In a small bowl, dissolve yeast in water and milk. You can add some of the sugar if you want. I just sprinkled some in while I was measuring!

In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, cream butter, sugar and salt until lightened. There isn’t enough sugar to make it “light and fluffy.”

Add the egg and beat it in. Softened butter will make this step much easier. My “room temperature” was on the cold side so my butter was soft but still cold. Amazing for cookies but less than ideal here. I ended up needing to add the flour with little lumps of butter. It’s fine, don’t stress about it.

Slowly add the flour with the mixer running on low then add the yeast mixture. Increase the speed to medium-high and beat until the dough is smooth and pulls away from the bowl. It isn’t going to make a “dough”, but you’ll see strands pulling away from the sides and then mixing back in, which takes about 2-3 minutes. Don’t stress about this either.

Press or spread dough into greased 9x13 inch baking pan. I used about 1 tablespoon of additional softened butter to grease the pan and then sprayed both sides of a small offset spatula with cooking spray to spread out the dough in the pan being sure to get enough by the edges and corners.

Cover and proof until doubled. It is difficult to tell when it has doubled but it will take about 1 ½ - 2 hours with active dry yeast and about 1 hour with instant yeast.

Preheat oven to 375°F.

In a small bowl, mix corn syrup, water and vanilla. Set aside.

In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, cream butter and sugar until a thick paste forms.

Add the egg and continue to beat until lightened and incorporated.

Reduce the mixer to low and slowly add the flour and salt. This will look (and taste) like sugar cookie dough!

Once those have completely incorporated, add the corn syrup mixture. Increase the speed to medium-high and beat until incorporated.

Dollop the sugar batter over the surface of the risen dough. There is enough batter to almost completely cover it even before spreading. Then use a small offset spatula or the back of a spoon to spread the sugar mixture over the top.

Bake in preheated oven for 30-35 minutes or until light golden brown. Rotate after 20 minutes. It was a golden brown but darker brown around the edges and a little in the bubbled center. It puffed and set. It still moved in a cohesive mass like cheesecake.

Cool completely then dust generously with confectioners’ sugar.