All Day I Dream About Food

All the best low carb keto recipes for a healthy lifestyle

Salted Caramel Magic Cookie Bars

Take your low carb magic cookie bars to the next level with sugar-free salted caramel sauce. This might be your ultimate holiday cookie recipe! 

Low Carb Salted Caramel Magic Cookie Bars

Pin It Button

When it comes to food and recipes, there really is no end to the inspiration to be found. Almost everywhere I look, I see something that inspires me to get into the kitchen and create something delicious. Mind you, I do spend an inordinate amount of time looking at food, so that might account for it. It’s hard not to be inspired when you are staring directly at the source of inspiration for the better part of every day. I always hunting it out, be it on the internet, in a book or magazine, in a grocery store or in my own pantry. And thankfully, food inspiration is willing prey and let’s me catch it  quite frequently. So frequently, in fact, that I can’t keep up and find that I have more ideas for recipes than I have time for. It would take me several lifetimes to complete all the recipe ideas I have. First world problems, I suppose.

Apparently many people have inspirations on my behalf too. Readers send me ideas for low carb recipes, often a high carb favorite they’d like to see made over into something more fitting for their way of life. And sometimes I inspire them as well, getting them into their kitchen to try their hand at adapting one of my recipes to suit their needs. It’s most certainly a mutual inspiration situation!

Low Carb Salted Caramel Magic Cookie Bar Recipe

This recipe was inspired by Esther, a lovely reader who has been wonderfully supportive over the past few years. She loves my recipes and I think she may have tried a large majority of them. She is dairy-free, so she has to adapt my recipes to suit her needs. I suppose in that regard, you could say I inspire her to create her own recipes. But this time, she inspired me with an offhand comment on Facebook. The minute she mentioned it, I knew I had to try using my low carb caramel sauce in a magic cookie bar recipe.

My whole family thanks you for the inspiration, Esther! These were beyond delicious.

Low Carb Grain-Free Salted Caramel Magic Cookie Bars

Salted Caramel Magic Cookie Bars
Print
Salted Caramel Magic Cookie Bars
Take your low carb magic cookie bars to the next level with sugar-free salted caramel sauce. This might be your ultimate holiday cookie recipe!
Servings: 24 bars
Ingredients
Crust:
  • 1 3/4 cups almond meal or any nut meal or flour I used Bob's Red Mill Hazelnut Flour|
  • 1/4 cup Swerve Sweetener
  • 1 tbsp coconut flour
  • 1/4 cup butter melted
Topping:
  • 1 cup flaked unsweetened coconut
  • 1 cup chopped pecans or walnuts
  • 3/4 cup sugar-free chocolate chips such as Lily's
  • 1 recipe Low Carb Salted Caramel Sauce
Instructions
  1. Preheat oven to 325F.
  2. In a 9x13 baking pan, whisk together the nut meal, sweetener, coconut flour and butter until well-combined. Press firmly into the bottom of the pan.
  3. Bake crust 10 minutes or until just beginning to brown around the edges.
  4. Remove and let cool at least 15 minutes to firm up.
  5. Sprinkle crust with flaked coconut, chopped nuts and chocolate chips. Pour caramel sauce evenly over everything.
  6. Bake 18 to 20 minutes, or until bubbly and browning around the edges.
  7. Remove and let cool, then cut into bars.
Recipe Notes

Serves 24. Each serving has 8.19 g of carbs and 3.97 g of fiber. Total NET CARBS = 4.22 g.

Food energy: 237kcal
Saturated fatty acids: 10.85g
Total fat: 21.46g
Calories from fat: 193
Cholesterol: 16mg
Carbohydrate: 8.15g
Total dietary fiber: 3.97g
Protein: 4.01g
Sodium: 112mg

Nutrition Facts
Salted Caramel Magic Cookie Bars
Amount Per Serving (1 g)
Calories 0
* Percent Daily Values are based on a 2000 calorie diet.

