Salted Caramel Chocolate Chip Cookie Bars
Salted Caramel Chocolate Chip Cookie Bars combine the rich flavors of caramel and chocolate into a convenient cookie bar form! Featuring luscious chocolate chips and a homemade caramel sauce that is a total dream!
Why We Love This Caramel Chocolate Chip Cookie Bars Recipe
There are treats you make on rare special occasions. Then some treats are so comforting they end up being family favorites that are replicated month after month, and year after year.
Salted Caramel Chocolate Chip Cookie Bars are the latter treat variety.
Sticky chocolate chip bars oozing with thick buttery caramel filling… These cookie bars scream family game night, movie night, or any other kind of cozy night you want to share with people you love.
Caramel chocolate chip cookie bars have layers of chewy chocolate chip cookie dough with a gooey, creamy caramel in the middle that is so easy to whip up!
This recipe came from a cookbook my friend Shelly Jaronsky wrote called The Cookies & Cups Cookbook, named after her wildly popular dessert blog.
Ingredients You Need
- Butter – unsalted and softened to room temperature
- Brown Sugar – packed
- Sugar – granulated sugar
- Eggs – large and room temperature
- Vanilla – adds extra flavor
- Salt – balances out the flavors
- Baking Soda – to help them lift in the oven
- All-Purpose Flour – or a gluten-free replacement flour
- Chocolate Chips – semi-sweet chocolate chips
- Sweetened Condensed Milk – to make the caramel creamier
- Soft Caramels – an easy way to add caramel to cookies
- Flaked Sea Salt – for added flavor and texture
How to Make Salted Caramel Chocolate Chip Cookie Bars
Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Line a 9×13-inch baking pan with foil and liberally coat it with nonstick cooking spray.
In the bowl of an electric mixer or a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, beat the softened butter with both sugars until light and fluffy, about 2 minutes. Add the eggs, vanilla, salt, and baking soda. Mix well, then scrape the sides of the bowl with a spatula.
Turn the speed to low and add the flour. Beat to combine, then mix in the chocolate chips.
Press half of the cookie dough into the bottom of the prepared baking dish.
In a medium saucepan, add the sweetened condensed milk and unwrapped caramels. Set over medium-low heat and stir until the caramels melt, making a smooth caramel filling. Pour the caramel layer over the cookie dough base.
Drop the remaining dough over the caramel filling in small teaspoon-sized clumps. Bake the bars for 25-30 minutes, until the center is just set and the edges are golden brown.
Sprinkle with sea salt flakes and allow the cookie bars to cool completely. Then lift the bars out of the pan by the edges of the foil and cut. Store in an airtight container at room temperature for up to 3 days.
Tips & Tricks
- Don’t over mix the batter! Once the cookie batter has flour in it, it will start to build gluten. You don’t want the batter to build too much gluten or else the cookies will end up tough instead of chewy and moist!
- To most efficiently press the chocolate chip cookie dough into the baking dish, try coating your fingers in flour! This will help prevent the cookie dough from sticking to your hands.
- Don’t sprinkle the top with table salt! The top should be sprinkled with a flaky, coarse salt like sea salt or kosher salt. If you don’t have flaky salt, simply skip the salt on the top.
- Serve with a scoop of vanilla ice cream or a dollop of whipped cream on top!
Frequently Asked Questions
Yes! To make these gluten-free, replace the flour with a gluten-free replacement flour that is a 1 to 1 ratio!
Definitely. Allow the salted caramel chocolate chip cookie bars to cool to room temperature, then freeze in an airtight freezer container or a zip freezer bag. Freeze for up to 3 months, then thaw before eating.
Since we want the edges to be set, but the center to be slightly soft and chewy, the bars will naturally sink in the middle a little bit! It is totally normal.
Store any leftover caramel cookie bars in an airtight container at room temperature for up to 4 days! If you have lots of them, feel free to freeze them!
Check the Recipe Card Below for Instructions on How to Make Salted Caramel Chocolate Chip Cookie Bars + Video!
Looking for more cookie & bar recipes? Try out some of your favorites:
- Blueberry White Chocolate Blondies
- Chocolate Chip Pumpkin Bars
- Bailey’s Irish Cream Coffee Bars
- Oatmeal Fudge Bars
- Gooey Blueberry Cookie Bars
- Potato Chip Cookie Bars
Salted Caramel Chocolate Chip Cookie Bars
Ingredients
- 1 cup unsalted butter, softened
- 1 cup packed light brown sugar
- 1/2 cup granulated sugar
- 2 large eggs
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 1 teaspoon kosher salt
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- 2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
- 2 cups semisweet chocolate chips
- 14 ounces sweetened condensed milk
- 10 ounces soft caramels, unwrapped
- 1 teaspoon flaked sea salt
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Line a 9×13-inch baking dish with foil and liberally coat with nonstick cooking spray.
- In the bowl of an electric mixer, beat the softened butter with both sugars until light and fluffy, about 2 minutes. Add the eggs, vanilla, salt, and baking soda. Mix well, then scrape the sides of the bowl with a spatula.
- Turn the speed to low and add the flour. Beat to combine, then mix in the chocolate chips.
