Brown Butter Sage Pecan Cookies

You heard right.

Brown butter sage pecan cookies.

Fats and flavors - By frying the sage leaves and toasting the pecans in the butter you infuse their flavor into the brown butter which already has a nutty flavor going on. I'm thinking of other herbed cookies... maybe rosemary lemon cookies, or honey thyme cookies.

But now, the pleasant surprise of the brown butter sage cookies (I swear my experiments rarely work out this well)...

Brown Butter Sage and Pecan Cookies

(this makes a smaller batch - about 18 cookies - I halved it from the original Ultimate Chocolate Chip Cookie recipe I modified so as not to be too wasteful if they didn't turn out. I've not yet tried it doubled, but I don't see why it wouldn't work.)

1/2 cup butter
about 1/3 - 1/2 cup sage leaves, whole and bound, if you can
1 cup chopped pecans, divided
milk... you'll see

1 cup + 2 tbsp bread flour
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt

3/4 cup brown sugar (I used roughly half dark and half light brown sugar)
1 egg
1 tsp vanilla

For the brown butter, place the butter in a sauce pan with the sage and a 1/2 cup pecans. Melt and allow the butter to brown. The nuts will be fragrant and lightly toasted; the sage will be fried; the process will take roughly 20 minutes or longer than you think it will.

Drain the delicious browned butter into a liquid measuring cup and keep the pecans but remove the sage. I tossed the pecans with a little salt-giving them a roasted, salted nut effect. For me the fat measured a little over 1/4 cup - let the fat cool. Since all that evaporated was milk solids, let's replace with milk liquids - fill with milk to the 1/2 cup line.

Sift the flour, baking soda, and salt. Set aside.

Mix the butter/milk mixture with the brown sugar. Add the egg, lightly beaten, and the vanilla. Next, slowly add the flour mixture, mixing fully. Finally add the reserved pecans as well as the other 1/2 cup of pecans. Chill the mixture until firm. Preheat the oven to 325 degrees. Scoop the batter onto a baking sheet in heaping tablespoon fulls. Bake for about 15 minutes, but as usual check since cookies size and oven temps vary.



Surprisingly amazing. These guys have a slightly salty/sweet thing going on. Oh, and the surprising thing for me was the texture... just awesome texture. Next up, herb roasted chicken breasts and an awesome meat cooking technique :)