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Delicious chewy sugar cookie bars made with brown butter. This adds such amazing flavor and the salted caramel buttercream on top is the best part! 
I love sugar cookie bars. They require little effort to make and taste just as amazing with a fraction of the work. Brown butter is also another favorite of mine. Have you made anything yet with brown butter in it? If you haven’t, then you are missing out!
How do you even describe brown butter? It becomes nutty and adds such great flavor with just a simple added step of cooking it on the stove. It is like a bakers gold. Whatever you add it to becomes amazing! It made these sugar cookie bars so soft and chewy and were literally the best that I have ever had!
But just when you think these delicious bars can’t get any better, you frost them with salted caramel buttercream. Oh my goodness. I think I am going to frost everything from now on with this frosting! The frosting took these delicious bars to a whole different and amazing level. Sprinkle it with a little sea salt and you are good to devour. 🙂
I have made some sugar cookie bars in my day that have been dry and crumbly before. Not these. They are so soft and chewy with the first bite! They even stay soft and chewy the next day. If they last that long! 🙂
I know that you will agree that these are one of the best cookie bars ever! And if you have never added brown butter to anything, now is the time to start!
Recipe frosting source Betty Crocker
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Brown Butter Sugar Cookie Bars with Salted Caramel Buttercream
Ingredients
For the Brown Butter Sugar Cookie Bars:
- 13 tablespoons unsalted butter melted until browned
- 1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract
- 1 cup dark brown sugar
- 1/2 cup granulated sugar
- 2 large eggs at room temperature
- 2 cups plus 2 tablespoons all-purpose flour
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
For the Salted Caramel Butter Cream:
- 1/2 cup butter or margarine
- 1 cup brown sugar packed
- 1/4 cup milk
- 3 1/2 cups powdered sugar
- Course Sea Salt for Sprinkling
Instructions
To make the sugar cookie bars:
- Preheat oven to 325 degrees. Line a 9x13 inch pan with aluminum foil and lightly spray with cooking spray.
- In a medium sized saucepan add the butter. Cook over medium heat and whisk the butter to brown. It will become frothy and start to have a nutty aroma. Then it will turn brown. It takes about 3 minutes. Remove from heat.
- In a large mixing bowl, combine dark brown sugar, sugar, vanilla, brown butter and eggs. Beat until incorporated.
- Add flour and salt and mix until just combined. Do not over mix. The dough will be thick. Spread evenly into the bottom of your prepared 9x13 inch baking pan. Bake for 22-25 minutes or until the edges are lightly brown. Remove from oven and allow to cool on a wire rack completely.
To make the salted caramel buttercream:
- In a medium sauce pan add the butter and brown sugar. Bring to a boil. Stir in the milk and bring back to a boil. Remove from heat and stir in powdered sugar. Frost the cooled bars ad sprinkle lightly with sea salt.
Nutrition
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
Hi! Could you please tell me if the dark brown sugar in the bar is packed? I would like to make them tomorrow. Thanks!
Just made them. They are wonderful! Very rich so I’m cutting them in very small squares and putting them in with my Christmas cookies! Thank you!
I just made these, and threw all the frosting on top without reading the reviews – it’s definitely twice the frosting needed (and I LOVE frosting). I used a 13×9, but my bars and my frosting are at least twice as thick as the picture. All that being said, these are delicious! Thanks for sharing a great recipe.
Hi, these bars look great! I love browned butter! I have a question, the dark brown sugar in the cookie is not packed? The light brown sugar in the frosting is packed. I always assume that brown sugar is packed unless stated unpacked brown sugar. I was just about to make these, it seems like a small thing, but could make a difference in the sweetness level. Thanks!
I used only 2 cups of powdered sugar for the frosting, and it still turned out well. The frosting recipe makes double what is necessary. Delicious!
I only have light brown sugar on hand. Would that be ok for the recipe?
This are exceptional! We are gluten free so I used Pamela’s Baking Mix for flour with no changes what is listed. Thanks for sharing.
these sound wonderful! Any idea how many days they keep or if you can freeze them? Would like to make them ahead of an event. Thanks!
These are very sweet and really really good. They looked beautiful when I took them to a church event! I think the richness and sweetness keeps me from eating too many at at time which I a great thing! Thank you for sharing this
They look amazing. But whoever took that bite out, has perfect teeth!
I only have salted butter on hand. If I eliminated the 1/2 tsp of salt, do you think I would be ok?
I think it would be fine using salted butter by itself. 🙂
That’s ‘COARSE” sea salt 🙂
I made these last night. Very easy but soooooo sweet. Really rich. Thanks for the recipe!
I am glad you liked them! They are super rich and sweet but amazing! I just ate them little square by square. 🙂
Probably a dumb question but 9×13 cake pan or like a cookie sheet?
Cake pan. 🙂
I’m always nervous to try new recipes that don’t have any reviews on them, but these sounded too yummy to pass up. I made them last night and they are amazing! Thanks for the recipe!
These sound amazing! For the frosting, are you using dark brown sugar still or light brown? I typically use light brown for all my recipes unless otherwise stated but since you used the dark earlier – I want to make sure. 🙂
I just used light brown for the frosting. 🙂
So you used DARK brown sugar in cake mix and regular brown sugar in frosting?? I usually only use the regular brown sugar do you think it would make a difference??
New to your website and everything looks so good – especially these bars! i know now what I’ll make for a work potluck. Thanks, I know they’ll love them with that brown butter!