Chocolate Chip Cookie Bars

5 from 1 vote

These chocolate chip cookie bars are the ultimate indulgence. Imagine sweet, nutty brown butter cookie dough filled with gooey dark chocolate chunks. Plus, you don’t need to wait for them to chill like classic cookies!

Prep Time25

Cook Time30

Total Time55

Course: Baking

Cuisine: American

Servings: cookie bars

Author: Margie Nomura

Ingredients

6 oz unsalted butter about 1 1/2 sticks; diced
7 oz soft light brown sugar about scant 1 cup
2.75 oz superfine sugar (caster sugar) about generous 1/3 cup
2 large eggs
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 tsp fine sea salt
10.5 oz all-purpose flour (plain flour) about 2 1/3 cups
1/2 tsp baking soda (bicarbonate of soda)
7 oz good-quality chocolate chopped into chunks
Flaky sea salt

US Customary - Metric

Instructions

Preheat the oven to 392°F (200°C/180°C fan). Grease and line an 8-inch (20 cm) square pan with parchment paper and set aside.
Make the brown butter: Pop the diced butter into a medium-sized non-stick saucepan and set over a low-medium heat. Stir gently until completely melted. Increase the heat to medium and allow the butter to bubble, stirring often. It will bubble and spit - don’t panic, this is normal (just take care!).
Continue to cook the butter, stirring to ensure it cooks evenly, until the crackling noises fade and the bubbles subside. At this point, you should see a foam appear on the surface, and the color will change from golden-yellow to light brown to deep amber brown. This can take anywhere between 7-10 minutes, depending on the size of your pan and how high your heat is. Watch the pan closely as it takes just seconds to go from brown to burnt.
As soon as brown flecks start to appear and you start to smell a gorgeous nutty aroma, remove from the heat. Quickly, but carefully, pour into a medium-sized heatproof bowl. This stops it cooking any further.
Leave to cool slightly. It doesn’t need to be room temperature, but it shouldn’t be scorching hot. You can make the brown butter up to 2 weeks in advance and keep it chilled in your fridge. Allow it to come to a softened room temperature before making the cookie bars.
Once the butter has cooled, add the sugars and mix well to combine. Add the eggs, followed by the vanilla extract, then stir to combine. Sift in the flour, salt, and baking soda, and mix until a smooth dough forms.
Fold in most of the chocolate until evenly distributed throughout the dough. Leave some to sprinkle over the top.
Press the dough into the prepared pan. Sprinkle over the reserved chocolate, pushing down into the top. Sprinkle generously with flaky salt. Pop into the oven and bake for 25-35 minutes - or until golden and baked (the exact time will depend on how gooey you like your cookie bars). Leave to cool in the pan for at least 20 minutes.
Once cool, remove from the pan and cut into squares.

Notes

Make-ahead and storage

To store: The brown butter can be made up to 2 weeks ahead and kept covered and chilled in the fridge. You can make the cookie dough up to 3 days in advance, then cover and chill in the fridge. Once baked, the chocolate chip cookie bars are best on the day they are made but will last in a sealed container for up to 5 days.

To reheat: Pop onto a microwave-safe plate and heat in 10-second blasts.

To freeze: The baked chocolate chip cookie bars can be sliced, wrapped in plastic wrap, and frozen for up to 3 months. Defrost at room temperature.

More quick tips

Weigh the ingredients: For the best results, weigh the flour, sugar, and similar ingredients on a kitchen scale for this (and most baked good) recipe.

Brown butter: Browning the butter is an additional step that adds so much flavor to these chocolate chip cookie bars. However, if you are short on time, you can use regular softened butter. If you are worried you have a few burnt bits in the brown butter (black flecks instead of brown), pour through a sieve to strain them out. Don’t be tempted to skip this step, as the burnt bits will give your chocolate chip cookie bars a bitter flavor.

Chocolate chunks: although this recipe uses dark chocolate, you can use whatever flavor (or combination) of chocolate you like. You can even make triple chocolate chip cookie bars with dark, milk, and white chocolate.

Nuts: Swap 3 1/2 oz (100 g) of chocolate for roughly chopped nuts. Chopped almonds, macadamia, pecans, pistachios, or hazelnuts all work well.

Nutrition