RELATED POSTS

The best low carb caramel sauce recipe

The Best Low Carb Caramel Sauce

Low Carb Brownie Cupcakes with Salted Caramel Frosting

Salted Caramel Brownie Cupcakes

Low Carb Salted Caramel Chocolate Cake PopsSalted Caramel Cake Pops

Nutritional Disclaimer

Please note that I am not a medical or nutritional professional. I am simply recounting and sharing my own experiences on this blog. Nothing I express here should be taken as medical advice and you should consult with your doctor before starting any diet or exercise program.I provide nutritional information for my recipes simply as a courtesy to my readers. It is calculated using MacGourmet software and I remove erythritol from the final carb count and net carb count, as it does not affect my own blood glucose levels. I do my best to be as accurate as possible but you should independently calculate nutritional information on your own before relying on them.I expressly disclaim any and all liability of any kind with respect to any act or omission wholly or in part in reliance on anything contained in this website.

Amazon Associates

All Day I Dream About Food is a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees by advertising and linking to amazon.com.

Reader Interactions

We are a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for us to earn fees by linking to Amazon.com and affiliated sites.

Comments

  4. Carolyn,

    I just found your site today and already printed this and a few other recipes! I havent tried Swerve, but look forward to trying it. I am sugar and flour free and I too LOVE to bake. I currently only use vanilla Stevia, which has been ok for now.

    Can’t help but feel your pain with the selling of your home, I’m a Realtor and I know the process is not easy for sellers or buyers–its emotional. Hope you have made it to your new location and get to baking again soon!

    Look forward to trying your recipes, 🙂

    -Renee

    Reply

    • I find that it doesn’t caramelize as well, but it should be okay if it’s all you can find. It might be a slightly thinner caramel sauce too, since it doesn’t have oligosaccharides with are a kind of fiber.

      Reply

  9. Just had to quickly say hi and thank you for this awesome recipe! I don’t have any Swerve so I used xylitol instead (for the caramel and the base). They turned out beautifully. My husband said they’re too delicious to be low-carb. I think they’ll be making at least one more appearance in my kitchen this holiday season…

    Reply

  11. I made these last night & the “bar” portion of it didn’t solidify at all- its still just flour basically. Seemed really dry when I pressed it in to the pan too- any suggestions? I used a mixture of almond & hazelnut flours. I have a dish of cookie crumbs that taste really good.

    Reply

      • I made these too with the same problem…..the cookie part on the bottom just crumbles when I take it out of the pan. The taste is wonderful, but I have to eat it with a spoon. Next time I will double the butter in the cookie part. This is a low-carb version of a favorite familly recipe (we call them yummy bars!), so I’m loving the recipe 😉 Just a tweak needed and then they should hold together nicely.

        Reply

          • I used Honeyville almond flour and all the ingredients exactly as you said. It just really needed double the butter in the crust. Very good flavor! Love the caramel!

  12. Both the caramel sauce and the squares are excellent! Rather than add salt to the caramel sauce, I sprinkled Maldon salt flakes on top of the squares after baking but before cooling. I really enjoyed that little salt burst. I also added a little vanilla to the sauce because I really like the combination. Next time I think I will make a larger batch of the caramel sauce. My coconut was really dry, so the topping wasn’t well glued down with this amount, and I would have liked just a touch more. There would be no concern of having any extra go to waste if my next square batch did not require extra…I could eat it with a spoon!

    Reply

  13. Best caramel sauce EVER!!!!!!!!! And the cookies were amazing too!! I also had a problem with my base being a little crumbly but that often happened when I made non-low-carb magic cookie bars so next time I think I’ll just add a little more butter per your suggestion.. And you better believe I’ll be making them over and over again because they are delicious!

    Reply

  14. Do you have a suggestion for a substitute for the coconut flakes that would still give the texture and feeling of the cookie bars?

    Reply

      • No, not a coconut allergy – I just hate the taste of coconut flakes. 😉

        I do love almonds though, so I will give that a try!

