These decadent layered bar cookies with frosting are called cherry squares. To create bite-sized pieces that melt in your mouth, slice them thinly. The frosting recipe might benefit from being doubled.
| Prep Time: | 20 mins |
| Cook Time: | 40 mins |
| Additional Time: | 15 mins |
| Total Time: | 1 hr 15 mins |
| Servings: | 36 |
| Yield: | 1 9×9-inch pan |
Ingredients
- 1 ¼ cups all-purpose flour
- ⅓ cup packed brown sugar
- ½ cup butter or margarine
- 2 large eggs
- 1 ¼ cups packed brown sugar
- 1 tablespoon all-purpose flour
- ½ teaspoon baking powder
- ⅛ teaspoon salt
- 1 cup flaked coconut
- ½ cup chopped walnuts
- ½ cup maraschino cherries, chopped
- 1 cup confectioners’ sugar
- 2 tablespoons butter
- ½ teaspoon vanilla extract
- 1 tablespoon water
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C).
- Prepare the cookie crust: Stir together flour and brown sugar in a medium bowl. Rub in butter using your hands or a pastry blender. Press into an ungreased 9-inch square pan.
- Bake in the preheated oven until lightly browned at the edges, about 15 minutes. Set aside.
- Make the cookie filling: Beat eggs in a medium bowl until light. Mix together brown sugar, flour, baking powder, and salt; stir into eggs. Mix in coconut, walnuts, and cherries; spread the batter evenly over the baked crust.
- Return to the oven and bake until brown, about 25 minutes. Set aside to cool.
- Make the frosting: Mix confectioners’ sugar, butter, water, and vanilla in a small bowl until smooth. Add more liquid if necessary to make a more spreadable mixture. Spread over cooled bars before cutting into squares.
Nutrition Facts
| Calories | 123 kcal |
| Carbohydrate | 19 g |
| Cholesterol | 19 mg |
| Dietary Fiber | 1 g |
| Protein | 1 g |
| Saturated Fat | 3 g |
| Sodium | 50 mg |
| Sugars | 14 g |
| Fat | 5 g |
| Unsaturated Fat | 0 g |
Reviews
These bars are really sweet!! I used pecans because that’s what I had. I do think the middle layer has too much brown sugar? I used 3 T. of cherry juice in icing. I probably won’t make again.
Delicious! I made small changes by using almond extract instead of vanilla in the icing mixture, and pecans instead of walnuts in the batter. Also added a little pink food colouring in the icing. So good! I’ll definitely make this again.
Many reviewers said these squares were very sweet and since we’re not a family who really gets into things that are “too sweet,” I did cut back the brown sugar in the filling to less than 1 cup. I used an 8×8 pan, so I did cook them longer, but the texture turned out fine, and you could eat them with your fingers. You won’t get a clean cut on these like you do on a lemon bar, for example, but that was OK with me. The bottom layer tastes like a rich shortbread cookie, and the filling was very moist. To get a nice frosting on the top, you may want to make extra icing, as I really didn’t have quite enough even for my 8×8 pan. By all means, do cut into small pieces because they are decadent (and filling).
This is a very tasty/sweet treat to add to the ‘traditional’ holiday cookies and tarts. I used the cherry juice in place of water in the icing as per a review and it finished off the squares well. I got alot of compliments and know that I will make this a part of my holiday baking from now on. Delicious! Thank you Karen!!!
I made these for my sister’s birthday because they sounded yummy. I followed another’s advice and cut back on the sugar and cooked it a little longer. We agreed that they were way too sweet and they were gushy/runny.
These are *very* sweet, but I like things really sweet so I loved these bars. Nice and gooey (but not runny) in the middle, nice texture and the icing was perfect. Thanks!
Very good, but very sweet. I usually have a little trouble with the baking time, as the middle layer doesn’t set properly. I also use the cherry juice to make pink frosting. Very yummy, I’ve made these many times.
I didn’t make this, but my coworker did. These were a gooey sticky fun treat! Nice and sweet – perfect with tea. Thanks for the recipe!
These bars were OK (WAY too sweet). I wasn’t crazy about them…. I made a batch to take to a friend’s Christmas party, and everyone seemed to like them (everyone that I talked to…). I had a lot left though, so I don’t know how many people REALLY liked them. There were a LOT of sweets to choose from, so that could be the reason…. If I make these again, I’ll omit the nuts alltogether (I don’t care for them and they seemed out of place here) and spread with the frosting called for (I decided to omit the frosting layer for time’s sake). You really need to watch these. Mine were pretty brown when they came out of the oven. These bars are tricky to cut because they are so sticky… Perhaps running your knife under water would solve this problem??? Thanks for sharing. I’ll try the recipe for cherry bars in my L&T cookbook instead….
I often make tray bakes for sharing with colleagues when I have ingredients to use up. This was a huge success and I had four requests for the recipe. I used an jar of cherries in kirsch left over from Christmas, and made up the icing with the leftover kirsch/cherry liquid. If you make up the icing in the quantities specified, it just sinks into the cake, so use much more icing sugar (at least triple) if you like yours thick!
I made these cherry squares today and followed the recipe to the mark ( with the exception of the icing; I added the juice from the cherries in place of the water that was called for and added 3 diced cherries for visual interest ). These just didn’t score very high with me or my husband. We found them far too sweet and they didn’t have a very desirable texture. Although they did get some bonus points for ease of preparation! I will not make these again. Thanks for the idea though! 🙂
What a great addition to any sweet tray. I add a little maraschino cherry juice instead of water in the icing.
This was a wonderfully easy recipe anyone can do this… very delicious as well I just have to say I find them a bit runny I think I should mabye have left them in the oven longer and I had to triple the frosting recipe to cover my squares? I don’t know what I did there haha.. but really terrific recipe thanks for sharing it was wonderful … I made this today Christmas eve.. and they are lovely
I made these yesterday and they are truly delicious and easy to make. Cutting them into bite size pieces is a great idea as they are very rich – but oh so yummy! I followed the suggestion to use cherry juice instead of water in the icing. I love the pretty pink color and extra cherry flavor. I also used almond extract instead of vanilla. I always add almond extract to a cherry pie and thought it would enhance the flavor here as well – and it did. I doubled the recipe, used a 9 x 13 pan and it came out just fine. I didn’t double the icing as I thought a glaze was all that was needed on these rich and deicious bars. Thanks for a new holiday favorite, Karen!!!
These are sweet, tasty treats. It was not as “cherry” tasting as I would have liked, but it is still good. I used maraschino cherry juice in place of the water in the frosting (to give it a little flavor and a nice pink color) and used about 2.5 T instead of the 1T called for in the recipe. Also-if you want this to stay pretty make sure you let it cool-otherwise you get an ooey gooey mess!
These were too sweet even for me. I did like the crust
These are very much like a recipe I had years ago. Made by a grocery chain in Halifax, they were my absolute favorite when I had no time and a craving for something indulgent. The only change I made was to substitute the water in the frosting with the maraschino cherry juice and voila!… cherry frosting! Wonderful!!
This recipe was simple and turned out great. Very delicious and I’m sure I will make it again.
ok this looks and sounds good! but you said cherry frosting. the ingredients are confestioner sugar, butter and vanilla and water. where is the cherry frosting??
Nice recipe, but i think i did something wrong as they didn’t want to stay together very well. Love the taste and the frosting though!
My Mom’s hard to beat at cooking, but both of my parents went nuts for these squares…SHE wants the recipee!!!!!!!