Brown Butter Pecan Pie Bars with Salted Caramel Sauce
Calling all pecan pie lovers to try these bars that are easier and quicker to make, easier to serve, and dare I say, taste better?!?! I make my favorite caramel pecan pie filling but I baked it on a thickkkk brown butter shortbread and ohhhhhh my is she good.
If you’re not familiar with my pecan pie, it’s THE BEST. It’s made with homemade salted caramel sauce because I don’t like using corn syrup so the texture and flavor is superior. If you haven’t made caramel sauce at home yet, make sure to read my post on that. & if you haven’t browned butter, please do so because that is also superior, I have a full post on that too.
The Salted Caramel Sauce – aka, liquid gold. No caramel is as good as homemade but in a pinch you could use store bought. To make caramel, sugar gets cooked with a little water and then once it’s a gorgeous amber color, mix in the butter and heavy cream.
The Brown Butter Shortbread – with four simple ingredients, we’ve created magic. I’m not a shortbread girl, there’s just nothing impressive about it HOWEVER, the brown butter, brown sugar and cinnamon make the best, most flavorful shortbread ever. Brown butter, mix in the rest, press into the pan and bake halfway.
Pecan Pie Filling – literally a scaled down version from my caramel pecan pie. Just whisk all the ingredients together and then fold in the pecans. Pour this over your par-baked crust and finish baking.
Salted Caramel Sauce
heat sugar over medium-low heatsugar turning into an amber colorpour the water on top of the sugar and swirl it until the sugar is immersed.add cream to caramelized sugarstir in the butter until the caramel is smoothconsistency of homemade salted caramel sauce at room temperature.
Brown Butter Shortbread
heat the butter in a pot until it’s meltedcook while stirring, until milk solids settle and brownbrown butter mixed with brown sugar, vanilla & cinnamon for the shortbreadFlour mixed into dough, finished shortbread doughshortbread pressed into panshortbread halfway baked, ready for filling
Pecan Pie Filling
eggs, sugar, butter, caramel & vanilla whisked togetherpecans mixed into filling and poured on top of crustpecan pie bars finished baking
Hot Tip: just like pecan pie, these can be difficult to slice nicely so I refrigerate them for a little after they’ve cooled and once they’re firm, you can slice them perfectly. I always clean my knife between every slice too to keep every slice looking clean.
How To Store Bars
These pecan pie bars can be stored at room temperature in an airtight container or a cake dome for a couple of days or refrigerated for a week. I also freeze them in an airtight container as soon as I’ve sliced them and just bring them back to room temperature before serving (thaw at room temperature overnight or a few hours before).
My easy caramel pecan pie filling baked on top of the best thick layer of brown butter shortbread. It's made with caramel sauce instead of corn syrup and
Begin by preparing the homemade salted caramel sauce. In a medium saucepan, heat the sugar and water over medium heat. Place the lid on the pan and remove it every 2-3 minutes to swirl (NOT stir) the sugar.
200 grams granulated sugar, 60 mL water
Once the sugar changes to an amber color, remove it from heat (it will continue cooking because the pan is hot so do this immediately). Stir in the butter and whisk continuously. Once that's combined, stir in the heavy cream and then the salt.
56 grams salted butter room temperature, 120 mL heavy whipping cream room temperature
Once it's all mixed, pour it into a heat safe bowl and stir in the salt. Set it aside and allow it to cool at room temperature for about an hour. It doesn't have to cool fully, just enough not to cook the eggs in the filling.
1/2 tsp fine sea salt
Brown Butter
If the butter is cold, cut it into cubes and place it into a light colored, medium size saucepan, over medium-low heat.
283 grams salted butter brown to 233 grams
Use a wooden spoon or rubber spatula to stir the butter occasionally. It will begin to bubble, continue stirring intermittently.
Once it begins to foam, you won’t be able to see what’s happening so stir continuously, making sure to scrape the solids off the bottom of the pan. The milk solids will begin to settle on the bottom of the pan and darken in color.
Remove from the heat and continue stirring for another minute or so, until the butter darkens into an amber color.
Pour the butter, with all the little solid bits, into a heat safe jar and allow it to cool.
Shortbread
Preheat the oven to 350F (177C) and grease and line an 8×8 baking pan with baking spray and parchment paper.
Measure out the brown butter and allow it to cool for a few minutes before using.
186 grams browned butter melted
Add in the brown sugar, vanilla and cinnamon and mix until they're well combined.
Fold in the flour, just until the last streak of flour is mixed in, and press into the prepared pan.
240 grams all-purpose flour spooned and leveled
Bake for about 15 minutes, just until the edges are starting to brown. Remove from the oven and allow to cool while you prepare the filling.
Filling
In a medium bowl, combine the cooled caramel sauce, brown sugar, eggs, brown butter and vanilla until they're smooth. Add the pecans and toss until they're fully coated.
Pour the filling over the crust and return to the oven for about 30 minutes, until the filling no longer looks wet or liquid-y. It should be sightly puffed around the edges and have slight wobble in the center when you jiggle it.
Remove from the oven and cool completely before slicing. I like to refrigerate it before slicing so I can get cleaner slices.
Top with extra salted caramel sauce and a pinch of sea salt flakes.
pinch of sea salt flakes
Notes
Store fully covered in the refrigerator or freezer, serve at room temperature.For a 9×13″ pan, I multiplied the recipe by 1.5x and kept bake time pretty similar.*feel free the replace caramel sauce with PURE maple syrup or honey.
