Cookies are always a favorite in my home, and I can honestly say it doesn’t matter which kind they are. All four of us love cookies! One of the best cookies we make, and one that is requested all year long, is gingerbread. If you haven’t had gingerbread in a while, especially homemade gingerbread, you need to give this recipe a try!
If rock-hard gingerbread cookie bricks, that aren’t even close to edible, come to mind when you think about gingerbread, these cookies are nothing like that. These traditional gingerbread cookies are so soft and tender, and they are perfectly spiced with cinnamon and ginger. This gingerbread is so incredibly delicious, and this recipe makes some of the most fun cookies to decorate using cookie cutters!
One of our favorite holiday traditions is to stock up on premade cookie icing, which can be found at local grocery stores or Amazon. I also love to make my own royal icing from scratch, which I seem to adjust my recipe for every year! Then, armed with so many sprinkles and tons of icing, my kids and I decorate cookies all afternoon. I usually have a mix of gingerbread cookies, sugar cookies, and even chocolate sugar cookies for us all to decorate. We have so much fun!
Once cookies are decorated (or not), they freeze beautifully. I love making these cookies near the beginning of the holiday season and then freezing them so I can focus on making candy and other goodies closer to the actual holidays. The cookies can come out of the freezer at any time and thaw in mere minutes on the kitchen counter. So convenient! Not to mention, I think this gingerbread tastes even better after it’s been frozen!
I hope your family enjoys these gingerbread cookies as much as mine does! They are fantastic any time of the year!
Gingerbread Cookies
Ingredients
- 1 cup sugar
- ¾ cup vegetable oil
- 1 cup molasses
- ½ cup hot water
- 2 eggs
- 1 tsp baking soda
- 2 tsp cinnamon
- 2 tsp ground ginger
- ½ tsp salt
- 7 to 7½ cups all purpose flour
Instructions
- In a large mixing bowl, combine the sugar, oil, molasses, and water. Mix well.
- Add the eggs and mix well again.
- Add all the baking soda, cinnamon, ginger, salt, and 5 cups of flour. Mix until well combined.
- Continue adding about ½ cup of flour at a time until the dough comes together into a smooth dough. The total flour used will be about 7 to 7½ cups of flour.
- Wrap the dough in plastic wrap, or place the dough in an airtight container. Refrigerate for several hours, or overnight.
- The next day, or several hours later, preheat the oven to 350°.
- Line a baking sheet with parchment paper, a silicone baking mat, or spray with nonstick spray. Set the prepared pan aside.
- Place the dough onto a floured surface (I like to do about ⅓ of the dough at a time to make it more manageable).
- Roll the dough out until it is about ¼ inch thick. Dust additional flour onto the dough and/or rolling pin to help with any dough sticking as you roll it out.
- Use cookie cutters to cut the dough into shapes and carefully transfer the cookie dough to the prepared pan. Place the cookies about an inch apart.
- Bake the cookies for 10 minutes.
- Allow the cookies to cool for several minutes before transferring them to a cooling rack.
- Repeat rolling out the dough, cutting and transferring the cookies, and baking them until all the dough has been used.
- After the cookies are all cool, enjoy them plain or decorate with cookie icing!
Notes
- This dough freezes so well! Bake the cookies first and then freeze them, or you can also freeze the dough and thaw it in the fridge overnight before baking.
- The total amount of cookies will vary based on the size of your cookie cutters.
- Adapted from Scovil Bakery’s gingerbread cookie recipe.
