Brown Butter From Brown Cows?

Remember back in the day when I used to write about food and recipes a lot? I still write about food, but it's more focused on restaurants and vacations and my ongoing cravings for cupcakes. But I was browsing on Pinterest the other night and stumbled upon this recipe for Brown Butter Snickerdoodles. I love all snickerdoodles. I might have mentioned this once or twice. The cinnamon, the slightly tangy cream of tartar flavor, either fluffy or chewy, I love them. So when I saw that some genius had decided to elevate the basic snickerdoodle into ridiculously crazy good levels, I stopped Pinteresting, threw on my apron and got my butt into the kitchen. 

A fairly straightforward snickerdoodle recipe with just a couple of solid changes: greek yogurt and that perfect brown butter. I love anything with brown butter. Really, I mean it, nearly anything. You could probably pour it over a bowl of dog food and I'd ask for a fork and a napkin.  When raving about this recipe, I got a couple of questions from friends about this mysterious "brown butter." "Do you buy it at the store?" "What makes it brown?" Brown butter is just regular butter, cooked low on the stove until it bubbles, browns slightly and starts to smell nutty and delicious. 

I made these on a Thursday night, ate a few and then sent the rest to Joe's office. Because I have no self control. But come Sunday, I had to whip up another batch. Joe made me. It was St. Patrick's Day. We needed to bring dessert to my brother's St. Patrick's Day feast. And while the cookies were just as fabulous the second time around, they faded in comparison to the feast that my former chef of a brother slaved over for us all day. Two kinds of corned beef cooked overnight in Guinness, Irish potato pancakes, an ironic and delicious Irish flag layered jello salad, spinach salad with blue cheese dressing, pumpernickel toast points with herb butter and a bit of cheese, Brussels sprouts with bacon, sausage and a sweet mustard sauce, and good lord, wrapping it up with braised cabbage. It was insane. I've never been a big fan of corned beef and cabbage, but we're making this a Ginger Christmas tradition. And I think the brown butter snickerdoodles are an essential part of that holiday.