This is the latest monthly-ish installment of I dream of a menu, rounding up the regenerative bakes I’ve been admiring on Instagram. Peep the previous menus. This is also the last newsletter of the year. I’m burrowing into a holiday break for some 2024 strategizing and — if the caffeine ever leaves my veins — perhaps a nap. Don’t forget that if you upgrade to a paid subscription during my holiday special, you won’t just be investing in a future collaborative climate-dessert cookbook, you’ll also get new cookie recipes and a first-run Pale Blue Tart sticker via snail-mail!
The cookie plates I admire most assemble an eclectic cast of characters. In The Washington Post this year, a figgy chocolate cookie that looks ready to turn in for the night cozies up with a youthful lemongrass-pandan thumbprint. Over at the kitchn, a cocoa-ribbon shortbread dressed in designer zest mingles with a sugar cookie that arrived in a rainbow sprinkle suit. Crisp or chewy, elegant or kitschy — a cookie plate is Santa-worthy only if it has balance.
A regenerative cookie plate strikes a balance of its own. A low-carbon reincarnation of a Sicilian classic scooches over to make room for a biscotti starring leftover ingredients. A biodiverse spice cookie that puts monoculture on the naughty list inches toward the mistletoe with an out-of-town nougat that’s naturally plant-based.
When I look across Instagram, regenerative cookies are already here, just waiting to be arranged on a plate and inhaled. Read on to see the ones that won’t last even eight nights.
All photos below are reprinted with permission from the extremely festive bakers and chefs who took them.
Cuccidati
’s plant-based cuccidati, a Sicilian fig cookie, is like a fig newton that went away to college, learned how to have fun, and came home for the holidays ready to deck the halls.Pfeffernüsse
Luisa Weiss’s pfeffernüsse is a reminder that there’s probably a lower-carbon cookie recipe lurking among your stash of existing family favorites. Luisa’s recipe in Classic German Baking uses just one egg — and no dairy — to bind together 48 of these iced, spiced gingerbread puffballs.
The-whole-grapefruit biscotti
These biscotti I developed last week are a dunkable celebration of the whole grapefruit (or orange or lemon) — even the parts like the pith and rind that are typically tossed but totally candy-able. It’s one of the regenerative cookie recipes I’ll snail-mail you if you upgrade to a paid subscription during my holiday special.
Harissa nougat noir
The harissa nougat noir made by French nougat confectioner Au Royaume des Abeilles is the low-carbon, slightly goth answer to the preppy nougat blanc that more commonly headlines French Christmas markets. While nougat blanc is made of egg whites, traditional Provençale nougat noir skips eggs for a simple honey-and-sugar caramel poured over toasted almonds.
Gevulde speculaas
These gevulde speculaas from the bakery Evelyn’s Crackers are baker Dawn’s bite-sized PSA about whole-grain holiday baking. If it’s a spiced cookie you seek, Dawn says, you can probably use climate-resilient rye flour — which thrives in her native Ontario — instead of all-purpose.
Holiday-lights conchas
Few know this, but every cookie plate fervently craves to count a fluffy pan dolce among its ranks. Mine’s gotta include Mija’s Bakeshop’s plant-based festive-lights conchas.
Stuffed eggnog snickerdoodles
Coco et Sel’s stuffed eggnog snickerdoodles get their jaunty swagger from a hit of rum extract, but their puff and chew is all thanks to leftover sourdough discard. That’s right — your excess starter has a sweet future.
Mint, corn, and macadamia-nut cannoli
A cookie plate achieves maximum swank if and only if it includes Pietramala pastry chef Jeremy Hrycko’s completely plant-based mint, corn, and macadamia nut cannoli.
Spelt, brown butter, and halva cookies
Hannah Davitian’s spelt, brown butter, and halva cookies remind us that flavor awaits when we venture beyond regular bread wheat toward biodiverse flours. Cue me burrowing directly into the lower branches of the Christmas tree to scarf these undisturbed.
Even more cookies
Fiction and food writer
is veganizing every cookie from NYT Cookie Week.Food history geek and Belgian Bake Off judge
bids us to shove the glasses up our noses and ask, Speculaas or Speculoos?The WaPo’s holiday cookies have a pleasing dash of climate spice this year, from the vegan to the whole grain to the naturally sweet.
The spelt, brown butter and halva cookies look really tempting. I'm going to make those and also the harissa nougat noir.
Love all.