In our house, everyone’s most-requested, all-time favorite treat is sugar cookies. These sugar cookies. If you’ve never made them, they are amazing–buttery, melt-in-your-mouth amazingness. The problem is that the chilling and rolling and cutting and re-rolling and re-cutting is messy time-consuming and requires fridge space and planning ahead and that doesn’t even take into account the subsequent decorating that has to take place. And then, people never want them at convenient times; they want them on Christmas Eve or birthdays or for their class the next day (when they remember to tell you at 10:30 pm) or at 2:00 in the morning (I’m pretty sure that was me when I was growing another human within me)–always at times when I have about 10 million things going on.
Sugar cookie bars solve so many of those problems–there is no chilling, no rolling, no cutting, no wasted precious dough, all the decorating is done in about 3 minutes, the mess is minimal. Plus, there is something so adorably festive and sentimental about them, even if it’s just frosting and sprinkles. Seriously, my friend pulled out a pan of sugar cookie bars at her Super Bowl party and people bypassed all sorts of fancy-schmancy desserts and went straight for the sugar cookie bars.
I’ve been so spoiled by our sugar cookie recipe that I wasn’t sure how I felt about using another recipe (actually, I was pretty sure how I felt about it and I didn’t feel good.) So I decided to try making our sugar cookie recipe into bars, crossing my fingers that I didn’t waste a whole pound of butter on a giant pan of fail. Luckily, these came out at LEAST as good as rolled cookies, and my kids were just as wildly excited (seriously–my two big kids, one of their friends, and the 1-year-old all saw them at the same time and shrieked with excitement). So it was a major win in every possible way.
How To Make Them
For the cookies, you’re going to need softened butter, no substitutions!), sugar, eggs, vanilla extract, almond extract, and 6 cups of flour. HEAR ME NOW AND BELIEVE ME LATER ($10 million if you catch that reference…just kidding…I don’t have $10 million dollars. But you’ll win my never-ending respect)–when you measure the flour, lightly spoon it into the measuring cups and level it with a knife. When you email us or leave us a comment that your dough was crumbly and didn’t come together, I can guarantee you that this is the problem because I’ve made the same mistake and I’ve seen exactly what happens when you scoop it out of the flour bag. Don’t do it. You will be sad. I will be sad. There’s enough sadness in the world without throwing sugar cookie tragedies into the equation.
Preheat your oven to 350 degrees. Lightly spray a half sheet-sized baking sheet (13 x 18 x 1″–I have 4 of these and I would die before I let anyone take them. Well, maybe not die, but I’d probably put up a good fight and then I’d be pretty bummed about the whole thing.) with non-stick cooking spray and set aside.
In a bowl of a heavy-duty mixer or in a large bowl, cream together the butter and sugar until light and fluffy, about 2 minutes. Add the eggs and extracts and beat until combined.
In a medium-sized mixing bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder, and salt.
Add to the creamed butter mixture and mix to combine.
Place the dough on the prepared baking sheet
and press the dough evenly into the baking sheet.
If desired, you can smooth it out with a rolling pin or a smooth drinking glass.
Bake for 20-30 minutes (mine was done right at 25 minutes, but every oven is different) or until the top is lightly golden brown.
Remove from oven and allow to cool completely.
While the cookie bars are cooling, prepare the frosting. Place the butter, powdered sugar, and extracts in a large mixing bowl
and whip together until combined. Very slowly, add a little bit of milk at a time until desired consistency is reached. If desired, add a few drops of food coloring and beat until very light and fluffy.
When the pan of cookies is cool, spread with frosting
and sprinkle with colored sprinkles.
Cut into squares.
The number of bars this makes will depend on how big you cut the squares, but these are VERY rich and you could probably get away with cutting these into 40+ squares.
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Oatmeal M&M Chocolate Chip Cookie Bars
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Frosted Sugar Cookie Bars {With Fluffy Buttercream Frosting}
Description
A fantastically easy bar recipe that is the best of two glorious worlds: sugar and bar cookies. Your new family favorite!
Ingredients
Cookies
- 2 cups real butter (no substitutions!), softened to room temperature
- 2 cups sugar
- 2 large eggs
- 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
- 1 tablespoon almond extract
- 6 cups flour, spooned lightly into the measuring cup and leveled with a knife.
- 1 tablespoon baking powder
- 1 teaspoon table salt
Frosting
- 1 cup (2 sticks) butter, softened to room temperature
- 3 cups powdered sugar
- 1 teaspoon almond extract
- 2–3 tablespoons milk (or more, if needed milk; whole or evaporated if you have it handy)
- 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Lightly spray a half sheet-sized baking sheet (13x18x1″) with non-stick cooking spray and set aside.
- In a bowl of a heavy-duty mixer or in a large bowl, cream together the butter and sugar until light and fluffy, about 2 minutes. Add the eggs and extracts and beat until combined.
- In a medium-sized mixing bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder, and salt. Add to the creamed butter mixture and mix to combine.
- Press the dough evenly into the prepared baking sheet. If desired, you can smooth it out with a rolling pin or a smooth drinking glass. Bake for 20-30 minutes (mine was done right at 25 minutes, but every oven is different) or until the top is lightly golden brown. Remove from oven and allow to cool completely.
- While the cookie bars are cooling, prepare the frosting. In a large mixing bowl, whip together the powdered sugar and softened butter until combined. Very slowly, add a little bit of milk at a time until desired consistency is reached. If desired, add a few drops of food coloring.
- When the pan of cookies is cool, spread with frosting and sprinkle with colored sprinkles. Cut into squares. The number of bars this makes will depend on how big you cut the squares, but these are VERY rich and you could probably get away with cutting these into 40+ squares.
Notes
- Important tip: When scooping flour into your measuring cup, if you scoop it straight from the bag, the dough will be too dry!
Just made these today for a Father’s Day luncheon at church. The cookies were good – much like a soft shortbread, I agree. But the frosting was AH-MAZING! I used the listed recipe for frosting, and used evaporated milk as suggested, and I’ve never had frosting so good! I’ll never go back to my other frosting recipes.
I made this for a Baby Shower tonight. I think I may have inadvertently sold 20 of your cookbooks in the process. AMAZING!
In case anyone is still looking at these comments, I made these cookies as written and liked them (and got rave reviews from everyone who tried them). But the texture was a little too shortbread-y for my taste, so I tried splitting the dough in half and pressing it into 2 jelly roll pans instead (13×18), and it was perfect! It is more the thickness of a “regular” sugar cookie, and it goes twice as far if you need to make a bunch of cookies at once. I have made it many times since, either the full recipe in two pans or half the recipe in one pan. Love it!
Katie, this is exactly what I was wondering. And yes, I was still looking through the comments to see if anyone had done what you did. Glad to know it works!
Made these as St Patrick’s Day treats for my department (with green icing and sprinkles of course!) And they were a big hit. I love that they are super easy to make and take. I think I might try lemon extract in the bars and frosting sometime.
This is what my daughter chose for to take to her class for her birthday tomorrow, with green icing of course. I made them and we sampled them (you know to make sure they were ok before sharing) and they are AWESOME!! I’ve been using your sugar cookie recipe for a while now (and have gotten much praise) but this is SO much easier that we may be making bars from now on. Bravo and thank you!
In this recipe there is almond extract, but there is someone in my house that is allergic to almonds. Would it be alright to not use the almond extract?
Yep, totally fine! Just increase the vanilla to compensate.
OMG, what a terrific idea. I love sugar cookies. I bake a lot of cookies, but avoid the ones I have to roll out. Boy Howdy, problem solved! I wish I had read this post prior to Valentine’s Day. Oh well—it’s all good.
Mmmhmm. A giant pan of fail is what I got when I tried using a different recipe. But YOUR’S!?? They turned out so perfect and exactly what I was looking for. I made them twice this last weekend for valentine parties and they were a hit all around. THANKS!
I made them. They were epic. My advice–just use vanilla extract.
That way all of the kids will eat them and you won’t have to buy new pants.
I almost never leave comments, and I never leave a “great recipe! I just changed everything about it” comment. But. I made these yesterday, and I may or may not have been trying to both watch Downton Abbey and read the recipe on my iPad, which involves switching the screen and apparently not reading closely. Because I read “2 cups butter” as 2 sticks of butter. And so that’s what I used. And then I might have been distracted while I was scooping and leveling my flour (because of something with Lady Mary, or Anna, or someone) and I couldn’t remember if I was on five or six, so I stopped and figured I see how the dough looked. Anyway. It all mixed together, pressed into the pan nicely, and baked up wonderfully. And while making the frosting I only used 1 stick of butter, because that’s how my buttercream icing recipe goes. And can I say, those cookies are still yummy! In fact, I didn’t suspect anything was off at all until I flipped to the recipe again today and noticed that my butter measurement was way off! So, long story short, if the pound of butter is freaking you out, you could cut it down and use one cup less of flour. (I think. ;)) I am now, however, wondering how much richer these cookies would be with more butter…
I did this, too, with 2 sticks vs 2 cups (I think I skipped down to the ingredients for the frosting). They turned out great. I was thinking while mixing that the dough looked a bit dry, for all that butter, but it wasn’t til they were cooling that I re-read and flipped out a bit. But they were still very delicious! I am going to try the recipe the way it’s written, still, although I’m going to try Megan’s idea of making a half pan in my Pyrex. I didn’t frost the first batch, so I’m definitely frosting this one. At least you have the excuse of an engrossing TV show, Jolie; I was singing Disney tunes and punk rock anthems with my cat, so should have been able to concentrate properly. 😉
Oh, the one thing I noticed about less butter is that it did stick, just a Little Bit, but not enough to ruin the cookie. 🙂
I didn’t notice any sticking because I lined my pan with parchment paper–I did that little trick where you leave some overhang so that you can lift the whole thing out of the pan once it’s cooled (and frosted, in this case), which made it a cinch to slice and serve. I actually really liked the cookie base on this with the 2 sticks of butter. I think I must have used just five cups of flour, which basically made this very close to the sugar cookie dough I usually make. The cookies were thicker than my rolled-out ones, but still nice and chewy and flavorful and not at all dry or crumbly. And certainly not cakey (blech).
Glad I’m not the only one who misread the recipe!
I made these for Valentines Day and they were a big hit
I just made these today and they turned out amazing! So yummy!!
Have you found it possible to overbeat this frosting? I accidentally let it go a little too long, and though the flavor was ok the texture was weird. It almost seemed to become a waxy consistancy. Tis odd because everything I have read online seems to indicate that it isn’t possible to overbeat buttercream…
Have you thought about listing the flour by weight instead of volume? This would produce a more reliable measure. Once I started baking by weight (bc of Alton Brown’s Baking Book), I found my results more predictable. If the flour is a big issue, this could help! Weigh the flour, then also fluff it up with a whisk before putting it in? Just a thought.
Okay, lame question, but would a half recipe work in a 9×13 Pyrex? I only have one pound of butter in the fridge and am not going out again in time to pick more up. I love this idea, I hate cutting and frosting 50 individual cookies!
Not lame at all! Lame would be, “So I’m out of butter, could I substitute a pound of applesauce??” Anyway. Yes, you can totally make half a recipe in a 9×13″ pan. 🙂
They turned out great! I did have to bake them the full 30 min even though it was a smaller batch. Probably because of my clear glass pan though. They were a hit at my baby sisters mission call opening!
Thanks for trying this out, Megan! I’m thinking of trying the half batch, after failing How To Read 101 the first time I tried this. 😉
Yum! I have made sugar cookie bars before and I loved how easy it was but the recipe I used wasn’t amazing but I love your sugar cookie recipe so I am excited to try it this way! Thanks for being so awesome!
I made these this weekend, and have heard nothing but good things ever since. (except for the part where I forgot to tell my nut-allergy friend that there was almond extract in them…agh!!) They are delish!! And I may never go back to making rolled out cookies.
Just FYI, on your frosting instructions it doesn’t say when to put in the extract. I put it in with the butter and powdered sugar. Thanks for the inspiration to make a yummy Valentine treat!
I have four baking sheets of this size, too! I love them all, and would definitely miss one of them if it disappeared. I am considering buying another couple just in case someone did try to steal one. 🙂 Thank you for your recipe for these that actually fits into this size pan. Other (inferior, I’m sure) sugar cookie bar recipes always seem to be for a 9×13 pan. That is not nearly enough yumminess to go around!
