Air Fryer Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Cookies

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These Air Fryer Pumpkin Chocolate Chip cookies make a small batch and cook up quick and easy in your air fryer. Plus the dough cooks up great when frozen so you can have freshly baked cookies whenever you need them. 

Overhead picture of air fryer pumpkin chocolate chip cookies with a glass of milk and a bowl of pumpkin puree in the background.

Why You’ll Love This Recipe: When you eat them warm, right out of the air fryer, these cookies have a perfectly crisp exterior and a soft, gooey interior. 

Happy Pumpkin Spice season to all who celebrate! 

The traditional oven recipe for these Pumpkin Chocolate Chip cookies has been in my family for longer than I have! When fall decor goes up, we start to crave them. 

However, the original recipe makes a gigantic batch, so we though we’d convert it down so we could make a small batch and have the option to freeze some of the dough to cook for later.

We love making these with our homemade pumpkin puree. If you make a batch and have leftovers, use it in our Pumpkin Chorizo Soup, Pumpkin Steel Cut Oats, or Classic Pumpkin Pie.

Ingredients for making air fryer chocolate chip cookies, including, pumpkin puree, salt, spices, white sugar, brown sugar, flour, crisco, and chocolate chips.

INGREDIENTS YOU NEED to Make Air Fryer Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Cookies

These pumpkin chocolate chip cookies mix up quick and easy, with your basic cookie ingredients:

  • Flour: We used unbleached, all-purpose flour.
  • Salt: We just used regular Morton table salt.
  • Baking soda: To avoid flat cookies, make sure you’re using fresh baking soda.
  • Pumpkin pie spice: We just buy a small Pumpkin Pie Spice blend. If you want to make your own, just combine 1/8 teaspoons of cloves, nutmeg, ginger, and cinnamon.
  • Cinnamon: We like mostly cinnamon in our Pumpkin cookies; however, if you like more bite you can add more pumpkin pie spice.
  • Shortening: I know shortening can be polarizing, but nothing’s better if you want a cakey cookie that holds its shape.
  • Brown sugar and white sugar: You can use all white sugar if you want, but we love the flavor from the brown sugar. 
  • Pumpkin puree: You can use homemade or canned. 
  • Egg: This works as the binding to keep the cookie together.
  • Vanilla: Our favorite vanilla is the Massey’s Vanilla Bean Paste, but any vanilla works. 
  • Semi-sweet chocolate chips: Measure with your heart. We call for 3/4 cup in the recipe, but we also tested it with 1/2 cup, and it turned out great that way. 
A bowl with the wet ingredients, another with the dry ingredients, and a third with chocolate chips all for making air fryer chocolate chip cookies.

How to Make Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Cookies in an Air Fryer

This easy recipe will work in any brand of electric pressure cooker, including the Instant Pot, Ninja Foodi, or Power Pressure Cooker XL.

Whisk together the dry ingredients in one bowl, then set aside. 

Since it makes such a small amount I preferred to use my hand mixer for the wet ingredients. Cream together the shortening, sugar, and brown sugar. Then add the pumpkin and mix. Then add the egg and vanilla and mix just until blended.

Mixing in batches like this ensures that all of the ingredients are evenly distributed and that the eggs aren’t overmixed.

Next, we’re going to add the dry ingredients in thirds, again to help ensure things are combined evenly without overmixing, then fold in the chocolate chips. 

Placing pumpkin chocolate chip cookie dough on a dehydrator rack for baking in an air fryer.

Preheat your air fryer to 300F. Line a dehydrator cooking rack with parchment paper with holes. 

Scoop four dough balls, about 1.5 tablespoons or #40 cookies scoop, onto the parchment paper. Use a lightly wet finger to gently flatten the tops of the cookie dough into a disc shape. At this point, we place magnets on the parchment to ensure the parchment doesn’t cover the cookies when baking. 

Cook for about 12 minutes. The cookies will smell and look done several minutes before the centers are set, so if you remove them early I recommend checking the middles right away. Use the retriever tongs to remove the tray to cool. 

Repeat steps ##-## as needed until all cookies are baked. 

Overhead picture of pumpkin chocolate chip cookies in an air fryer tray after being cooked.

