Skillet Chocolate Chip Cookie

New Year's Eve 2024. Chloe's annual eulogy: "Goodbye, 2024. You gave us Kevin's wedding and Kevin's retirement and fifty-six turkeys and a second-place writing contest and a soccer season and a sweet tea cookie and a camera and the table growing. You were the year we became what we were becoming. Goodbye." The year we became what we were becoming. The most profound Mitchell year-end audit yet. The becoming is the story. The becoming has been the story since Week 1. And now the becoming has a name: Sarah's Table. The becoming has a sign. The becoming has a counter and six stools and a cast iron skillet on the wall and a woman behind the counter who says: come eat. The becoming is: arrived. But the arriving is just another becoming. The table grows. The becoming continues.

2025. The expansion year. The year the adjacent unit opens. The year the six stools become twelve. The year dinner service begins. The year Sarah's Table becomes: more. More seats. More food. More people. More of the thing that Earline started with a skillet and a recipe: more feeding. More love. More cornbread. The year starts now. The year starts with: black-eyed peas at the restaurant, free with any order, the tradition extended to everyone, the hope served with the food, the hope that is the whole menu. Come eat. Come hope. Come sit at the table that grows.

Black-eyed peas. The tradition. At the restaurant. Elijah ate them. Without complaint. Year three of the pea acceptance. The pea rebellion ended at two and three-quarters. The peas are now: tolerated, consumed, and occasionally requested ("mo peas, Mama" — a sentence I thought I'd never hear from the orange-food child). The peas are green. The peas are tradition. The tradition won. The tradition always wins.

I made the first cornbread of 2025 at 5 AM on January 1st. In the restaurant. In the dark. The same way I make every first cornbread: alone, early, with the overhead light and the silence and the hands that know the recipe better than the brain. The first cornbread of the expansion year. The first cornbread of the bigger table. The first cornbread of Year 9. The cornbread was: perfect. It's always perfect. The perfection is not mine. The perfection is Earline's. I just gave it an address. The address is about to get bigger. But the cornbread stays the same. The cornbread always stays the same. 2025. Here we go. The table grows. Amen.

The cast iron skillet on the wall at Sarah’s Table isn’t decoration — it’s a statement. Earline cooked in cast iron, and so do I, and so will whoever comes after me. After I pulled that first cornbread of 2025 from the oven in the dark and the silence, I wanted something to serve the people who’d fill those stools later — something that came out of that same heavy, honest pan. This skillet chocolate chip cookie is that thing: one pan, made to share, the kind of dessert that says the table is big enough for everyone. Expansion year. Here we go.

Prep Time: 10 minutes | Cook Time: 25 minutes | Total Time: 35 minutes | Servings: 8

Ingredients

1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, melted and slightly cooled
3/4 cup packed light brown sugar
1/4 cup granulated sugar
1 large egg plus 1 egg yolk, room temperature
2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon fine sea salt
1 1/2 cups semi-sweet chocolate chips, divided
Flaky sea salt, for finishing (optional)

Instructions

Preheat and prepare. Preheat your oven to 350°F. Grease a 10-inch cast iron skillet lightly with butter or non-stick spray and set aside.
Mix the wet ingredients. In a large bowl, whisk together the melted butter, brown sugar, and granulated sugar until smooth and well combined, about 1 minute. Add the egg, egg yolk, and vanilla extract and whisk until the mixture is glossy and slightly thickened, about 30 seconds more.
Add the dry ingredients. Sprinkle the flour, baking soda, and fine sea salt over the wet ingredients. Using a rubber spatula, fold everything together until just combined — do not overmix. A few streaks of flour are fine at this stage.
Fold in the chocolate. Reserve about 1/4 cup of the chocolate chips for the top, then fold the rest into the dough until evenly distributed.
Fill the skillet. Transfer the dough into the prepared cast iron skillet and press it out evenly to the edges with the spatula or clean hands. Scatter the reserved chocolate chips across the top and press them in gently. Finish with a pinch of flaky sea salt if desired.
Bake. Bake on the center rack for 22 to 26 minutes, until the edges are set and golden brown and the center looks just barely underdone — it will continue to cook in the pan. Do not overbake.
Rest and serve. Let the cookie cool in the skillet for at least 10 minutes before slicing into wedges. Serve warm, directly from the pan, with vanilla ice cream if the table calls for it.

Nutrition (per serving)

Skillet Chocolate Chip Cookie — Cast Iron, Tradition, and the Table That Grows