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Sunday Special: ’Tis the Season for Cookies

The first week of December at The New York Times is known as “Cookie Week.” Every day, for seven days, our cooking team highlights a new holiday cookie recipe. This year’s batch features flavors that aren’t necessarily traditional holiday ones — or even, for that matter, flavors. Instead, they draw inspiration from family night at the movies, drinks like Vietnamese Coffee, and perhaps most surprisingly, an Italian deli meat. In this edition of the Sunday Special, Gilbert Cruz talks with Melissa Clark and Vaughn Vreeland from New York Times Cooking about this year’s cookies, and they answer questions from readers about how to navigate cooking and baking during the holidays.
Duration
47m
Broadcast on
07 Dec 2025
Audio Format
other

The first week of December at The New York Times is known as “Cookie Week.” Every day, for seven days, our cooking team highlights a new holiday cookie recipe. This year’s batch features flavors that aren’t necessarily traditional holiday ones — or even, for that matter, flavors. Instead, they draw inspiration from family night at the movies, drinks like Vietnamese Coffee, and perhaps most surprisingly, an Italian deli meat.

In this edition of the Sunday Special, Gilbert Cruz talks with Melissa Clark and Vaughn Vreeland from New York Times Cooking about this year’s cookies, and they answer questions from readers about how to navigate cooking and baking during the holidays.

Background Reading:

These 7 Cookies Will Be the Life of Every Party

Melissa Clark is a food reporter and columnist for The Times.

Vaughn Vreeland is a supervising video producer for NYT Cooking and writes the “Bake Time” newsletter.

Audio produced by Tina Antolini and Alex Barron with Kate LoPresti. Edited by Wendy Dorr. Engineered by Rowan Niemisto. Original music by Daniel Powell and Diane Wong. 

Photo credit: Rachel Vanni for The New York Times. 

For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily. Transcripts of each episode will be made available by the next workday.

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This podcast is supported by TikTok. Sometimes the most interesting discoveries are the ones you weren't looking for. That happens every day on TikTok. A science experiment can spark a whole new interest. A recipe you stumble upon can become a meal you make for the people you love. And a restaurant you've never heard of might become your new favorite spot. That's the thing about TikTok. Follow your curiosity and see where it leads. Your next discovery is waiting on TikTok. (upbeat music) - Welcome everyone to the Sunday Special. I'm Gilbert Cruz. The holidays are upon us and that means so many people are doing a lot of cooking and baking and hosting parties, all of that fun stuff. Here at the New York Times, it's cookie week. We all love cookies. Cookies are great, cookies are wonderful. I personally can only eat gluten-free ones, which is probably why I just never realized what a big deal cookie week was around here. Or, frankly, even what it was. My guests today are two people who think a lot about cookies, of course, but also about how they baking and cooking and entertaining. Because it's their job to do so. Melissa Clark and Von Vreeland. Melissa Clark has been writing about food for the times for almost 20 years. She has a weekly column. She writes one of our cooking newsletters and I, is it true? I read this in your bio. Have you written 45 cookbooks? That is true? 45. Yeah, I think, you know, cookbooks are a volume business. Okay. Yeah. Maybe we'll get it to that. I didn't know that was possible. Welcome, Melissa. Thank you, so great to be here. And Von Vreeland writes the big time newsletter. He is also the editor of a new cookbook just out this fall, titled Simply Cookies. Cookies.

Transcription truncated.

The first week of December at The New York Times is known as “Cookie Week.” Every day, for seven days, our cooking team highlights a new holiday cookie recipe. This year’s batch features flavors that aren’t necessarily traditional holiday ones — or even, for that matter, flavors. Instead, they draw inspiration from family night at the movies, drinks like Vietnamese Coffee, and perhaps most surprisingly, an Italian deli meat. In this edition of the Sunday Special, Gilbert Cruz talks with Melissa Clark and Vaughn Vreeland from New York Times Cooking about this year’s cookies, and they answer questions from readers about how to navigate cooking and baking during the holidays.