Important Tips for Making Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Cookies in an Air Fryer

One Rack at a Time: We choose not to bake multiple racks at a time because the top rack cooks much more quickly than the bottom rack. However, having the 3-pack of racks makes it really easy to switch from one tray to another.

How to Freeze Dough: If you wish to freeze some dough for baking in the future, you can shape the cookie dough on a half-size baking sheet. Place the baking sheet in the freezer until the dough is frozen solid, then transfer to a freezer-safe ziplock bag. 

Making in a Instant Pot Pro Crisp (Pressure Cooker/Air Fryer Combo: When we cooked this in our Instant Pot Pro Crisp, the cookies were not quite done after 12 minutes. I’d recommend adding another 2 minutes to the total cook time. We also don’t recommend using the dehydrator rack that came with the Crisp—it doesn’t allow the hot air to circulate as well.

A stack of air fryer pumpkin chocolate chip cookies on a white plate, with more cookies placed on the counter around it.

Products

Most of the recipes on our site don’t call for any particular product, but after several attempts, we settled on using these trays and parchment paper simply because they make the cookies significantly easier to move in and out of the air fryer. 

  • Dehydrator trays (basket style): For our Instant Vortex, we really like these square trays. They come with silicone feet that allow you to stack taller items underneath them, and they also come with remover tongs, and I really like the all-in-one.
  • Dehydrator trays (pressure cooker air fryer style): For our Pro Crisp, we’ve been really happy with these round trays. You can cook 5 rows at once or you can remove interior rows as well. 
  • Perforated parchment paper: The little holes in the parchment allows the air to circulate while preventing the cookie dough from baking through the rack.
    • For basket style air fryers, these parchment papers fit the racks perfectly while these ones fit the overall air fryer basket perfectly and have to be cut down to fit the racks.
    • For pressure cooker–style air fryers, we really like these rounds
  • Retriever tongs: If your retriever tongs do not come with your dehydrator trays, I absolutely recommend them for removing the trays from basket-style air fryers. If you’re using a pressure-cooker style air fryer, it might be easier to use a pair of tongs to keep the rack level while you remove it. 
A hand holding an air fryer pumpkin chocolate chip cookie with a bite out of it, with more cookies on a white plate in the background.

Other items that are useful but not absolutely necessary for this recipe:

  • #40 cookie scoop: We have been really happy with the Vollrath cookie scoops. This holds about 1 ½ tablespoons.
  • Silicone air fryer magnets: These silicone magnets are nice to help prevent the parchment paper from curling over the cookies while they’re baking.
  • Silicone spatula spoon: We absolutely love these spatula spoons in our kitchen. Works as a spoon to mix in the chocolate chips and as a spatula to scrape the last bits of cookie dough out of the batter.
  • Handheld mixer: Since this has such a small volume, we didn’t want to dirty our KitchenAid, so we used our handheld mixer.  
Half of an air fryer pumpkin chocolate chip with melty chocolate chips inside, on top of more cookies on a white plate, with pumpkin puree in a bowl in the background.

Frequently Asked Questions about Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Cookies

Can I use butter in this recipe?

The shortening plays a key part in the cakey texture of this cookie. You can swap for butter, but I wouldn’t recommend it because the cookies will spread and have a much crunchier texture.

Can I just bake these in a regular oven?

Absolutely; however, they won’t have the same crispness to the outer layer; they’ll just be soft all through, especially after they cool. Preheat your oven to 375F and bake for 12 to 15 minutes.

How to bake these cookies from frozen?

If you wish to freeze the dough, prepare as directed through steps 2-5, then place on a parchment lined plate or quarter-sheet cookie tray. Make sure to press down the cookie dough into a disc before freezing. When you’re ready to cook, preheat the air fryer and prepare the trays with parchment, as directed in step 1, then cook for 14 minutes.

How long can I freeze the dough for?

The dough will keep in the fridge for 2 to 3 months.

