Pistachio Bars are soft cookie bars filled with white chocolate and topped with a creamy frosting and crunchy pistachios. If you like Pistachio Cookies, you're going to love this ultra soft cookie bar version!
These delightful, easy pistachio squares are such a fun St. Patricks Day or holiday treat! They're super soft and green colored from the pistachio pudding mix. They're topped with a divine buttercream frosting and filled with white chocolate chips. These quickly became one of our favorite quick and easy baked pistachio treats.
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What To Expect
- Ease: These are as easy as mixing up cookie dough, without the work of scooping individual cookies.
- Taste: They taste just like the pistachio pudding mix they are made from, with a creamy slightly almond flavored frosting on top.
- Time: The bars only take 15 minutes to bake, but they take much longer (30 min-1 hour) to cool before frosting! Keep that in mind if you need to make them ahead.
🛒 Ingredients
- Butter - salted is best for this recipe, the taste is better than unsalted.
- Eggs - act as a binder and make the bars nice and soft.
- Almond extract - adds a nice subtle flavor to the frosting that's delicious.
- Pistachio pudding mix - make sure you use instant pudding mix and not the cooked version!
- White chocolate chips - or chopped white baking chocolate.
- Pistachios - I use lightly salted roasted pistachios.
See the recipe card below for full list of ingredients and quantities.
✏️ Substitutions & Variations
- Pudding mix - you can use sugar free or regular, as long as it's the instant variety.
- Flavors - you can substitute different flavors of pudding mix for a fun twist!
- Nuts - you can replace the pistachios with extra white chocolate chips, or chopped macadamia nuts, however there are still pistachios in the pudding mix.
🧑🍳 Instructions
Here's how to make the pistachio dessert bars and how to make the sweet creamy frosting for the top. Don't forget to preheat the oven to 375℉!
Step 1. With an electric mixer, cream together butter and sugar for 2-3 minutes on high speed until fluffy.
Step 2. Add in eggs and vanilla and mix well.
Step 3. Add pudding mix, baking soda, flour, and salt and mix on low speed until combined.
Step 4. Add in white chocolate chips last and gently stir into the dough.
Step 5. Spread evenly into bottom of baking dish and bake for 15-17 minutes, will be soft and look harder around the edges and slightly underbaked in the middle, just like a cookie. Cool completely before frosting.
Step 6. With an electric mixer cream together butter and powdered sugar until light and fluffy, 2-3 minutes.
Step 7. Add in vanilla and almond extracts, and heavy cream (or milk), and mix well.
Step 8. Once the bars are completely cool, frost the top and sprinkle with chopped pistachios. Slice to serve and enjoy!
📌 Top Tips For Success
- DO NOT OVER BAKE. These are meant to be shiny and doughy looking on top when coming out of the oven, and slightly UNDER baked, just like a soft chewy cookie. Overbaking causes the bars to be dry and crumbly.
- Use a metal pan to bake for a quicker bake time, 15-17 min. A glass or ceramic pan will take a few minutes longer to bake.
- Use dry pudding mix, not pudding that's premixed or already has milk in it.
❓Frequently Asked Questions
Room Temp: 2-3 days in an airtight container.
Frozen: up to 3 months. Freeze unfrosted bars in an airtight container and then make frosting when ready to serve after thawing the bars at room temperature.
White chocolate, almond or amoretto, or fruits like raspberry.
Yes! Pistachio chocolate bars are delicious, you can use semi-sweet or dark chocolate chips instead of the white chocolate.
More Pudding Mix Desserts
These are dessert recipes using pudding mix, all of them are delicious!
Did You Try This Recipe? ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ Make sure to leave a star rating and a comment below the recipe card. I love hearing from you, and it is so helpful to other readers! Better yet, share it with family and friends. Thank you!!
📝 Printable Recipe
Pistachio Bars
Ingredients
For the Pistachio Bars
- 1 cup salted butter softened
- ½ cup white granulated sugar
- 2 large eggs
- 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
- 2 (3.4 oz) boxes instant pistachio pudding mix
- ½ teaspoon baking soda
- 2 cups all purpose flour
- ¼ teaspoon salt
- 1 cup white chocolate chips
- ¼ cup chopped pistachios
For the Frosting:
- ½ cup salted butter softened
- 2 cups powdered sugar
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- ½ teaspoon almond extract
- 2-3 Tablespoon heavy cream or milk
Instructions
For the Pistachio Bars:
- Preheat the oven to 375°F and prepare a 9x13 inch baking dish with baking spray or parchment paper.
- With an electric mixer, cream together butter and sugar for 2-3 minutes on high speed until fluffy. Add in eggs and vanilla and mix well.
- Add pudding mix, baking soda, flour, and salt and mix on low speed until combined. Add in white chocolate chips last and gently stir into the dough.
- Spread evenly into bottom of baking dish and bake for 15-17 minutes, will be soft and look harder around the edges and slightly underbaked in the middle, just like a cookie. Cool completely before frosting.
For the Frosting:
- With an electric mixer cream together butter and powdered sugar until light and fluffy, 2-3 minutes. Add in vanilla and almond extracts, and heavy cream, and mix well.
- Spread over cooled bars, then sprinkle chopped pistachios on top. Slice and serve.
Madison says
There's no way to get brown edges at 10 minutes. I'm at 20 minutes and I think I can take it out, it's still very soft, but the edges are not brown at all. The frosting taste amazing!
Jaxx says
This came out extremely dry, and with such an overpowering taste of the fake ingredients used in the pistachio pudding mix. It needed twice the amount of time in the oven as listed. It crumbles too easily and unfortunately tastes of chemicals. I still want to try a pistachio pudding par recipe, but unfortunately this one was a miss!
Sara says
I would recommend not overbaking them so they don’t turn out dry and crumbly. They are made to be a soft sugar cookie like texture. Kids enjoy the taste immensely, but it is definitely made with artificial flavoring so if you don’t like the pudding, the bars won’t be to your liking.
Marissa Murphy says
I followed the recipe but needed more time in the oven than 12 minutes
Connie says
Love pistachio! Will be trying soon!