I’ve really been missing Baked Sunday Mornings lately. I would usually take a break from the group each year over the holidays because of other baking plans, and then would re-join with renewed passion and commitment every January. Because we wrapped up our journey back in May, this was the first January in 10 years that I didn’t have any BSM recipes to make. And in a lockdown no less, where I have so much time on my hands! Sad.

So instead, I’ve created a new project for myself! I’m going to bake along with Claire on her new YouTube show: Claire Saffitz x Dessert Person, where she’s making recipes out of her new cookbook. I flipped through this book quickly at Chapters back when it came out in the Fall (and stores were still open!) and my super quick impression of it was that the recipes looked really complicated. But to my surprise, when the show started, everything she made looked very approachable (that, or she’s just starting with the beginner-level recipes). The ingredient list for the recipe is posted in the show notes, and then obviously you can watch the show to see the directions, so I decided I was in business!

The first recipe I made was Claire’s Oat & Pecan Brittle Cookies. She warns us at the beginning of the show that there’s a lot going on in the recipe, plus you have to use a food processor (which she hates cleaning; I can relate!), but you will be rewarded at the end with the most delicious oatmeal cookie of your life. I’ve got nothing but time for multi-step, complicated recipes these days, so I dove right in (as soon as my package from The Vanilla Food Company arrived because I needed a re-up on vanilla).

The unique part of the recipe is that the first thing you do is make a pecan (say it like Claire: puh-cahn) brittle, which you then let cool and chop into pea-sized pieces. Half of the brittle gets pulverized with some oats, flour and the rest of the dry ingredients, and the other half gets folded in (with more oats) at the very end. The cookie dough is also portioned out into 2oz dough balls and chilled for a minimum of 24 hours before it gets baked. This results in very large cookies, with super crisp edges and chewy middles, very reminiscent of any of Christina Tosi’s Milk Bar cookies.

I was very delighted by these cookies, especially by Claire’s suggestion to keep some cookie dough in the freezer because “I cannot emphasize enough how awesome it is to have cookie dough ready to go in your freezer. I love nothing more than my own personal warm cookie from the oven for dessert at night”.

You can find the ingredient listing + directions in Claire’s video here!

More Planet Byn x Dessert Person posts here!

Note: I can’t find Diamond Crystal Kosher Salt anywhere, so just use regular salt and cut the measurement in half for these recipes.