Follow chef Rick Andrew Martinez and you have a glimpse of his quarantine adventures in Mexico that seem to be all cooking and sunsets. My kind of guy. He’s one of those fun chefs that Instagram matrixes the home chef’s creations following his recipes and day after day, story after story, were these Brown Butter and Toffee Cookies. I had to see for myself what all the hype was about and glad that I did as these are hands down the best bake of quarantine.

First up, the batter is thiccccckkkk. Did I do something wrong? What is flour hydration?? I added the butter at the wrong step like a real dolt so I was a tad worried.

The cookies are dark. I like an underbaked cookie, so again I was worried I just spent the afternoon creating time consuming sugar bricks.

However, when you bust them open, they are perfect, chewy, crispy, somehow a perfectly carmelized bottom. They are HEAVEN. I am sharing some with family tomorrow and freezing the rest, mostly so I stop eating them.

Brown Butter and Toffee Cookies

• 1 c. (2 sticks) unsalted butter
• 2 c. flour
• 1 tsp. baking soda
• 3/4 tsp. Kosher salt
• 1 c. dark brown sugar, packed
• 1/3 c. sugar
• 2 eggs, room temperature
• 2 tsp. vanilla
• 2 1.4oz. toffee candy bars, like Skor or Heath, chopped into 1/4″ pieces
• 1.5 c. chocolate discs, with as high of cocoa % that you can find
• Flaky sea salt

1. Melt butter in a small sauce pan over medium heat. Stir often. After about 8 minutes it foams and spits and then turns brown. It’s supposed to smell nutty, but not burn. There are particles in the butter. Don’t worry, it’s weird.
2. While butter is browning, combine flour, baking soda, and salt in a small bowl
3. Pour butter (and browned bits) into mixer bowl and set aside to cool for 10 minutes.
4. Add brown sugar and sugar to mixing bowl with butter and mix until combined, about one minute.
5. Mix in eggs and vanilla over medium speed until mixture begins to thicken, about one minute.
6. Reduce speed to low and mix in dry ingredients.
7. Mix in toffee and chocolate discs.
8. Allow batter to rest in bowl for at least 30 minutes so that the flour “can hydrate.”
9. Preheat oven to 375F.
10. Prepare baking sheets with parchment or silpat.
11. Using an ice cream scoop, scoop dough into ping pong ball sized balls. Place at least 3″ apart as they spread quite a lot. Sprinkle with flaky salt.
12. Bake 9 minutes.
13. Allow to cool on baking sheets for about 5 minutes and transfer to cooling racks.