Gingerbread Cookies

Gingerbread cookies that are soft and chewy and taste amazing thanks to molasses, butter and spices. Great for decorating with royal icing and bringing to your next holiday party or to give as gifts.

Course Dessert

Cuisine American

Prep Time 10

Cook Time 12

Resting Time 1

Total Time 22

Servings cookies

Calories 132kcal

Author Elizabeth Marek

Ingredients

20 ounces all purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
½ teaspoon baking soda
2 teaspoons cinnamon
1 teaspoon powdered ginger
½ teaspoon nutmeg
¼ teaspoon cloves
1 teaspoon salt
7 ounces unsalted butter
5 ounces brown sugar
8 ounces molasses
1 large egg

US Customary - Metric

Instructions

Preheat the oven to 350ºF. Whisk together your flour, baking powder, and baking soda. Set aside.
Melt the butter and add it to your stand mixer.
On low, add in the brown sugar, molasses, salt, cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg, and cloves and mix until combined.
Let it cool for a few minutes.
In the bowl of your stand mixer, once the mixture has cooled to about room temperature, add in the egg and whisk until combined.
Switch to your paddle attachment and add in your flour mixture.
Mix until the dough starts to form. Dough will still be slightly sticky.
Divide the dough in half, form it into a rectangular shape, wrap it tightly with plastic wrap, and place it in fridge for at least 1 hour.
Once the dough has been chilled, roll out the dough to ⅛”-¼” thickness on a clean, floured surface. The thinner you roll your dough, the crisper the cookies will be. If your dough gets sticky, you may need to reflour your dough (both sides) as you go.
Flour your cookie cutters and cut out all your desired shapes.
Bake on a parchment lined cookie sheet for 8-12 min or until the edges are slightly brown.
Let the cookies cool completely for several minutes before removing them from the cookie sheet and placing them on a cooling rack to completely set. This will prevent them from cracking.
Decorate your cooled cookies!

Video

Notes

The most important thing to remember when making gingerbread cookies is to make sure you melt down your butter and combine it with your brown sugar, molasses, salt, and spices. You can do this in the microwave or you can do it on the stovetop if you prefer.

This insures that the sugar is completely dissolved and is what get's you those soft and delicious chewy gingerbread cookies.

Melting your butter in your gingerbread cookie dough will insure that your cookies are very flat and do not puff up. Sometimes you want your cookies to be very airy and in that case, you should cream your softened butter with the sugar but in this case, we want our cookies to be very very flat with no bubbles.

Oh, and did you you know that the longer you rest your dough (up to 24 hours), the better your cookies will be? It's true! Once baked, your cookies will spread less, be more tender to eat, and have a more flavorful taste.

Making gingerbread men cookies can be so fun! Just make your dough, bake your cookies and then frost details with royal icing! No special piping skills required. I used a piping tip #2, a piping bag, and Chefmaster food color gel for my royal icing in red, green, and black. Use code "SUGARGEEKTEN" to get 10% off your Chefmaster purchase.

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