Vegan Easy No-Bake Pumpkin Cheesecake

If you’re more spoopy than spooky at Halloween, then this vegan easy no-bake pumpkin cheesecake is perfect for you! A spiced ginger crust, creamy pumpkin filling and adorable piped pumpkin decorations. It’s the sweetest scary treat there is!

When it comes to vegan cheesecakes, we’ve come a long long way. I remember trying one at a food festival back in 2013, and honestly it wasn’t great. This pumpkin cheesecake however, is SO good. Honestly I don’t think you’d know it was vegan, and it’s super easy. That’s something I’m always keen to ensure in all my vegan bakes, that there isn’t a huge list of hard to come by ingredients and its not a 9 step process with overnight soaking. No shade at all to vegan bakes that are like this, but I think the more complicated (and more impressive!) vegan bakes should be left to the bakers who specialise in it. More and more I’m trying to include vegan bakes here on the blog, but I’m not professing to be an expert in the field at alll. So easy vegan bakes are where I’m at right now, and when they’re this delicious I’m sure you’ll be converted too!

Key Ingredients You’ll Need

Ginger Biscuits – Ginger biscuits will make up the base of our cheesecake, and happily for us most ginger biscuits on the market are naturally vegan! I used McVitites Ginger Nuts, (with most supermarket versions appearing to be vegan too), but of course check the packaging when you buy.
Vegan Double Cream – Cream is what makes our cheesecake deliciously…well creamy! And for this I used Elmlea Plant Double. I think its such a great substitute, but if you have another brand of vegan double cream that you like, then go ahead and use that!
Vegan Cream Cheese – A cheesecake wouldn’t be a cheesecake without cream cheese! And luckily for us, theres so many great vegan alternatives on the market now. I prefer Violife Original Cream Cheese, and its what I used in my Vegan Carrot Cake recipe! But again, use your favourite brand.
Canned Pumpkin – Now this is a really American ingredient, but in recent years I’ve seen it on the supermarket shelves more and more! Of course you can make your own pumpkin puree, but honestly the canned variety is just as good and WAY easier to bake with. I got mine from Sainsburys in the American section of the ‘world foods’ aisle, but you can also buy them from amazon (though its much more expensive!).

How to make vegan no-bake pumpkin cheesecake

As I said above, this is a really simple recipe. and if you’ve made one of my no-bake cheesecakes on the blog you’ll be pretty familiar with the steps. There are a few slight changes, but nothing tricky I promise! Now lets get going, as your cheesecake will need to chill in the fridge for 4 hours at least – so let’s get baking!

Making the ginger base

Like with most cheesecakes, this vegan cheesecake starts with a biscuit crust. If you have a food processor, this couldn’t be easier – just blitz the biscuits to fine crumbs and then pulse in melted vegan butter. If you don’t have a food processor, you can place the biscuits in a sealable food bag or even just a big bowl and bash them with the base of a rolling pin.

Once you have your biscuit/butter mixture combined, it should look a little like wet sand, you can then tip it into your prepared tin. If you have a springform tin (i.e. a tin with a latch on the side) then use this, and it’s much easier to remove your cheesecake once you’re ready to serve. But if you don’t have one, use a loose-bottomed tin instead. For both tins, make sure you line the base with baking paper before you add the biscuit mix, as again it’ll help you to remove your cheesecake.

So back to the biscuit base, once you’ve tipped it in the tin, you need to press it down evenly and firmly. Using a cup measure or spoon can help here, to give you an even flat base. Then it needs to be chilled for 20 minutes in the fridge, to set.

Making the pumpkin cheesecake filling

For the cheesecake filling, ideally you’ll use an electric hand-whisk. You’ll get a much creamier and well combined cheesecake if so, but of course whisking by hand will still work well. You’ll also want to keep your cream in the fridge until you are ready to use it, as it will whip much better when cold.

So, the cream should be whipped first in a large bowl until it’s thickened and has reached soft peaks. Then in a separate large bowl, whip the cream cheese and icing sugar together until well combined. Then pour in your whipped cream, and whip again on a high speed. It will really thicken at this point, and look really creamy and luscious. The final step, is to add in the canned pumpkin.

Then you can pour the whole mixture on top of your chilled ginger base. Tap the whole tin a few times on your work surface, just to make sure you remove any air pockets and to help flatten it out. As we’re decorating the top, I also like to level it out with a spatular or spoon.

Then it needs to chill in the fridge – the words you never want to see at the end of a recipe! But honestly, cutting this too soon will result in a overflowing mess! So into the fridge for a minimum of 4 hours, but ideally you’d leave it overnight.

Decorating the cheesecake

The final step in this vegan cheesecake, is to add the super cute pumpkin decorations! It’s a really simple butter icing – vegan butter beat until smooth and lightened, with icing sugar then added in. This makes a really small amount, as obviously we don’t need much! Once the icing is ready, you need to separate out a small amount into another bowl. This smaller amount will be your pumpkin ‘stalk’, so green food colouring should be added. Then orange food colouring can be added to the larger amount, for your pumpkins.

For the green buttercream, I just placed this into a piping bag and snipped off the end making a very small hole. For the orange buttercream, I placed this into a piping bag fitted with a small star tip. Then you can begin the decorating! Starting with the orange buttercream, pipe small round balls, as the star tip will make it look like it has the ridges of a pumpkin. Finish off with the green buttercream stalks, and you’re done!

Tips & Tricks

Can you make vegan no-bake cheesecake in advance?

Yes absolutely! And actually as the cheesecake needs to set for a minimum of 4 hours, making it the night before serving is actually ideal.

How do I make sure my vegan cheesecake sets?

This cheesecake will be a softer-set than a dairy filled cheesecake, but so long as you whip the cream separately first and chill it in the fridge for the required time it will be set enough to cut.

I don’t have a piping bag, how can I decorate the cheesecake?

If you have a food or freezer bag, you can use this as a makeshift piping bag by just snipping off one corner! So simple!

This vegan no-bake pumpkin cheesecake is so light, so creamy and perfectly spiced. Ginger and pumpkin go so well together, and its the perfect dessert for Autumn & Halloween! And best of all it really is so easy to put together, and looks SO impressive and adorable when you serve!