- Press half of the cookie dough into the bottom of the prepared baking dish.
- In a medium sauce pot, add the sweetened condensed milk and unwrapped caramels. Set over medium-low heat and stir until the caramels melt, making a smooth caramel filling. Pour the filling over the cookie dough base.
- Drop the remaining cookie dough over the caramel filling in small teaspoons-sized clumps. Bake the bars for 25-30 minutes, until the center is just set.
- Sprinkle with sea salt flakes and allow the bars to cool completely. Then lift the bars out of the pan by the edges of the foil and cut. StoreĀ in an airtight container at room temperature for up to 3 days.
Video
Notes
Nutrition
Recipe from The Cookies & Cups Cookbook by Cookies and Cups.
Love the recipe made for Christmas. Then made for a Birthday party on request. But I add pecans on bottom layer then Carmel and rest of cookie dough on top .
These were too sweet for me, but my family loved them. Iād half the caramel layer next time. Used GF flour 1:1 and chilled the bottom layer before adding the caramel and second layer. Baked an extra 10 minutes. Came out just fine and plenty left over which I will freeze for another day.Ā
Hi Meem,
See my Comment/Review for substitutes & suggestions I made to dial the sugar down on this great recipe. The sweetened condensed milk (@ 1.5 cups of sugar per can) then added to the massively sugary caramel in the recipe makes this layer very sweet. For health & a much lower sugar profile – while still making them a treat – you can try the mods and see if they work for you. Organic ingredients also help! When you tweak this recipe til it’s right for you, it’s a keeper that is infinitely adaptable to what you want to include (sub for chips, etc.)
From Angelil — See comment in my original post 1/20/24 & 1/23/24 for healthier and/or less sweet options and subs.
I made this recipe over New Year’s weekend for a family gathering, and it was such a hit! Everyone loved it so much I now have a request to bake three more batches for a friend. I call that a winning recipe!
OmgĀ
These are the bomb of all caramel brownies! You will love them! Absolutely deeeelious!!!
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These are the best! I make a scratch desert every other weekend for my family. I was looking for something different and I found this recipe. My family has declared this the one they want most of the time. I would highly recommend using parchment paper instead of tin foil. When I used foil, the bottom cookie layer was greasy and soft as I have read in other posts. Went back to parchment paper, which I used the first time I made these, and it comes out perfect every time. I do add 1 tsp sea salt to caramel and just a few sprinkles on top when done. Also highly recommend Brachs caramels, they have the best results. Used Kraft caramels once (they were out of Brachs), the middle came out too gooey. Back to Brachs, they fo not disappoint.
Can you use Caramel chips in place of wrapped caramels?
Hi Pat,
No, caramel baking chips are too solid to work in this recipe. Sorry!
These are wonderful!! I now add a teaspoon of vanilla and once the caramel melts, I take off the heat and add two tablespoons of butter- makes the caramel even richer!Ā
These were delicious. I don’t see how you can mess this one up unless you overbeat the flour or burn the caramel or something critical like that. So good! You have to be patient getting the 1st and 3rd layers down, but so worth it! I will be going to a wedding in a few months where I have to take cookies for a cookie table, and this is what I will be taking. This is going into my “very best recipes” file.
I read the other comment about adding in some salt to the caramel … I wondered about it but didn’t want to do that the first time round. I think I’ll try that on the next batch.
Thank you for the wonderful recipe … I just need to stop eating them already.
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Love these bars! Everyone I have made them for loves them. I even started making them for catered events, and everyone loves them. We get requests for them when they run out! Seriously the best š¤©
These bars were excellent and a huge hit for my family! They are a bit rich, so I cut them into bite-sized pieces.
These bars are now my favorite! Beware, they are addictive! š
Has anyone tried adding a peanut butter layer? Maybe after baking the bottom layer and before adding the caramel?
Made this for a party, but the result was a failure, so I did not take it.
Full disclosure: I substituted Bob’s one-to-one for the flour, but everything else was per recipe. The result was that the chocolate from both layers melted and went into the caramel. The bottom layer was almost all absorbed into the goo as well, but the top layer looked fine. So for some reason the entire bake was very jiggly out to the crust, out of the oven. Even after 30 minutes baking, the layers did not remain separate.
No, you didn’t make this for a party. You made something else. You subbed out a key ingredient – flour – and making any changes to the recipe disqualifies you from saying you made it. The recipe was not tested with your ingredient and it’s not fair to ding the recipe because you didn’t follow it. No shocker that it failed. Either make the recipe as stated or keep your mouth shut . If you have to complain, go complain to Bob. At least you were honest with your full disclosure though. Hopefully it’ll deter other Bob’s one to one users from making the same mistake
Wow, let’s beat someone down for substituting an ingredient because you know, maybe they can’t have gluten or were making it for someone who can’t have it? They’ve probably used the Bob’s in the past for different bakes and it worked fine. You’re flat out rude and maybe you’re the one that should keep your mouth shut.
Absolutely delicious and incredible! Added 1 tsp salt to the caramel and otherwise followed the directions. Let them cool overnight and they were perfect.
This is one of my go-to desserts to bring to a gathering. Everyone always loves it so much!! The caramel just takes it over the top in the best way. Big fan!!