Description
Soft, tender Christmas cookie bars with vanilla-almond flavor and festive red and green swirls. Easy to make and perfect for feeding a crowd during the holiday season.
Ingredients
For the Cookie Base:
- 3 cups all-purpose flour
- 1 teaspoon baking powder
- ½ teaspoon salt
- 1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, softened
- ½ cup granulated sugar
- 1 large egg
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- ½ teaspoon almond extract
- Red & green food coloring
For the Topping:
- Sprinkles (red, green, or festive mix)
Instructions
Set oven to 350°F. Grease your 9×13 pan or use parchment paper. Trust me on the parchment – these stick like crazy otherwise.
Put flour, baking powder and salt in a bowl. Whisk it together. My grandma always said do this first so you don’t forget anything.
Beat butter and sugar until fluffy, about 4 minutes. Don’t skip this step or your bars will be dense instead of tender.
Beat in the egg completely, then add vanilla and almond extracts. The kitchen starts smelling good right about now.
Add flour mixture slowly. Mix just until you can’t see white streaks. Stop there – overmixing makes tough cookies.
Split dough into three bowls. Leave one plain. Add red coloring to one, green to another. Start with just a tiny drop – you can always add more.
Press plain dough in the bottom of your pan. Drop spoonfuls of colored dough on top. Take a knife and barely swirl it around – just a few strokes.
Sprinkle those red and green sprinkles all over. Kids love doing this part and honestly they do it better than me.
20-25 minutes max. Edges should barely start turning golden. Middle should look set but not brown.
Don’t even think about cutting these until they’re completely cool. Warm bars just crumble into a mess.
Notes
Stop mixing once you can’t see flour streaks anymore. Overmixed dough gets tough and nobody wants that.
Gel food coloring works better than liquid. The liquid stuff can make your dough sticky. Also, press that dough down firm in the pan or it bakes weird.
When swirling colors, barely touch it. I made mud-colored bars my first try because I went crazy with the knife.
- Prep Time: 15 minutes
- Cook Time: 20-25 minutes
- Category: Dessert
- Method: Baking
- Cuisine: American