We Tried Costco’s New Pumpkin Bar Cake

If you’re looking to change up your Thanksgiving with a different sort of pumpkin treat rather than the same old pumpkin pie, then Costco has just the thing for you. Their bar cakes are very popular and for good reason―they’re tasty and they can really serve a crowd. Well, just in time for Thanksgiving (or fall if you just want a fun fall treat, we won’t judge), they’ve released a new bar cake: a pumpkin bar cake!

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The Good And The Bad

Pros: The bar cake is a long, layered dessert that features layers of pumpkin sponge cake, pumpkin mousse, and whipped cream. Presentation wise? This is a lovely cake and would be a standout dessert for any fall entertaining you have to do with those crisp, defined layers. But you don’t care (too much probably) about how it looks. 

The components of this bar cake are amazing. To get such quality from something that is produced on a large scale is impressive. Light, airy sponges like the ones in the pumpkin bar cake are hard to find outside of smaller bakeries. The mousse and whipped cream also were light and airy, leaving the whole bite feeling delightful rather than something heavy that’s going to weigh you down. 

Cons: Now this is what I was most disappointed about―the taste. I will say, I like the bar cakes from Costco and have tried many of them. But the flavors on this one? Well, they were a little lacking. Maybe that’s because I went in expecting pumpkin spice and this does not actually say that there’s spice in it. 

But honestly, any baked good that is pumpkin really needs at the very least cinnamon if not the other warming spices to really make it shine. And this just didn’t have that. It was good. Just kind of one note. The sponge was light but it kind of blended with the mousse. So it was just all a soft vaguely pumpkin flavored bite. And if you know pumpkin, you know it doesn’t have a ton of flavor by itself. Something crunchy would’ve been great too. 

The Verdict

Overall, I probably wouldn’t buy the pumpkin bar again. When I have pumpkin things in the fall, I want that punch of spice. And this doesn’t deliver. If you’re looking for a subtle pumpkin treat for the fall though, this would be perfect. It just wasn’t particularly to my tastes. That said, the cake itself was beautifully made. It was light, airy, and moist. Which isn’t a surprise because their other bar cakes always do really well in production as well. I just found the flavor was a little lacking.