A collage of four different fall recipes. On the left is a photo of shredded pot in a bowl with cooked carrots and new potatoes. The top right photo is a creamy orange pumpkin soup with black beans, tomatoes, and cilantro on top for garnish. The lower middle photo is a white bowl holding a creamy potato soup, garnished with bacon, shredded cheese, and parsley. And the bottom right photo is a side-view photo looking into a bowl of beef bourguignon with mashed potatoes in the background garnished with parsley.

More Instant Pot Fall Recipes

This is one of our favorite Instant Pot Fall recipes! Other fall Instant Pot recipes you might like:

  • Instant Pot Pot Roast: This comfort food is the classic recipe for fall, made with fork-tender shredded beef, soft carrots and potatoes, with a rich and flavorful gravy.
  • Pressure Cooker Pumpkin Chorizo Soup: This soup has a mild spice level and gets a surprising creaminess from the canned pumpkin. It’s even better the day after you make it.
  • Instant Pot Beef Bourguignon: Made with mushrooms, tomato, beef broth, wine, and pearl onions, this fall classic comes together in a fraction of the time it would take to make on the stovetop. 
  • Easy Chunky Potato Cheese Soup: This soup has a little bit thinner broth than other super-rich versions of potato soup, but it’s packed with flavor and surprisingly filling.

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Overhead picture of pumpkin chocolate chip cookies in an air fryer tray after being cooked.

Air Fryer Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Cookies

Servings: 20 cookies
Prep Time: 10 minutes
Cook Time: 12 minutes
Other Time: 5 minutes
Total Time: 27 minutes
Course: Dessert
Cuisine: American
When you make these Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Cookies in your air fryer, you'll get a cookies with a slightly crisp exterior and a tender, cakey interior. Plus they make a small batch and freeze well
5 from 1 vote
Print Pin Recipe Rate

Ingredients

  • 1 1/4 cups flour use the fluff and scoop method
  • 1/2 teaspoons salt
  • 1/2 teaspoons baking soda
  • 1/2 teaspoons pumpkin pie spice
  • 1/2 teaspoons cinnamon
  • 1/4 cup shortening
  • 1/2 cup sugar
  • 1/4 cup brown sugar
  • 1/3 cup pumpkin puree Libby’s pure pumpkin or homemade
  • 1 large egg
  • 1/2 teaspoon vanilla
  • 3/4 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips

Instructions

  • In a medium mixing bowl, whisk together flour, salt, baking soda, pumpkin pie spice,and cinnamon. Set aside.
  • In a second medium mixing bowl, add shortening, sugar, and brown sugar and beat at a low speed until well blended. Add the pumpkin and mix until well combined. Add the egg and vanilla and mix just until blended.
  • Add about one-third of the dry ingredients and mix just until blended. Repeat with another third and then the final third. Gently fold in the chocolate chips.
  • Select Air Fry and set the temperature to 300F. Line a dehydrator cooking rack with parchment paper with holes. Set aside.
  • Use a small #40 cookie scoop to place four scoops of cookie dough on the parchment rack. Use a wet finger to flatten the tops of the cookie dough into a disc shape. The edges of the parchment paper can roll, so we recommend using silicone magnets to keep the parchment down.
  • Use retriever tongs to carefully lower the prepared tray to rest on the bottom of the air fryer basket. Cook for 12** minutes, then use the retriever tongs to remove the prepared tray to a heat-safe surface to cool.
  • Repeat as needed until all cookies are baked.

Notes

* Our set of dehydrator trays came as a set of 3, so we prepared all three trays and cooked 12 cookies, putting in one rack right after we took out the other. 
**When we tested this our Instant Pot Pro Crisp, the cookies needed 14 minutes. Also, we don’t recommend using the dehydrator rack that came with it since the hot air doesn’t circulate as well; instead, we use the bottom level of a low dehydrator rack.
 

Nutrition

Calories: 125kcal | Carbohydrates: 18g | Protein: 2g | Fat: 5g | Saturated Fat: 2g | Polyunsaturated Fat: 1g | Monounsaturated Fat: 2g | Trans Fat: 0.3g | Cholesterol: 9mg | Sodium: 91mg | Potassium: 63mg | Fiber: 1g | Sugar: 10g | Vitamin A: 651IU | Vitamin C: 0.2mg | Calcium: 11mg | Iron: 1mg

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