Easy Pumpkin Spice Syrup

Fall season brings classic flavours like pumpkin and apple. You’re going to love this recipe for pumpkin spice syrup. Made with simple ingredients, it allows you to drink affordable pumpkin spice lattes without leaving home on busy days. It’s vegan, dairy free, soy free and gluten free!

A PSL can be anywhere from $5-10.00 depending on the coffee shop. While a can of pure pumpkin puree costs about $4.00-5.00 to purchase. So for one latte made at home, we’re talking $1-2.00 or less.

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Homemade pumpkin spice syrup

These are the main ingredients you’ll need for this pumpkin sauce. It contains actual pumpkin and is made with a milk base instead of water. Making it closer to the Starbucks pumpkin sauce.

• Pure pumpkin purée: Use homemade or canned.
• Pumpkin pie spice: I make my own pumpkin pie spice by mixing together; ground cinnamon, ground nutmeg, ground ginger and ground cloves
• Oat milk: or use canned coconut milk. Any milk works, oat and coconut both have a high fat content.
• White and Brown Sugar
• Salt – Brings out taste
• Vanilla extract: Optional but adds more depth of flavour. I don’t always add it because I often forget.

What’s in Starbucks Pumpkin Sauce?

The Starbucks pumpkin spice syrup is actually called a ‘pumpkin spice sauce’. It contains sugar, condensed skim milk, pumpkin purée, and less then 2% of each of the following: fruit and vegetable juice for colour, natural flavours, annatto, salt and potassium sorbate.

We can see that there is a lot of sugar, pumpkin puree and the base is condensed milk. Lots of recipes call for water but the syrup lacks richness when made that way. This recipe makes it into a pumpkin spice sauce.

Condensed Milk

I use oat milk and cook it with the sugar to create my own condensed milk. If you don’t need it to be dairy free you can use coconut milk or regular milk.

Fruit & Vegetable Juice

It also contains fruit and vegetable juice for colour. If you want to make this syrup more orange, simply add 1/8 teaspoon of turmeric to make it more vibrant.

Starbucks Pumpkin Spice Latte

The grande (16oz) Starbucks pumpkin spice latte or the iced pumpkin latte is made with espresso, 4 pumps of their pumpkin sauce, milk, pumpkin spice topping and whipped cream.

My recipe for the syrup is dairy free and vegan. And while it contains less ingredients than Starbucks recipe it still comes out tasting just as rich. It also doesn’t require tracking down any dairy free sweetened condensed milk.

How to make This Recipe For pumpkin spice Syrup

This Pumpkin spice sauce recipe is affordable and simple to make so let’s go through the basics!

Step 1: Combine Milk & Sugar

First cook white sugar and the oat milk together to create your own form of condensed milk. Bring to boil for 1 minute and remove from heat. Make sure you are stirring it, so it doesn’t boil over.

Step 2: Measure Ingredients & Cook

Then add the rest of the ingredients, except for the vanilla, into the pot with the oat milk. Bring it back to a boil, turn the heat to medium low and let it simmer for 4-6 minutes. The longer you let it simmer the thicker it will be. I normally do about 4.

Remove from the heat add in 1 tsp vanilla extract.

Step 3: Strain & Store

Strain it through a fine mesh strainer to make sure it’s smooth. Store in the fridge in an airtight container. I like to use a glass jar. It is best used in the first few days but lasts up to a week. it may separate some which is normal because of the pumpkin. Mix or shake it up before using.

Ways to use Homemade Starbucks Pumpkin Spice Syrup

I like to add some of this pumpkin syrup to my favourite coffee drink. Or the perfect way to use it is in a latte recipe or in your cold brew/iced coffee.

Garnish your drinks using cinnamon sticks, coconut whip cream and a sprinkle of pumpkin pie spice or cinnamon. 

Homemade Pumpkin Spice Latte (Dairy Free)

To make a dairy free pumpkin spice latte:

• Add 2 tablespoons pumpkin syrup to coffee mug
• Prepare double espresso shot or use 1/3 cup homemade espresso substitute and add it into your mug.
• Stir the espresso and syrup together.
• Heat and froth 2/3 cup oat milk and pour frothed milk over the espresso.
• Top with some coconut whip cream and sprinkle of pumpkin pie spice.

Iced Pumpkin Spice Latte

How to make a dairy free iced pumpkin latte.
Into a tall glass add:

• 1 cup ice cubes
• 2 tablespoons of pumpkin spice syrup
• Double shot espresso, or ⅓ cup espresso substitute
• ⅔ cup cold oat milk, frothed or use any milk

Stir, top with some coconut whip cream and pumpkin pie spice.

Use as Topping for Pancakes or Ice Cream

This syrup is so rich you can use it on some French toast or pumpkin pancakes. Or use it to make your ice cream into pumpkin ice cream!

Substitutions & Tips

• Oat milk: Replace with canned coconut milk or almond milk
• White Sugar: Subaru for all brown, use cane sugar or honey.
• Brown sugar: Maple syrup, dark brown sugar or coconut sugar
• Homemade pumpkin puree: use canned pure pumpkin purée. Just make sure you don’t accidentally grab a can of pumpkin pie filling. It will not result in the same taste since it isn’t just actual pumpkin
• Homemade pumpkin pie spice: can be replaced by 1 3/4 tsp premade pumpkin pie spice
• Sweetness level: This recipe is less sweet than Starbucks but still contains a significant amount of sugar. You could cut the sugar in half if you don’t like the sweetness of the Starbucks pumpkin spice lattes.