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Sugar Cookie Bars (aka Thickest, Softest, most Perfect Cookie Bars Ever)

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sugar cookie bar bunny vibrant-1

sugar cookie bar bite-1

We have never taken so many beauty shots of a single food item. Ever. These Sugar Cookie Bars are as OUTSTANDING as they are photogenic. If you’ve been on the hunt for a bar that’s not dry and has a fudge-like texture and isn’t sickly-sweet, hunt no more. As you might be aware, sugar cookies are awesome. Our Aunt Becky makes the best sugar cookies known to mankind (we used her frosting recipe here). HOWEVER, sometimes you don’t have time for all of that cutting-out-into-shapes, flour-all-over-your-kitchen mess but you still want to sink your teeth into a soft, wonderful sugar cookie. And – if we’re being honest here – we might never go back to making normal sugar cookies again (don’t tell Aunt Becky). These are THAT amazing. There is a just a touch of both lemon zest and almond extract in the dough, which lends a beautiful flavor and some brightness. Those flavors may be contradicting each other in your brain right now, but we assure you – they work wonderfully well here. A touch of lemon zest and some cream cheese in the frosting rounds everything out and results in pure, sugar cookie bliss. Many, many thanks to Baker Bettie for this amazing recipe (see our frosting recipe below).

Here’s the dough:

sugar cookie bars dough-1

If you are doubling this recipe, we suggest using two 8×8 inch pans (as opposed to one large pan) as you are less likely to achieve that evenly moist, fudge-like texture when using a large pan. The directions say to bake for 14-16 minutes. They will look underdone when you remove them from the oven, and they should be underdone. Don’t worry, they will firm up if you allow them to cool entirely in the pan before trying to remove them. We’ve baked ours for both 16 minutes and 14 minutes, and both were great but removing them at the 14 minute mark resulted in an even softer texture. Some cookie bars have a greasy feel when they are “underdone,” but this is not the case with these. They will be ultra soft but not greasy. Unless your oven’s heat calibration is way off (or you live at the top of the Rockies), your bars should’t be in the oven for longer than 16 minutes. Be sure to remove them from the oven to check for doneness as your oven light may play tricks on you.

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We dropped globs of the same color frosting in a row, then smoothed each row separately using an off-set spatula. The soft frosting allowed the colors to fade into one another naturally.

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Make your frosting as thick or as smooth as you like by using more or less milk.

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Just look at that texture. Is it fudge or a cookie bar, for crying out loud?!

 

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If you have deep cookie cutters, cut out any festive shape you wish!

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sugar cookie bars collage

Aunt Becky’s Frosting:

Combine:

  • 1/3 C cream cheese, at room temp
  • 1/3 C butter, at room temp
  • 1/3 C light corn syrup
  • 6 C powdered sugar
  • 1 T vanilla
  • 2 to 4 T milk
  • 1/4 tsp lemon zest (a TAC addition for this recipe)

 

Dulce De Leche Cookie Bars

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dulce de leche bars 1 - 1

We adore cookie bars because they are soft and chewy and we can skip the edges if we want and have 3 or 4 sides of thick, soft wonderfulness. These Dulce De Leche Bars are everything to be desired in a cookie bar: soft, rich, and just a little chocolatey. The shortbread-ish crust is flaky and buttery, and the dulce de leche is sweet and gooey. The nuts and chocolate chips lend some pleasant texture. Thank us later.

We wanted to make our own dulce de leche for this… and it turned out horribly at first. We used the ole’ “pour sweetened condensed milk into a dish, cover with foil, and set that dish inside another dish with hot water coming half way up the sides of the dish and cook for 1 hour 15 minutes…blah blah blah” method. Bull. I cooked that junk for 4 hours and it didn’t get any darker than an extremely pale caramel color (and didn’t really thicken). So DON’T use that lame method. What DID work was this method: remove the labels from 2 cans of sweetened condensed milk, set them inside a large pot, cover with water. Bring it to a gentle boil and leave them in there, undisturbed, for 3.5 hours (you may need to add more water as it evaporates). Makes about 2.25 cups.

boiling cans of sweetened condensed milk for dulce de leche cookie bars-1

 

dulce de leche bars 2 - 1

Dulce De Leche Cookie Bars
 
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Author:
Difficulty: Easy
Serves: 25 bars
Ingredients
  • Cooking spray
  • 2 cups plus 1 tablespoon all-purpose flour
  • 1½ sticks (12 tablespoons) cold unsalted butter, diced
  • ⅓ cup confectioners' sugar
  • 1 tablespoon pure vanilla extract
  • ½ teaspoon kosher salt
  • 1 cup dulce de leche
  • ¼ cup heavy cream
  • 2 large egg yolks
  • ¾ cup semisweet chocolate chips
  • ¾ cup pecans, chopped
Instructions
  1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Line a 9-inch-square baking dish with foil, leaving a 2-inch overhang on two sides; coat the foil with cooking spray.
  2. Pulse 2 cups flour, the butter, confectioners' sugar, 1 teaspoon vanilla and the salt in a food processor until the mixture starts clumping together, about 1 minute. Press firmly and evenly in the bottom and ¼ inch up the sides of the prepared pan. Bake until firm and lightly browned, 25 to 30 minutes. Transfer to a rack and let cool 5 minutes.
  3. Meanwhile, combine the dulce de leche, heavy cream, egg yolks and the remaining 1 tablespoon flour and 2 teaspoons vanilla in a medium bowl and whisk until smooth. Pour the mixture over the crust and sprinkle with the chocolate chips and pecans. Return to the oven and bake until set around the edge but slightly jiggly in the center, 20 to 25 minutes.
  4. Transfer to the rack and let cool completely. Lift out of the pan using the overhanging foil. Remove the foil and cut into pieces.

From: Dulce de Leche Cookie Bars

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