LISTEN TO THE PODCAST
A sure sign of the season, molasses cookies. Susan Reid, who wrote the King Arthur Essential Cookie Cookbook, told Tonia's Kitchen to combine room temperature butter, along with molasses of course, sugar ginger and eggs. Combine that with enough flour for a soft dough, and refrigerate it for at least an hour. Take a small ice cream scoop, and ball the dough. Then dip the balls in some sugar and place onto a light colored aluminum pan, and bake. By the way, the color of the pan matters, because the lighter the color, the easier it is to brown those cookies evenly.
COOKIES
- 1 cup unsalted butter
- 1 cup sugar
- 1/2 cup molasses OR 1/4 cup molasses + 1/4 cup ginger syrup
- 2 1/4 teaspoons baking soda
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 1 1/4 teaspoons ground cinnamon
- 1 1/4 teaspoons ground cloves
- 1 teaspoon ground ginger
- 2 large eggs
- 3 1/2 cups King Arthur Unbleached All-Purpose Flour
- sugar, for coating; pearl sugar; sparkling white (coarse) sugar; or granulated sugar
GINGER SYRUP
- 4 cups fresh ginger root, unpeeled, cut into 1/8" to ¼" slices (a food processor makes short work of this task)
- 3 1/2 cups sugar
- 3 1/2 cups water
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350°F. Lightly grease (or line with parchment) two baking sheets.
- In a large mixing bowl, cream together the butter and sugar until they're light and fluffy.
- Beat in the molasses (or molasses and ginger syrup), baking soda, salt, and spices.
- Add the eggs, beating well and scraping down the sides of the bowl to make sure everything is incorporated.
- Stir in the flour.
- Scoop the soft dough into 1 ½" balls; a tablespoon cookie scoop works well here.
- Roll them in granulated sugar, coarse sugar, or pearl sugar.
- Space the cookies on the prepared baking sheets, leaving about 2 ½" between them.
- Bake them for 10 minutes. The centers will look soft and puffy; that's OK.
- Remove the cookies from the oven, and cool them on the pan for 10 minutes before transferring them to a rack to cool completely.
- To make easy, pretty shaped cookies, use a cutter smaller than the cookie to cut a shape from the center of each cookie, while the cookies are still mildly warm. Serve both the original cookies, and the shapes you've cut from them.
- To make ginger syrup: In a large, heavy saucepan, bring the ginger, sugar, and water to a boil.
- Boil the mixture for 45 to 60 minutes, until it registers 216°F to 220°F on an instant-read or candy thermometer. The lower temperature will give you a thinner syrup, one that's easy to stir into drinks; the higher temperature will yield a thicker syrup, better for baking. You can't tell how thick the syrup will be while it's still hot; you have to go by its temperature, as it'll thicken as it cools.
- Remove the pan from the burner and carefully strain the syrup into a non-reactive container. Store in the refrigerator indefinitely. Yield: about 2 1/4 cups syrup.
