Maple Pecan Bars

­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­These simple Maple Pecan Bars are soooo delicious and will be the highlight of any dessert buffet. They’re made with a crunchy, buttery brown sugar shortbread base and topped off with a gooey and sweet maple syrup filling. The flavour of the maple syrup pairs beautifully with the toasty pecans.

The bars are a lovely autumnal dessert and are perfect for any Thanksgiving Dinner. You can cut the bars into different sizes, making these bars ideal for a small snack in between or an elaborate dessert served with vanilla ice cream and fresh maple syrup.

The perfect fall dessert

I absolutely love autumn (fall :)). The beautiful colours of the leaves; the misty mornings/evenings; the crisp, cool air; the golden afternoon sun. If we’d have a fireplace, that’s where you’d find me – all cosy and cuddled up in my woolly blanket, sipping a cappuccino, and scrolling through Pinterest. Also, my birthday is in Autumn (October 15^th), so Autumn is awesome anyway 😉

I especially love the autumnal desserts – these Maple Pecan Bars are one of my favourite treats ever. They’re not rich like some decadent chocolate pie, but also aren’t light, sour and summery. They’re something in between – ideal for these early-winter weeks!

Of course I love ALL the apple desserts, too. Apple pie, apple crumble, apple cake … I have yet to try pumpkin pie though ! 🙂

I also love Marroni (chestnuts) and Vermicelle (a chestnut-paste pushed through a special sieve to make spaghetti-like strands). And because we’re so close to Christmas, I sometimes can’t help already baking up some Christmas cookies – even if it’s mid-October!
It doesn’t have to be the classic Christmas cookie – I love Almond Thumbprint Cookies with a sweet-sour jam filling, classic Chocolate Chip Cookies (please make them with brown butter!) or even not-so-plain Shortbread Cookies. All these recipes are on my blog already, and you’ll get why I couldn’t not share them. 😉

Maybe you knew this already: Switzerland has a HUGE variety of Christmas cookies to offer. Not just Gingerbread and Linzer Cookies – Christmas cookies are a BIG deal here. Honestly. In the future, when I hope to have more time for my food blog, I plan on doing a whole roundup on Swiss Christmas cookies. To name a few:

• Zimtsterne (cinnamon stars)
• Brunsli (a chocolate, cinnamon, clove powder, Kirsch biscuit – my fave!)
• Spitzbuebe = Linzer Cookies
• Vanille-Kipferl (a vanilla-shortbread cookie with ground almonds – my other fave!)
• Mailänderli (a lemon-y, vanilla cookie best for decorating).

Ingredients

You need 10 simple ingredients for these delicious Maple Pecan Bars. And I am sure you have most of them in your cupboard already. Because this recipe is so easy, you can even substitute some of the ingredients – see down below and also read the notes in the recipe.

1. Flour: Flour holds the crunchy shortbread base together, and is used to bind the maple pecan filling.
2. Light brown sugar: One of my favourite baking ingredients. Like any sugar, it provides sweetness, but because of the molasses in it, you get these beautiful deep, caramel-y, nutty tones. It is more moist than white granulated sugar, thus not every recipe calls for it. You can be sure though: All recipes using brown sugar make for extra intense baked goods. Just sayin’. In this recipe, you can swap the light brown sugar for dark brown sugar in the filling, and I think it could also work in the shortbread base.
3. Butter: Butter makes everything better. Especially when used for baking!
4. Vanilla: Vanilla is probably my most favourite ingredient. It has a phenomenal, distinct flavour, that makes every baked good just a lil’ bit better. It gives desserts the certain oomph. In this recipe, you can use vanilla extract, vanilla sugar, vanilla paste or ground vanilla.
5. Salt: A necessity when cooking and baking!
6. Eggs: The eggs hold the delicious filling together.
7. Pecans: The star of these bars! 🙂 Instead of pecans, you most definitely also use walnuts.
8. Maple syrup: The maple syrup has a special flavour too, and not only makes the filling nice and sweet, but also holds it together. I think you could use runny honey; but I haven’t made any experiences with corn syrup. I recommend using the best maple syrup you can find!
9. Milk: The milk makes the filling the slightest bit runny. If you don’t have any on hand, you can use (heavy) cream instead.
10. Flaky sea salt: The finishing touch to sprinkle onto the bars! You could leave this step away, but I actually quite like the little bit of salt on top to offset some of the sweetness of the Maple Pecan Bars.

3 in 2 layers

I absolutely love that these bars bake into three layers, even though you only prepare two. It’s the magic of baking! (or the pre-Christmas-magic? I don’t know …) The bars’ texture is heavenly; insane; unbelievable.

