Sugar Cookie Bars

Happy Halloween! I'm so excited it's Halloween this weekend!! My favourite holiday and time of year. I've wanted to make Halloween sugar cookies and decorate them for years but this year was the first I actually did it! It was fun but stressful because I have never worked with royal icing really. I made some of the "flooding" icing too thin so it had air bubbles and didn't harden properly. But I've learned some things that will make next time easier. I was really wanting to make these creepy coffin cookies but I didn't plan very well and thinned my white icing before I had the chance to draw out skeletons. Next time! Anyway I just wanted to share a photo of these with you to spread some Halloween cheer.

I also want to share this other sugar cookie bar recipe with you. I'm sure many of you have seen it around on other blogs and there's a reason for it. It's really good and so easy to make. The cookie part is really thick and soft, not like a regular sugar cookie that's thinner and more crisp/hard. The frosting is good but very messy. Well messy in the sense of if you want to travel somewhere with these, you can't just throw them all into a container, you have to carefully layer them with parchment. But it's worth it! The most exciting part for me was definitely buying animal sprinkles to put on top.

If this sounds good, you might also like:
Gingerbread Pumpkin Bars
Cream Cheese Swirl Blondies
Snickerdoodle Blondies
Peanut Butter Squares with Milk Chocolate and Oats

Sugar Cookie Bars
Adapted from Anissa's Kitchen

I would omit the milk in the frosting next time - it made it look kind of weird (though it tasted fine).

1 cup unsalted butter, room temperature
2 cups sugar
4 eggs
1 tbsp vanilla
5 cups flour
1 tsp salt
1/2 tsp baking soda

Cream butter and sugar until fluffy. Add eggs, one at a time, mixing after each egg. Add vanilla & mix well. In a separate bowl combine flour, salt & soda & stir with a whisk to combine. Add to wet mixture and mix just until combined. Spread on a greased baking sheet (use a 13 x 18 pan). Bake at 375 degrees for 10-15 min, until light golden brown or until a toothpick comes out clean. Cool completely and frost.

Frosting
1 cup unsalted butter, room temperature
2 tsp vanilla
pinch of salt
3 3/4 cups powdered sugar
5 tbsp milk
food coloring (if desired)

For frosting cream butter until smooth and creamy. Add vanilla and salt. Add powdered sugar in 1-2 cup increments until combined, then add milk & mix until smooth and spreading consistency. Add food coloring, if desired. Spread over cooled cookies.