Don’t Write Off the Dessert Menu Cookie. It Exists for a Reason.

Not everyone is a dessert person. With all due respect to Claire Saffitz, sometimes the last thing I want after a filling meal is one more thing, even if it is a sweet treat.

On the other hand, if you are a sweets person, a dessert menu can be filled with too many good choices. And when a menu has all manner of celebratory cake slices, intricately plated profiteroles, or beautiful mignardises, it’s easy to ignore the humble cookie when it takes up space amongst all the more laborious options.

I, too, was once a person who ignored the restaurant cookie. In a city rife with dedicated cookie shops and bakers — which we should all patronize — I felt silly ordering the cookie. Not only can I get a quick fix when need be, out in the wilds of the Bay Area, but I can manage to make a batch of cookies if ever time happens to intersect with ingredients. The restaurant cookie felt unnecessary, perhaps too simple, an afterthought rather than a consideration.

I’m not sure when that all changed, however — somewhere along the line, I must have sampled a life-changing restaurant cookie, and it really lifted the veil off my eyes. Why diss something just because it’s something I can make myself? Because, as I’ve learned, most of the restaurant cookies aren’t something I can do. Plus, there’s something about a warm cookie arriving at the table, typically a la mode with some specialty ice cream melting in rivulets into the craggy parts of the cookie.

Brenna Houck

I’ve since become a huge proponent of the dessert menu cookie. Two standouts in recent weeks were a warm chocolate and coconut cookie at Seabird on Bainbridge Island in Washington. Topped with house vanilla ice cream, it felt like a celebratory reward for surviving the ferry schedule and a nice counterpoint to a seafood-laden dinner. A recent dinner-ender at Caché arrived in the form of a warm cookie for two, complete in a silver bowl with caramel and sweet almond gelato. Done right, a warm cookie feels like a hug, and when not done right? Well, for the most part, it’s still pretty damned good anyways.

Add onto the fact that a cookie can feel like a manageable post-meal treat; and even when it’s not, such as when you’re in Pizookie territory, who can resist smiling and digging in anyways?

This is in no way, shape, or form an endorsement of getting rid of pastry chefs. In fact, this is more encouragement for pastry chefs to, of course, do the whimsical, fun, flavorful desserts that make their hearts sing. But I also love the idea of trying what I imagine to be the cookie a dessert person would make at home on their precious time off, or what they would bring to a party. The cookie feels like a perspective into a person, like peeking through a portal into their childhood, and the simple things that come from flour, eggs, vanilla, and more, in whatever combination that may be. This isn’t an entreaty to get a specific cookie from a certain restaurant, but instead to just indulge in a Little Treat when you can. You deserve it. We all do.