Fresh Cranberry Bars layer tart, jammy cranberries between a buttery shortbread crust and crumble topping ~ bright, simple, and made for the holidays.
When I spotted the first stack of fresh cranberries in my supermarket the other day I lunged at them. These easy cranberry shortbread bars were in the oven before the other groceries were even unpacked. So good.
➡ The filling for these crumble bars is simply raw cranberries ~ just toss them in! They bake up into tart little jammy pockets.
➡ There’s only one bowl to worry about, no nuts to chop, no spices to measure.
➡ These are perfect for pot-lucks, bake sales, book groups, office parties, all that stuff. They pack and travel well, and can be eaten with fingers or forks.
Simple shortbread dough in 3 ingredients
The crust and crumble of these cranberry bars are made with the same simple shortbread dough. Pat some of it into your pan for the bottom crust, and crumble the rest over the berries for the topping.
Butter: I use a good quality salted butter. Cheap butter can contain extra water and doesn’t bake up as nicely.
Sugar: I use white sugar for this classic shortbread crumble, but you can also use light brown, or even maple sugar.
Flour: regular AP flour is standard. A good gf baking blend also works.
Using fresh cranberries
Just give them a rinse and dry well. They’re ready to go. Tumble them right onto the bottom crust.
Note: if you find cranberries too tart on their own you can cook them down with a splash of water and a little sugar in a saucepan until they start to pop. Then let cool and spread over the bottom crust.
cranberry shortbread bars are a versatile holiday treat
- For dessert: serve them with coffee after dinner. Dust with powdered sugar for a festive look.
- For breakfast or brunch: fresh out of the oven in the morning.
- Take along: perfect for the office, bake sale, church supper.
- Holiday cookie collection: once cooled these bars are quite sturdy. You can even cut them into small squares and add them to a cookie platter.
- Get a head start: they freeze well.
the flavor of cranberries blooms in the oven
They get soft and jammy, and become even more brilliant red when they bake, so these bars are especially pretty. I use vanilla in these cranberry bars, but you can also use almond extract, and then the cranberries take on a cherry flavor.
Reader wisdom: tips, tweaks & little discoveries
Over the years, readers have left some really useful ideas in the comments:
- You guys have had great luck using frozen cranberries straight from the freezer ~ no thawing needed, and no soggy bars.
- Orange is a favorite addition. A little orange zest in the dough or cranberries, or a simple orange glaze on top, comes up again and again.
- Almond is another popular direction. Readers have added almond extract, sliced almonds, and even a little almond paste.
- A double batch works beautifully in a 9×13 pan, which is handy for holidays, potlucks, and bigger groups.
- One reader solved a too-hard bottom crust by pressing the dough in more lightly and pulling the bars as soon as the edges started to turn golden.
- You’ve also played with extra cranberries, white chocolate, walnuts, coconut, cinnamon, and a little sugar sprinkled over the top.
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Fresh Cranberry Bars
Equipment
- 9×9 baking pan you can also use an 8×8 pan
Ingredients
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350F
- Line an 8×8 or 9×9 baking pan with parchment paper or foil with overhanging edges, this will make it easy to lift the bars out of the pan for cutting. Alternatively you can just lightly spray the pan with non-stick spray.
- Cream the 1 cup unsalted butter, at room temperature and 2/3 cup sugar together. Beat in the 1/2 tsp salt and 1 Tbsp vanilla bean paste, or vanilla extract.
- Mix in the 2 cups AP flour, just until combined. The dough will be crumbly, but should hold together when pressed between your fingers. Mix long enough so that there is no dry flour left.
- Using your fingers, pat 2/3 of the dough into the bottom of the pan. The dough will be soft and sticky, do your best to cover the entire surface of the bottom, but you don't need to compact the dough, just firmly pat it down.
- Spread the 1 1/2 cups fresh cranberries, rinsed and patted dry out across the dough, and then, using your fingers again, crumble the remaining dough on top. Try to get the dough in smallish crumbles, but don't worry about covering all the cranberries, they will show through.
- Bake for about 45-50 minutes until just beginning to get golden around the edges.
