Pumpkin Spice Cannoli Dip

If you’re looking for a crowd-pleasing dip for entertaining your hungry party guests, then look no further than this Pumpkin Spice Cannoli Dip recipe. It’s like eating a cannoli but without having to fill cannoli shells.

There’s a section of Pittsburgh often referred to as Little Italy. It’s where you can find several Italian grocery stores that sell homemade Italian goodies, including fresh pasta and homemade lady locks. Every year this neighborhood throws an Italian festival where vendors line the streets with all of the Italian food you can imagine. One of the main attractions is the cannoli; you couldn’t walk down that street without seeing at least 3-4 booths selling cannoli (actually, you couldn’t walk down the street at all because of big crowds of people). I went last year and again this year because it’s only about 10 minutes from me. 10 minutes to drive, forever to park (seriously I drove in circles through the neighborhood until I finally found a spot). It was SO hot that day, in the 90s no doubt, so I didn’t stay long. Got an iced mocha, looked at the ridiculously long lines for food, then attempted to navigate the street while not getting shoved out of the way. I ended up not buying any food and went home to my not crowded air conditioned apartment.

When I think of fall with winter not far behind (ugh), I think of entertaining – tailgating parties, Halloween, Thanksgiving, supper club parties. They all have one thing in common – groups of people who love to eat! Since I didn’t get my cannoli at the festival, I fixed that craving at home. Pair that with the fact pumpkin spice season is upon us, I decided to mash the two ideas together in a recipe perfect for entertaining a hungry crowd. However, instead of piping the filling into shells, I made it easier and turned it into Pumpkin Spice Cannoli Dip. All of the flavors of cannoli and fall in one bite.

Cannoli is an Italian pastry filled with a ricotta cheese mixture then rolled in either chocolate chips or pistachios. You can buy cannoli shells at an Italian grocery store or make them homemade. However, I decided to forego filling shells and go straight into dip mode. Why waste time filling shells when you can eat it much faster with chips? I also made my cannoli dip more season appropriate for fall by adding pumpkin and spices to it. This dip isn’t very sweet as most cannoli fillings aren’t.

For the chips, what better way to pair a pumpkin dip than with Harvest Pumpkin Chips from Food Should Taste Good? They are tortilla chips with a hint of cinnamon and nutmeg, perfect to pair with pumpkin spices in cannoli dip. To give you some background on Food Should Taste Good, they focus on crafting better snacks made with real and simple ingredients. That means their products are non-GMO, certified kosher, and certified gluten free with most varieties being vegan.

For more information on Food Should Taste Good, please visit their website and say hello on Facebook, Twitter, and Pinterest.

Disclosure: This post is sponsored by Food Should Taste Good. Thank you for supporting me and the companies I work with as sponsored posts help pay for the costs of running Chocolate Moosey, including website hosting and groceries for recipe development.