Gingerbread Men

It’s starting to feel like Christmas!  We managed to get our tree up today, and with that comes gingerbread cookie season…(photos to come soon).

This recipe comes from The Good Housekeeping Illustrated Cookbook (a classic from 1980).  This cookbook reminds me of my grandma, and baking these cookies at her house when I was younger… so much that the book automatically opens to this page because of how well used this recipe is.

PREP TIME: 2 min   COOK TIME: 8 min   TOTAL TIME: 10 min   YIELD: 24-36

Ingredients:

• 2 1/4 cups All purpose flour
• 1/2 cup White sugar
• 1/2 cup butter (I use non-hydrogenated margarine)
• 1/2 cup Light molasses
• 1 Egg
• 1 1/2 tsp Ground cinnamon
• 1 tsp Baking powder
• 1 tsp Ground ginger
• 1 tsp Ground cloves
• 1/2 tsp Ground nutmeg
• 1/2 tsp Baking soda
• 1/2 tsp Salt

1. Mix sugar, margarine, molasses, and egg together.
2. Mix remaining ingredients together well, then add margarine mixture until well blended.
3. Cover and refrigerate for at least 1 hour.
4. Preheat oven to 350 ºF.
5. On lightly floured surface, with floured rolling pin, roll chilled dough 1/8″ thick (crispier cookies) or 1/4″ thick (softer cookies).  With cookie cutters, cut out men (or any other shapes that you might like).
6. Don’t have a gingerbread man cookie cutter?  Make one easily enough by tracing the gingerbread man shape onto a piece of paper, cutting it out to use as a stencil, and just cut gingerbread dough around using a small knife.
7. With pancake turner, place cookies 1/2″ apart on cookie sheets.
8. Bake for 8 to 9 minutes in preheated oven, remove and cool cookies on rack before decorating.  Overcooked gingerbread cookies will be crunchier/dryer (we prefer them soft/chewy around our house).
9. Decorate (cooled) cookies with Ornamental Cookie Frosting.