The Best Sugar Cookie Bars
These really are The Best Sugar Cookie Bars. Super delicious and so easy to make, you’ll find yourself making this unique take on a Frosted Sugar Cookie again and again.
We love Frosted Sugar Cookies and we make a lot of different versions of them. These yummy and super easy-to-make Sugar Cookie Bars is one of our favorite variations. The dense Sugar Cookie Bar covered in creamy sweet Buttercream Frosting is mmmmm …. mmmm …. good! Make a batch for your family today!
Ingredients You Will Need
How to Make the Cookie Dough
Step 1: Add the sugar and the softened butter to a mixing bowl.
Step 2: Cream the butter and sugar for 2 minutes and then add the eggs and mix for 3 more minutes.
Step 3: Add the vanilla and mix until combined.
Step 4: Mix in the flour, one cup at a time. Add the Baking Soda with the first cup of flour.
Baking Instructions
Step 5: The Sugar Cookie Bars dough is now ready to prepare for baking. No chilling necessary.
Step 6: Cover a cookie sheet with parchment paper. Pour all of the dough out onto the prepared cookie sheet.
Step 7: Press the dough down onto the cookie sheet. The dough is soft and sticky so it is a little tricky to get the dough evenly distributed on the cookie sheet. If you cover the dough with another piece of parchment paper it makes the process a little less messy.
Step 8: You want the dough to be about 3/4″ high. It will rise to about 1″ high during the baking process. The dough may not fill the entire cookie sheet if you are using a large baking sheet as we did here.
Step 9: Here is the Sugar Cookie Bars dough ready for the oven.
Step 10: Bake the Sugar Cookie Bars in a 375-degree oven for 18-20 minutes. The cookie bars will be lightly browned around the edges and slightly golden on the top. You don’t want to overbake the cookies. The cookie bar will not come out of the oven a deep golden brown – in fact, it might look a little undone but it is not. If you bake these cookie bars too long they will be dry. Let the cookie bar cool completely before you frost them.
Frosting the Cookie Bars
Step 11: While the cookie bars are cooling, make a double batch of our yummy The Best Buttercream Frosting. It is the perfect topping for these Sugar Cookie Bars. You can find detailed instructions on how to make our Buttercream Frosting here.
Step 12: We didn’t our Buttercream Frosting pink. We used 3 drops of Wilton Color Right Pink food coloring to get this pretty light pink color.
Step 13: Scoop the frosting onto the cookie bar.
Step 14: Spread the frosting with a knife or an offset spatula.
Step 15: Add some pretty sprinkles.
Step 16: Allow the frosting to setup for a bit and then cut into individual bars.
Expert Tips and FAQS
Both the eggs and the butter should be at room temperature which will help your cookies turn out lighter and fluffier. For the eggs, room temperature simply means not cold out of the refrigerator. If you forget to take the eggs out before you start making cookie dough you can put the eggs in a bowl of warm water for 5-10 minutes to warm them up. The butter also needs to be softened to room temperature which means if you touch it you should leave an indentation on the stick of butter. Do not use butter that has been over-softened or melted. If that happens you should use a different stick of butter or put it back into the refrigerator to let it set up. We have a whole post about How to Soften Butter, click here if you need more information on how to do that.
Yes. In our opinion, you need some kind of a mixer to make a good cookie dough. A stand mixer, while expensive, is a great investment if you believe you have a lot of homemade baked goods in your future. An electric hand-mixer also works well and you can probably find one for around $20. You can hand mix cookie dough in a pinch (which is how we did it growing up), but you will really have to use a lot of muscle to cream the butter and sugar and eggs properly.
Creaming the butter, sugar and then mixing the eggs in is the most important part of the cookie dough mixing process. Creaming is when you fully incorporate the butter and sugar together and add some much needed air to the dough. We recommend creaming the butter and sugar for 2 minutes on medium-high speed and then mixing the butter/sugar/eggs for another 3 minutes at the same speed. Once you add the flour, you want to mix the dough as little as possible. Mix it too much and you will get tough cookies. Mix in the flour on low speed and continue mixing ONLY until the dry ingredients are incorporated into the dough. Make sure you scrape down the sides and the bottom to make sure all the flour has gotten mixed in.
