Christmas Cherry Bars – Buttery batter bars with cherry filling and topped with a glaze, Christmas Cherry Bars make a lovely holiday dessert! Ideal for holiday get-togethers, tho, these bars are the best of both worlds, a bar cookie texture and a cherry pie flavor that are a seasonal hit with the entire family!
Why You’re Going to Love These Christmas Cherry Bars:
Festive Look: The brilliant red cherry filling and optional glaze make these bars an excellent contribution to holiday festivities.
Simply Made: With basic ingredients and easy steps, these bars come together with very little fuss.
Very Good Layers: The buttery crust, juicy cherry filling and sweet glaze all combine for a rich flavor burst that’s difficult to resist.
Fun to Share: This 9×13 inch batch makes lots of bars, so great for a crowd.
Make-Ahead Friendly: These bars can be baked ahead of time, and the glaze added just before serving, which will save time during the holidays.
Key Ingredients:
Butter
The butter should be softened at room temperature before creaming. So a light, fluffy batter is achievable.
Make sure to use unsalted butter so you can control the salt level. If using salted butter, then reduce the added salt to around ½ teaspoon.
Sugar
This recipe uses classic granulated sugar, which adds just enough sweetness while also aiding in structure of the batter. You want to stay away from using powdered sugar in the batter — it’s a great add-in for frostings, but in this case, it can mess with the texture and make things either too soft or dense.
Optional Topping: If you want to add a little festivity to the top, especially for the holidays, dust some coarse sugar on top of the glaze. That not only gives the finished product a glittering beauty, but also a gratifying crunch in each bite.
Eggs
Temperature: For ease of mixing, eggs should be brought to room temperature before adding to the batter; cold eggs make for lumpy, incohesive dough.
Adding Eggs One By One: Adding eggs one at a time keeps the batter loose and helps it maintain a lighter texture without becoming heavy.
All-Purpose Flour
Measured Correctly: Using the spoon-and-level method for measuring flour will prevent you from adding too much flour, which will make the bars dense.
Alternative Flours: For a fluffy texture, you can replace ½ cup of all-purpose flour with cake flour.
Cherry Pie Filling
Use Good Filling: The cherry pie filling is the star here, so go for a good brand with whole cherries and less additional sugar.
Homemade Alternative: If you feel ambitious, you can use fresh or frozen cherries to make your own cherry pie filling for a more natural flavor.
Optional Glaze
Powdered Sugar: Powdered sugar melts right in to form a smooth glaze. (If you have any lumps, be sure to sift it.)
Milk: You may want to add more, but just enough to get the right texture, like pourable but not too thin.
Vanilla Extract: A small amount of vanilla rounds out the flavor of the glaze, and pairs nicely with the cherry filling.
