Pajas

Pajas are a flourless, eggless cookie held together entirely by sweetened condensed milk. Shredded coconut forms the base, mixed with butter-toasted pecans, chopped dried apricots, and semi-sweet chocolate chunks. Six ingredients, no mixer needed, and a texture somewhere between a macaroon and a candy bar.

Toasting the pecans in butter before chopping is the step that makes these special. The butter browns slightly during toasting, giving the nuts a rich, toffee-like flavor that raw or dry-toasted pecans can’t match. They go into the bowl with everything else and get stirred together with a wooden spoon until evenly moistened.

These cookies don’t spread during baking. You flatten them by hand before they go in, and they hold that shape, developing a pale golden exterior while staying chewy and dense inside.

Kitchen Tips

• Toast the pecans until golden and aromatic, watching closely. They go from toasted to burned fast, and burned nuts ruin the batch.
• Chop the pecans roughly after toasting. You want visible pieces in each cookie, not a fine grind.
• Flatten each cookie to about 2¼ inches since they won’t spread on their own. Skip this step and you get thick lumps instead of cookies.
• Pull them when the coconut is very pale golden. Overbrowning the coconut makes the cookies dry and bitter instead of chewy and sweet.

Variations

• Swap dried apricots for dried cherries or cranberries for a different fruit character.
• Use white chocolate instead of semi-sweet for a sweeter, creamier cookie.
• Drizzle cooled cookies with melted chocolate for a more finished presentation.