brown butter snickerdoodles + a secret ingredient!

Happy 2017 everyone! I hope your new year is off to a grand start, and that you're still excited about this new, fresh, exciting year! January is so motivating to me, and while I don't always follow through with my grand new year plans, it feels nice to reevaluate, organize, and reset.

Most of my plans for 2017 are large and a lot of them require getting out of my comfort zone and won't actually produce results until a little later. However, i'll be 30 this year (what?!?!) and that's made me a little introspective. My perspective on goal setting this year was, "what do I want my life to look like in the next 5 years", and I have some clear goals for both personal and professional areas.

What does all of that have to do with cookies? NOTHING. Not one thing! Ha! Maybe I can segue this blog post super gently into cookies by saying: if your resolution is to make super delicious cookies, this recipe will rock your world!

I'm sure you're just dying to know what that secret ingredient is, huh? Well friends, it's toasted PECANS. Yep, you read that correctly. Pecans! Toasty, fragrant, delicious, pecans that are pulsed in a food processor that add the best nutty flavor, especially when paired with the brown butter. 

I didn't realize that snickerdoodles were hit or miss cookies. Did you? It seems like people either love them, or they really don't. I am actually not a huge fan of snickerdoodles (give me chocolate chip any day), but I just couldn't pass on these cookies with the yummy extra additions so I gave them a try. I am so glad I did because not only are they delicious and impressive, but they're incredibly easy, too!

Brown Butter Snickerdoodles

recipe from Kevin & Amanda

2 sticks unsalted butter

1 cup whole pecans

1 cup oats

1 1/2 cups all purpose flour

1 teaspoon baking powder

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/2 cup sugar

1 cup brown sugar, packed

2 eggs

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

for rolling

1/4 cup sugar

2 teaspoons cinnamon

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

In a heavy-bottomed metal pot brown your butter. If you've never done this before I use this post! Once it's browned pour the entire mixture into the bowl of your stand mixer to cool.

In a large skillet over medium heat toast whole pecans until lightly browned and toasted. 

Immediately transfer the toasted pecans to a food processor. Add flour and pulse mixture until nuts and oats and combined. 

Transfer oats and pecans to a large mixing bowl and whisk in flour, baking powder, and salt until well combined. 

Meanwhile in the stand mixer, add both sugars to the browned butter and mix well (about 3 minutes on high). Add in eggs one at a time until combined, then the vanilla extract. Scrape the sides of the bowl. 

Add in flour mixture to the wet ingredients beating on low speed until combined. 

Use a medium cookie scoop to form dough balls then roll in cinnamon sugar mixture. Place dough on a parchment-lined cookie sheet and bake for 10 minutes. Cool completely on a wire rack then enjoy!

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