Frosted Sugar Cookie Bars {with Fluffy Buttercream Frosting}

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 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, 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.

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.

Frosted Sugar Cookie Bars {with Fluffy Buttercream Frosting}

Cookies

Ingredients:

• 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. This is very important! If you scoop it straight from the bag, the dough will be too dry!
• 1 tablespoon baking powder
• 1 teaspoon table salt
• Frosting
• Ingredients:
• 1 cup (2 sticks) butter, softened to room temperature
• 3 cups powdered sugar
• 1 teaspoon almond extract
• 2-3 tablespoons (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.