!!I have a scratch fam. Recipe that is soooo good..and honestly, I am so not a pumpkin fan, but ooohhhh man! This totally changed my life. So so moist from the extraaaa pumpkin puree and also very simple to put together! Need to make sure and emember and take the butter out ahead of time, but micro. For 30 seconds, and the 2 half sticks came out perfectly “room temp.” The strudel is a game changer as far as toppings go! Don’t skimp and make any less than what the recipe calls for to the T!(: so so worth it. 10000% will make this over and over ! Thank you so much for sharing this amazing recipe (:
Karly says
So glad to hear you enjoyed this! ๐
Ashley Boyd says
Made this for a “pumpkin potluck” party! TO. DIE. FOR. !!!I have a search fam. Recipe that is soooo good..and honestlyl, I am so not a pumpkin fan, but ooohhhh man! This totally changed my life. So so moist from the extraaaa pumpkin puree and also very simple to put together! Need to make sure and emember and take the butter out ahead of time, but micro. For 30 seconds, and the 2 half sticks came out perfectly “room temp.” The strudel is a game changer as far as toppings go! Don’t skimp and make any less than what the recipe calls for to the T!(: so so worth it. 10000% will make this over and over ! Thank you so much for sharing this amazing recipe (:
Jenna says
Yum! Please excuse me while I scrape my jaw off the floor and go make this. This cake looks so unbelievably good.
Elizabeth says
Karly,
Thank you for this recipe. I served it to my guests at our bed and breakfast and they loved it! Elizabeth
Karly says
Glad to hear that!
Julie says
This looks wonderful and I plan to make this very soon. I was thinking about substituting this streusel recipe for the topping on an apple crisp that I am making tomorrow. Do you think this will work?
Karly says
I think it should work! Let me know how it goes. ๐
Julie says
Thanks! I’m going to try it today with some of the apples I picked over the weekend ๐
Julie says
Made the apple crisp last week with this streusel topping and it was unbelievable. Absolutely the easiest and most delicious streusel I’ve ever had! I want to add it to everything. I followed the baking time from the apple crisp recipe but it probably could have used less time as the apples cooked down quite a bit. Using a smaller pan might have resulted in a deeper layer of apples as it was mostly streusel….not necessarily a bad thing. Just putting another one in the oven now. How well do you think the streusel mixture would freeze? I was thinking of keeping some on hand when my kids want pumpkin muffins before school.
Karly says
I think that it would freeze fine, but I haven’t tried it myself.
Glad to hear you enjoyed it! ๐
Laura says
I love pumpkin but am not a huge pumpkin pie fan bc of the texture. Would this be a little more “cakey” if you only used 1 can of pumpkin instead?
Karly says
Yep, absolutely! Much more like a traditional cake. ๐
Liz says
I’m halving the recipe, because it’s only me and my fiance…how should I adjust baking time?ย
Karly says
It likely won’t take as long, but I haven’t tried halving it myself, so I can’t say how much shorter.
Laurine Jennings says
I want to make this, but in the recipe you say pumpkin puree and in the video is shows 100% pumpkin, not puree. Does it matter? Thank you, I will make it as soon as I know! Can’t wait!
Karly says
Pumpkin puree is the same as 100% pure pumpkin. ๐
Susan says
Could I use this cake recipe and then use a boxed yellow cake mix with butter and pecans in place of the streusel? ย My son doesn’t like streusel. ย
Karly says
Hmm, I think that would be pretty cake-y. It should work fine, but I’m not sure the flavor would be great. I’d probably leave off the topping and then add a browned butter drizzle over the top, found here: https://www.bunsinmyoven.com/browned-butter-krispies-treats/
Leeleespears says
Question.. streusel directions can I use all purpose flour?
Karly says
Yep, all purpose flour.