Gingerilicious

Of the four new cookie recipes I baked for our annual Craft Party, this is the one that CrafterKat said I had to make again. I chose this one because I thought it would be perfect for dunking in a large cup of coffee or glass of milk. Turns out I was right.

Gingersnap Sticks

1 c. unsalted butter (2 sticks)
1 ¼ c. + 2 T. sugar
½ tsp. vanilla
2 small eggs or 1 ½ large eggs*
1/3 c. molasses
3 c. flour
2 ½ t. baking soda
½ t. salt
2 ½ t. cinnamon**
2 ½ t. ginger (ground)
1/8 t. black pepper (ground)

Sift the dry ingredients together and set aside. Cream butter until soft. Add sugar, and beat until light and fluffy. Add vanilla and eggs, and beat until fluffy. Add molasses and beat until well-incorporated. Slowly add the dry ingredients until all is well blended.

Line a bread loaf pan with plastic wrap so that the some of it hangs over the outside of the pan. Press the dough into the pan, packing it tightly. Make the top as level as possible. Cover the dough with the remaining plastic and then place a second bread loaf pan onto the mixture (stacking them). This will even out the top of the dough. Freeze the bread pan loaf sandwich for several hours (overnight is best). This dough gets soft quickly, so work fast before it turns into a gooey mess!

Slice the brick into thin slices, no more than 1/8” thick. ***

Place the slices on a parchment-lined cookie tray with plenty of space between. With this much butter, the cookies will spread.

Bake in a 350 degree oven until the edges turn dark brown, about 12 minutes. Keep an eye on them—there’s a fine line between under baked and burned. I took them out at 12 minutes and they still looked like a chewy cookie. By the time I had tasted one 30 minutes later, they had crisped considerably, like a true gingersnap.


* Based on my chocolate chip recipe from Alton Brown, I used one egg and one egg yolk. Seemed to work well.

** The Costco-sized cinnamon and nutmeg containers look surprisingly similar. I’m pretty sure I used nutmeg and no cinnamon. This is what we tech/geek people refer to as a feature!

*** Do you know how thin 1/8 inch is?! My knife skills are not that precise—I was lucky to get them about 1/4 inch thick. The dough was incredibly hard. Trying to cut the ginger brick with a wicked long knife, I ended up with white indentions in my palm from the top of the blade. CrafterKat asked why I kept rubbing my left hand on Sunday; I told her, “My knifing hand hurts…” Perhaps I should call these Jack The Ripper Gingers? Next time I may just roll the dough onto a cookie sheet and freeze that.

I should add that I found the original recipe here; I've reprinted it with my comments. One thing I enjoy about sharing recipes is the little stories that go with them. I liked how this chef got the recipe!