        Reply

        • My husband has this weird ability to know it’s coconut even if you can’t even tell it’s in there! If you can have it, i often swap with gluten free rolled oats, won’t always work but does alot of the time

          Reply

  15. Have the Magic Cookie Bars ever been successfully frozen? I would love to have some in the freezer to pull out when the need arises.

    Thank you for all of your great recipes. This is my “go to” site, for recipes I can count on.

    Reply

  16. We ran out yesterday and my in-laws and hubby are asking when I’m going to make them again. So easy and great hit! Thanks 🙂

    Reply

  17. love this recipe! Only suggestion I want to make is that I change the order of toppings over the crust because everything stuck to the coconut layer. So I would probably do the chocolate then nuts then the caramel then the coconut. Or possibly the coconut then the caramel last. But it all tasted great even with this small issue. Totally similar to the unhealthy version mom used to make every Christmas.

    Reply

    • I mixed my coconut, nuts and choc. chips together and then sprinkled the mixture on top. Then poured the caramel on. The caramel dispersed well while cooking and everything stuck to the bars very well.

      Reply

  18. I’ve made these twice…they are so good! If you are comprising a list of the best recipes (2014) may I nominate this one? I think the caramel sauce should qualify on its own as well.

    Thank you for so generously sharing your creativity. With two diabetics in my family, your recipes and food philosophy have so greatly enriched our lives with delicious and healthy recipes where no one feels deprived.

    Reply

  19. I made these today and they are delicious! But the almond base was super crumbly, like I could hardly take a square out. Any thoughts why? I used my own ground almonds. Thanks 🙂

    Reply

  21. I made these last night – YUM!!! My crust was really crumbly, too. Next time, I think I’ll make extra crust to see if it holds together better. Added bonus because I loved the crust!

    Reply

  24. I made these today and they are amazing! I’m going to freeze one and see if they hold up to the freezer. I wanted a thicker cookie base so I made this in a 9×9 pan. The caramel sauce is incredible! I’m definitely going to make another batch of that just to have around the house.

    Reply

  25. I use powdered Stevia can you or someone else that uses Stevia tell me how to substitute it for the Swerve sweetener you use in your recipies. Thanks for the help.

    Reply

  27. My daughter made these last night.

    They. Are. Awesome.

    I have officially branded them “dangerous cookies” — that’s our label for anything that is so like the “real thing” we have trouble avoiding overindulgence. I even made my daughter show me the chocolate packaging to make sure she didn’t use “real” sugar by mistake. 🙂

    The caramel sauce is so good that she also made an extra double batch to give to her dad for Christmas.

    You are either the best thing or the worst thing to happen to my family since switching over to low carb 3 years ago!!! I’ll let you know, as soon as I find a padlock to put on the cookie pan.

    Reply

  28. P.S. you actually eat this stuff, right? Does it affect you like this? I don’t measure insulin levels or anything like that, but it’s hard to imagine this isn’t wreaking *some* kind of havoc!

    Reply

    • LOL! Yes, I actually eat this stuff. A fair bit of it, although I do try to keep my treats as “treats”, meaning I have my portion after dinner. But when creating a recipe, I taste as I go and I taste after it’s done, so I sometimes take in more in a day than I intend. And sometimes when the cravings hit, I overindulge too. I do think you can eat too much of it and then you are taking in more carbs than you need to….but it’s a whole sight better than eating a pack of Oreos! It’s certainly not wreaking that kind of havoc. But yes, when something tastes that good, the self control part can be hard. I know a lot of low carbers keep things in the freezer in single serve portions.

      Reply

  29. Hahaha! Additional directions for low carbers:
    1. Wrap neatly in individual portions, and place in freezer.
    2. Leave the kitchen as quickly as possible.
    3. After a reasonable period (at least 1 minute), return to the kitchen and open the freezer.
    4. Remove one — ONE — portion.
    5. Close the freezer door.
    6. Slowly unwrap, and place on a pretty plate.
    7. Leave the room, treat in hand, as quickly as possible. DO NOT SKIP THIS STEP.
    8. Enjoy slowly.
    9. Return to step 3 and repeat until gone.