I’m going to make these for Valentine’s using a heart-shaped cookie cutter and then the “scraps” as “broken hearts” or “Take a little piece of my heart” along with the pretty heart shapes…
Update: I made these last night and used a small heart-shaped cookie cutter, pressed into the bars just after coming out of the oven and they came out perfectly! One pan made 36 hearts…and lots of “scraps” for me to eat. I may or may not have made myself just a litttttle sick on cookie last night.
Also, the almond extract addition to sugar cookies? Life. changing. Thanks for another home run ladies!
A few things:
First: Ladies. Ease up. This is not rocket science. If you do anything *other than* plunge your measuring cup into the bag of flour and use whatever ends up in the cup, you will do fine. Folks have been baking without the benefit of weight measures forever. Some of my grandmother’s cookbooks list “butter the size of an egg”, for goodness’ sake. The fact that one should “scoop and level” should not be a baking revelation; it’s pretty basic baking protocol. Anyway, it will be good no matter what, to be honest. With a pound and a half of butter total, how can it not be?
Second: A pound. And a half. Of butter!!!!
Third: My family recipe for (homemade) slice & bake sugar cookies includes lemon zest and nutmeg. It’s awesome! Just throwing that out there for inspiration. I have been known to make it just to eat the (unpasteurized, potentially salmonella-filled) cookie dough. So good!
I made them yesterday and had no problem at all with the texture. I creamed the butter/sugar really well but stopped the mixer as soon as the flour was combined. Maybe that would help Jill for next time? My friends talked me into making cream cheese frosting but I’m trying yours next time. They were a huge hit so thank you!
So, I made these. The taste was phenomenal. But, the texture was not quite as phenomenal. They were just kind of dense. I promise that I spooned the flour!!! I followed the recipe to a tee!!! The only thing I can think of is that I over-mixed them. Is that a thing? Overmixing your cookies? (Sorry for such a rookie question)
Overmixing is totally a thing! 🙂 That could be it. How fresh was your baking powder? That’s my best guess, but I can’t say for sure. 🙂
It might be the brand of flour, too. My sister gave me some Gold Medal, I think it was, flour once (and now that I think about it, she should have known better!). I have only used White Lily flour in the past, and I could NOT get my biscuits to bake up normally. I finally threw the rest of the bag away!
Made these over the weekend and they are delicious. Problem is, I have gained 5 lbs from eating the entire pan. I need to stay away from your site the week of Valentines. Sugar cookies are my favorite cookie (and my weakness), therefore, Valentines is my favorite holiday. 🙂
I made these and they were great! Don’t stress about the weight of the flour, just spoon it in and then level it. Just watch them carefully in the oven; I took them out when they were barely, barely the lightest brown around the edges but NOT on top and they were perfect. I don’t love almond extract either, but the amounts are just right in this recipe!
I’d like to add my voice to those asking for the weight of the flour. I use a kitchen scale as much as possible in my baking as I find it makes for much more consistent results. However I’m making these today whether you get around to the weighing of flour or not! Maybe it’s something you could consider for future baking posts? I know it would be appreciated by many.
How many ounces is a cup of flour “lightly spooned?” I think everyone “lightly spoons” bit differently, and I find the scale way easier and more consistent.
I would have to weigh it out. But…I just get a regular spoon (like for soups or cereal) and spoon heaping spoonfuls in, then level it out and it comes out great. 🙂
Would you be willing to do a weight measurement of the flour? I think that would help my OCD self to make sure I don’t do too much.
I would…but not tonight, hahaha. In the meantime, just grab a cereal spoon and just spoon out heaping spoonfuls (wow…could I say the word “spoon” more??) until the cup is heaping, then level it off. 🙂
I’ve been craving sugar cookies, and these look perfect! I think I’ll make them for my primary class so I don’t end up eating half the pan myself.
THANK YOU!!! I don’t love the whole chill and roll and cut out part of sugar cookies…but being that they’re my hubbys face I try…but these are awesome and so so so easy!! Especially when I have leftover buttercream in the fridge needing a place to go !! 🙂 I only made a quarter sheet just to try..about the same cooking time. Perfect!!!!
Thanks for the info. I don’t have a half sheet pan!