Everyone’s oven is different. We recommend starting with a test bake with a single cookie to help you hone in on the exact baking time for your oven. You should set your timer for 2 minutes less than whatever the recipe recommends. Once the timer goes off, open up the oven and see how your cookie is baking. Make corrections accordingly. Our oven has a hot spot in the back so we always rotate the cookie sheet half-way through the baking time to get a more even bake. Although this may seem like an unnecessary step, it is better to do this then burn a whole tray of cookies.
Cookies should always be stored in an airtight container. They should be completely cooled before storing them. You can also keep them in the refrigerator and that extends their freshness for up to a week. If you need them to last longer, you can freeze them for up to 3 months. You can pull them out of the freezer and leave them on the counter for 1 hour and they will be ready to eat.
Other Sugar Cookie Recipes You Will Love
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The Best Sugar Cookie Bars
These really are The Best Sugar Cookie Bars. Super delicious and so easy to make, you'll find yourself making this unique take on a Frosted Sugar Cookie again and again.
Ingredients
- 1 cup Butter (Sweet Cream Salted, Softened)
- 2 cups Granulated Sugar
- 4 Large Eggs
- 2 teaspoons Vanilla Extract
- 5 cups All-Purpose Flour
- 1/2 teaspoon Baking Soda
- 2 batches of our The Best Buttercream Frosting
- Wilton Color Right Food Coloring - Pink
- Sprinkles
Instructions
- Add the sugar and the softened butter to a mixing bowl.
- Cream the butter and sugar for 2 minutes and then add the eggs and mix for 3 more minutes.
- Add the vanilla and mix until combined.
- Mix in the flour, one cup at a time. Add the Baking Soda with the first cup of flour.
- The Sugar Cookie Bars dough is now ready to prepare for baking. No chilling necessary.
- Cover a cookie sheet with parchment paper. Pour all of the dough out onto the prepared cookie sheet.
- Press the dough down onto the cookie sheet. The dough is soft and sticky so it is a little tricky to get the dough evenly distributed on the cookie sheet. If you cover the dough with another piece of parchment paper it makes the process a little less messy.
- You want the dough to be about 3/4″ high. It will rise to about 1″ high during the baking process. The dough may not fill the entire cookie sheet if you are using a large baking sheet as we did here.
- Bake the Sugar Cookie Bars in a 375-degree oven for 18-20 minutes. The cookie bars will be lightly browned around the edges and slightly golden on the top. You don't want to overbake the cookies. The cookie bar will not come out of the oven a deep golden brown – in fact, it might look a little undone but it is not. If you bake these cookie bars too long they will be dry. Let the cookie bar cool completely before you frost them.
- While the cookie bars are cooling, make a double batch of our yummy The Best Buttercream Frosting. It is the perfect topping for these Sugar Cookie Bars. You can find detailed instructions on how to make our Buttercream Frosting here.
- We colored our Buttercream Frosting pink. We used 3 drops of Wilton Color Right Pink food coloring to get this pretty light pink color.
- Scoop the frosting onto the cookie bar.
- Spread the frosting with a knife or an offset spatula.
- Add some pretty sprinkles.
- Allow the frosting to setup for a bit and then cut into individual bars.
Notes
Storage/Freezing Tips
Cookies should always be stored in an airtight container. They should be completely cooled before storing them. You can also keep them in the refrigerator and that extends their freshness for up to a week. If you need them to last longer, you can freeze them for up to 3 months. You can pull them out of the freezer and leave them on the counter for 1 hour and they will be ready to eat.
Did you Make this Recipe? Leave a review below, then snap a picture and tag @twosisterscrafting on Instagram so we can see it!