- Cool on a rack before slicing.
Nutrition
you can never have too many cranberry recipes
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Fresh Cranberry Recipes
Fresh cranberry season is short, so I make the most of it ~ muffins, cakes, pies, sauces, preserves, and savory recipes that put those tart little berries to work. fresh cranberry recipes for cranberry season This is what you do with those bags of crimson gems you score in October through December.
Made this recipe and loved it. I used cake flour and sifted it before measuring out the 2 cups. Should I have measured out 2 cups then sifted it? Doing the latter would add more flour to the recipe and I wonder if that would make it a little less sticky. Do you usually sift the cake flour before or after measuring it (or do you sift it at all)? Thanks.
Well, the pandemic is here and, like most of the world, we are making use of what we have in the house. Which for us includes four bags of cranberries in the freezer since Thanksgiving. Not sure what I was thinking at the time, but now that I’ve found your recipe I know exactly what I am going to do with them. Thanks for the great idea! Our memories of being housebound will involve many yummy servings of this sweet treat.
I only wish I had some leftover bags in the freezer, used mine long ago :/ I hope you enjoy them, Wendy ~ stay safe and healthy!
I measure first, then sift.
Amazing recipe – thank you
We found it hard not to eat the whole cake in one evening!!
Could I use frozen cranberries or would it make the cake too soggy?
This will become one of our favourites.
Glad you liked these Maggie ~ I’m not sure about the frozen berries, they might make the bars soggy but I’m not certain. It’s worth a try, for sure.
Hi! I have made this 3 or 4 times now & always use frozen berries. It is delicious every time. Never soggy. Hope this helps!
Thanks Elise 🙂
Love this recipe. It had me at cranberry!!!!!!! Made it exactly as the recipe suggested and it was perfect. It’s a keeper and l’ll make it again and again. Thank you 🙂
I love this recipe so much that I decided to try it with blueberries instead so my husband would love it too. LOL.
Now I need HELP. I made it twice before with cranberries and it turned out perfect but the one time I try blueberries the bottom crust comes out rock hard. ?? Completely inedibly hard. I have no idea why it would come out differently when I didn’t make any changes to the dough. ? Any idea?
I don’t know what could have changed Michelle, but it does sound like something was different to make it come out that way. Did you by chance pack it down really hard that time? Or could the oven have been hotter?
The oven was set at 350° just like the first two batches. I suppose it is possible I may have patted down the bottom crust more this time around. Would that cause it to harden?
It doesn’t seem like it would make that much difference…but I always make sure not to cram it in real tightly.
I’ll try it again in the next couple days and update. ?
Update:
I tried it with blueberries again and it turned out perfect! With the cranberries I ended up needing to leave it in for 50-55 mins so that’s what I did with the first batch of blueberry ones. This batch I only put in for the 45 mins and I didn’t pack down the bottom crust and I guess that did the trick.
Thank you for this recipe. It will forever be a favorite of mine! ?
I’m so relieved you worked it out, I’ll try it with blueberries next time.
I don’t bake often but these looked easy enough so I tried them. Twice. Family loved them! As did I.
Now I’m wondering…. Do you think blueberries would work just as well in place of the cranberries?
I think they would work well.
Love this recipe! I found it last year and have been waiting for cranberries to appear this year so I could make again! Next time I’m at the store I’m going to stock up so I can make these all winter! Really easy and delicious!!
Very good and easy to follow! Only thing I did differently is add a little bit of cinnamon to the cranberries and sprinkled a little bit of sugar on the top before baking. Everyone loved them!
I made this yesterday and served today with our Thanksgiving dinner. It was a huge hit! Thanks so much for the easy and delicious recipie!
Thank you Molli and Happy Thanksgiving to you too :))
I love this recipei have made it the last 3 years to take to thanksgiving, its yummy and delicious!
These are good. The first time I made them the dough wasn’t sweet enough. They were still good but the second time I made them I used a full cup of sugar and added 2T of brown sugar to the topping. I also added small chocolate chips. It was amazing with chocolate.
Oooh, the chocolate sounds good!