Layer 1

The first layer is of course the shortbread base. It’s so simple! The butter, brown sugar, flour, vanilla and salt make for a really good dough to nibble on, too. In case you don’t have enough dough, just make another quarter-portion and add it into the finished dough.

Layer 2

Because of the moist, liquid-y filling on top, the shortbread does go a bit “soggy”. But boy, this surprise-layer is one of my fave parts about this dessert! The filling melts right into the shortbread.

Layer 3

The maple pecan filling on top is the final layer. And it is fantastic. I could eat it off a spoon.

How to make the Maple Pecan Bars

These Maple Pecan Bars are really really simple. Like the kind of baked-within-an-hour-simple. And if you manage to wait: Eat them on day two after baking and cooling in the fridge. The bars just get better!

The shortbread base

First, you start off by creaming your butter, sugar and flour together in a bowl, and adding in the salt and vanilla. The dough for the delicious shortbread base comes together really quickly! The dough isn’t very sticky, so if it is too sticky, add in a bit more flour.
You might have to use a bit of force to press the dough into the prepared and lined baking pan. Prick some holes into the dough.

Next, you bake the shortbread for around 15 minutes until light and golden brown. Take out of the oven and leave the shortbread in the pan to cool while making the filling.

The maple pecan filling

The filling is really simple too. First, you melt together the sugar and maple syrup in a big pot, until the mixture just starts to boil. Then you pour in the milk and vanilla, and continue to cook on low heat for around 5 minutes.

In the meantime, you beat your eggs until pale and fluffy. The next part is crucial: Pour in half of the hot liquid SLOWLY (and I mean SLOWLY) into the eggs. Do this while your eggs are mixing on low. Instead of pouring half of the filling in, you can use a big tablespoon to ladle in all of the liquid.
It is really important that the eggs get tempered (“slowly adjust to the warm temperature of the liquid”), otherwise you’ll end up with scrambled eggs in the filling.

Pour the warmed egg-mixture back into the pot, and cook further on medium-low. Add in the flour and salt whilst stirring.

Finally, you add almost all of the pecans. I enjoy lightly chopped pecans with some left whole or simply halved, but of course you can also use only whole pecans. Keep some pecans leftover for later. Stir well.

Pour the filling onto the slightly cooled shortbread. It might be helpful using a spatula to spread the pecans. To finish, sprinkle on the remaining pecans. Bake for 35-45 minutes until the filling is set and a little bit jiggly in the centre. The bars will firm up even more after baking.

Sprinkle on some sea salt, let cool in the pan for 10-20 minutes, and then move the whole “block” into the fridge so it can firm up. Fridge-time should be at least 2-3 hours, preferably overnight (or even 24 hours).

Serving & storing

To slice the bars, I find it is easiest using a sharp, serrated knife. And if the bars are cold, that make the cutting process easier too. If baking in a 20x20cm pan (9x9inch), cutting 9 squares is ideal for a dessert – throw on a dollop of vanilla ice cream and a drizzle of maple syrup. Yum. 16 squares are kind of your average brownie size, and 25 squares are cute and bitesized.
Cutting 15, 18 or 21 rectangles make nice little fingers. The smaller the bars, the more will be eaten 🙂

To keep the bars, I put them in a Tupperware and put that Tupperware in the fridge for up to 5 days – I feel these bars are best on day 2 or 3, so keep that in mind 🙂

Tips for the Maple Pecan Bars

• You can prepare the dough the day before: Either wrap it in plastic wrap, or already press it into the prepared baking pan, wrap the pan in plastic wrap and put the pan in the fridge until ready to bake.
• I enjoy these bars the most when they are a day or two old. That means, I bake them on day one, and put them in the fridge overnight. Then I eat them on day two or three, depending how long it takes my family 😉
• In total, this recipe uses 250 ml (1 cup) of liquid between the maple syrup and the milk. If you run out of either, substitute the missing amount with the other ingredient (and by that I mean if you are missing around 50 ml (1/4 cup) or so.
• If you have teeny weeny droplet of maple syrup left in your jar after baking and possibly decorating these bars, I strongly suggest pouring in about 100 ml (1/2 cup) of milk into the jar, and shaking it. That maple-milk is so good in a coffee, for breakfast or further baking!

I hope you enjoy this recipe as much as I do! If you make these Maple Pecan Bars, do leave me a comment and rate the recipe! And don’t forget to tag me on Instagram and Facebook 🙂 Take care and stay healthy,
Joelle xx

You might also like …

• My latest Salted Caramel Nutella Blondies – they’re good for those long wintery nights … 🙂
• Chocolate Cookies with caramelized white chocolate … so so good!

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