I made fig jam sandwich cookies this week, and it wasn’t as easy as all of the articles made it look, so these were the things I would suggest you watch out for if you do them this way! There are a lot of recipes for fig jam sandwich bars, and I only found one that admitted that these cookies are “fiddly.” They’re pretty easy to make but there are probably easier ways to do them, which I’m going to be looking into!
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Start with the cookie dough.
I used my basic cookie dough recipe for this, and I doubled it so that I could divide it in half for the top and the bottom layers (get the recipe here)
Take half of the cookie dough and roll it out onto a silicone baking mat. I used the small ones from this set so that I could roll the dough out to fit exactly onto the sheet: Silicone baking mats (affiliate link)
Bake the cookie dough to where it’s almost completely baked, but not completely. This is a tricky party because if it’s too baked it will be really crispy when it’s done, but if it’s underbaked it will be really doughy. I didn’t bake this as long as I should have and the cookies ended up being too soft, so I had to put them back in the oven later!
I baked these at 350 degrees F, but you should follow the baking instructions for whatever dough you use. I put them in for about 10 minutes and the actual recipe said 13-17 minutes for the final cookies. I think it would have been easier to manage if I left them in for 13.
I was also using insulated cookie sheets, which tend to slow down the baking time, so I should have taken that into account! I love insulated cookie sheets for cookies because it keeps them from getting scorched, but I think they slowed down the baking for these, so a regular pan might have been better.
While the dough is baking, roll the other half of the dough out onto the second silicone mat and put it in the fridge or the freezer to harden up.
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Spread the jam on.
When the first sheet of cookie dough is baked enough (like 3/4 of the way done), take it out of the oven to add the jam to it. I used homemade fig jam (get the recipe here) but you can use any kind of jam that you like.
Add the jam to the cookie dough by spreading it on. If it’s underbaked it might be hard to do this, and you should put it back in the oven!
Tips for this part are:
- If the dough is pulling (like it is in the photo above) it’s probably not baked long enough, put it back in the oven to bake some more. Underbaking the cookie dough is the major thing that will give you trouble with this recipe!
- Let the dough cool off and harden up a little before spreading the jam on.
- Spread the jam as evenly as possible so that the final baking step works evenly.
When the jam is spread all over the cookie dough evenly, you’re ready for part two.
Add the second sheet of cookie dough.
Take the second sheet of cookie dough out of the freezer and turn it upside down onto the jam-covered sheet.
Press the dough onto the jam layer.
Carefully peel the silicone mat off of the cookie dough.
You’ll be left with a cookie dough sandwich with the fig jam in between.
Bake the cookies again.
When the top of the dough is completely baked, take it out of the oven and let it cool off. My mistake on this was that I was impatient and I cut the cookies up before everything had cooled down. The center of the dough was also not baked as much as the edges, so I was looking at the browning edges and took it out too soon.
If you’re not sure about whether it’s baked or not, put it back in the oven. If the edges are really brown and ready, cut them off (read the steps below) then put the rest of the pan back into the oven to bake some more.
Cut the cookies into squares.
Let the cookies cool off for a bit before you try to cut them up. If the dough is still really hot it will be a lot harder to cut evenly. You can also slide the silicone mat off of the cookie sheet and put it on a cooling rack to speed up the cooling process.
Since the cookies will still be on a silicone mat, don’t use anything sharp to cut them up. I used a bench scraper and pressed the lines into the sheet of dough. Since I had underbaked them a little, I ended up having to wipe the edge of the scraper after every cut to clean it up. If this happens to you be careful because that filling is HOT!!!
Cut the dough vertically about 1 1/2″ apart, or however wide you want the final cookies to be.
Cut the sheet horizontally to make the squares, wiping the edge of the cutter in between cuts.
Keep that edge clean or you’ll rip the cookies up!
Put the cookies on a cooling rack.
This is the test…If the cookies will come off of the silicone mat easily when you use a spatula, they’re baked enough. If they won’t, you should conside putting them back into the over to bake for another 5 minutes or so. Keep an eye on them so that they don’t get too browned, but don’t worry too much because the layers of dough and how thick the bars are will keep them pretty well insulated.
Once you’re done with taking them in and out of the oven to bake enough, get them all onto a cooking rack to cool off completely.
Storing the cookies.
Store the cookies in a container, or you can freeze them for later. These are really good, so they might not last that long in your house, but once they cool down they’re pretty easy to stack.
Here’s the required photo of a stack of the cookies that every recipe article seems to have. Notice that these do NOT have super-regular edges, because real cookies don’t cut that evenly! Fake photos made from AI will look perfect, but don’t feel bad if your cookies don’t look picture-perfect, nobody’s do.
These taste great, and even though they take a little more effort to make, it’s worth it. Just make sure to bake them long enough!