    Reply

  30. AMAZING! I’m obsessed with these. I subbed a tbsp of swerve for a tbsp of sugar free Torani salted caramel syrup in the caramel sauce, and it worked great. I had the same issue with the base being really crumbly – so more butter next time! I realized I had shredded coconut instead of flakes, so that’s what I used, and it turned out fine. Also subbed almonds for walnuts because of an allergy. My family can’t get enough! These are dangerously tasty 🙂 Thanks so much for the recipe!

    Reply

  31. I definitely took this and made it my own! Thank you so much for the inspiration and framework!

    I asked on the Trim Healthy Mama Facebook page for help with the difference in baking blend and almond flour but didnt’ get any answers so I winged it. I tweaked it with homemade baking blends, extra oil and some water and flavorings in the crust. I also used gentle sweet in the crust, did half erythritol and half xylitol and stevia then subbed out half and half for part of the caramel’s cream, and used half the nuts. (I’ve a huge sweet tooth) SO good!! Hubs approved as well! The caramel sauce is indeed, is FLIPPEN AMAZING! Thanks for all your hard work!

    Reply

  33. Hi Carolyn. One of your comments said there’s a huge difference in almond meal and almond flour. I only have almond flour. Will that be okay to use or do you think the almond flour id what makes it crumbly?

    Reply

  34. I’ve been lurking on this website for a while now. I finally tried these bars with the help of my son. We (he) burned the caramel sauce (you really do have to watch it very closely!) but we decided to proceed with the bars because the sauce tasted good even slightly burned. These bars are delicious. We followed the recipe exactly. The crust held together. We used Bob’s Red Mill Hazelnut flour. It was slightly crumbly the day it was baked but held together just fine after that. We also thought they tasted better the second day. I lined the entire baking pan with foil and sprayed with cooking spray. After it cooled I lifted the whole thing out and sliced. It would have been less messy if I had waited until day 2 to slice. Thanks Carolyn. You are a genius. We plan to try many more of your recipes!

    Reply

  35. These are my new favorite cookies! I shared them with some friends that are diabetics and they were really happy. It is truly amazing that they are low carb. Thank you Carolyn!!!

    Reply

  36. These are my new favorite cookies! I shared them with some friends that are diabetics and they were really happy. It is truly amazing that they are low carb. Thank you Carolyn!!!

    Reply

  37. Awww..when you said your dairy free friend inspired this I was hoping that this recipe would be dairy free. I never have dairy in my house because I can’t eat most of it. Would coconut milk or cream work for the caramel sauce?

    Reply

  38. I made these today for Father’s Day. The cookie part is very crumbly. I used Trader Joe’s Almond meal. For next time, would you suggest Almond Flour or more butter for the cookie? They do taste fabulous either way. Thank you for all your great recipes. I have been having fun in the kitchen these days.

    Reply

    • I have the same problem and I use really finely ground almond flour (Honeyville Farms). Just adding a little more butter solved the problem.

      Reply

  39. Carolyn you have to be the most creative ‘normal’ baking expert ever. I am so impressed by you. Have you heard of a Thermomix? You would loooooooove it. Look it up. I made this slice using it to melt the butter, mix all the base, grind the Lindt 90 choc and chop the walnuts in seconds. You’re AMAZING, thank you sooooooo much.

    Reply

  41. Carolyn,

    I just put a batch of these in the oven. The caramel sauce is the best thing I’ve ever tasted, low car or otherwise! It is a thing of beauty.

    It’s been a year since I went low carb to fight my diabetes and your website is a beacon of light in a meat and veggie world. Thank you for all your efforts and expertise, I am a better low carb baker than I was a high carb baker and it is all thanks to you.

    Jane from Ottawa.

    Reply

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *