Pumpkin Cream Cheese Brownies

I've made these a few times now, but I kept forgetting to take pictures. They are so amazing. I bake them like brownies in a 9"x12" glass pan. The outer bars will be a little more firm and cake like, while the inside bars will be more like gooey brownies. So gooey that you will probably eat them with a fork. You could try cooking it a little longer, but I think the outer edges would come out too dry. As it is, I still end up feeding the very edges to my dogs. They love all things pumpkin and this is one of their favorites. Plus, it's not overly sweet and fairly low in sugar.

I started out with this recipe for Pumpkin Cake with Cream Cheese Swirl and then I veered off and did my own thing. Shocking, I know. Her photos are so pretty and artistic! You're just lucky I remembered to snap a few with my phone. ;) This was purely for me, my roommates, and maybe some co-workers if it lasts until Monday, so I wasn't trying for artistic. With a little effort, you could probably make yours prettier if you tried. Here's my version. All it takes is one bowl and an electric mixer of some sort. I use a cheapy hand-held and it works just fine.

Pumpkin Cream Cheese Brownies

1/2 cup butter (1 stick softened)
2 eggs
1 can pumpkin (not pie filling)
2 tsp vanilla extract/flavoring
2 tbls pumpkin pie spice
1 box yellow cake mix
8 oz fat free cream cheese, softened (or reduced fat, or full fat, your choice)
1/4 cup Vanilla creamer of your choice (I use coconut creamer)

1. Preheat oven to 350 and either spray a 9"x12" pan with cooking spray, line with parchment paper, or butter and flour. I use cooking spray.
2. In a large bowl, cream together butter, eggs, pumpkin and 1 tsp vanilla with an electric mixer. Set beaters aside but don't wash them yet.
3. Across the top of this mixture, sprinkle one tbl of pumpkin pie spice and stir that in.
4. Dump cake mix on top of that and sprinkle the remaining tbl of pumpkin pie spice on top of cake mix, and stir this all in. It should be a moist batter but not runny.
5. Press pumpkin mixture down into the pan.
6. Using the same bowl and electric mixer, cream together cream cheese, vanilla creamer and 1 tsp vanilla extract. Here's where you can get artistic if you want to.
7. You can drop the cream cheese mixture on top of the pumpkin mix and then swirl it around all pretty, or you can spread it across the top and then mix it into the top layer of pumpkin mix. I like to spread and combine it a little into the pumpkin, but it's your choice.
8. Bake at 350 for 30 minutes, turn off the oven and bake for another 10 minutes with the oven off, then remove from oven.
9. Let it cool completely in the pan before you start cutting or it makes a mess. Or, just make a mess and cut immediately, like I do.