Soft Gingerbread Cookies
These are the best soft gingerbread cookies. They are chewy, soft and perfectly spiced, and the dough is easy to make, roll out and bake! This is my Mom’s recipe that I have refined over the years in professional bakeries.
Servings: 35 Cookies
Ingredients
For the Cookies:
- 1 cup unsalted butter softened
- 1 cup granulated sugar
- ½ teaspoon kosher salt
- 1 whole egg
- 1 cup molasses
- 2 tablespoons vinegar I used apple cider vinegar
- 5 cups all-purpose flour
- 1 ½ teaspoons baking soda
- 1 tablespoon ground ginger
- 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
- 1 teaspoon ground cloves
- raisins optional for decoration
For the white icing:
- 2 cups powdered sugar sifted
- ¼ teaspoon vanilla
- ½ cup whole milk or more as needed
Instructions
Preparing the Dough:
- Whisk together flour and spices. Set aside.
- Thoroughly cream butter, sugar, and salt. Stir in egg, molasses and vinegar; beat well.
- Stir flour into butter mixture. It is easiest to add the flour in several additions, scraping down the bowl between each one.
- Form dough into two balls and chill wrapped in plastic or in a covered mixing bowl over night or at least 5 hours. I have found that 3 hours of chilling time is okay but the dough will not be as easy to roll out without sticking. Overnight will make the rolling and cutting process a breeze!
Rolling the Cookies:
- Preheat oven to 375* and line two baking sheets with parchment paper.
- On a lightly floured surface, roll one ball out to 1/8 inch thick. Cut with cookie cutters and gently place cookies 1 inch apart on prepared baking sheets.
- Decorate with raisins.
- Bake large gingerbread boys (~5” tall) 6 minutes in preheated oven; bake medium cookies (3-4” tall) 5 minutes; bake small to medium cookies (2-3” tall) 4 minutes but watch them because they could easily over bake; and bake the cute little 1” cookies like my angels only 3 minutes.
- Cool 2 minutes on baking sheet and then move to a wire rack to cool completely.
- Store for up to two weeks in a sealed plastic bag or a tightly closed container.
Make the Icing
- Add powdered sugar into a medium bowl. Add vanilla and 2 tablespoons milk. Stir with a spatula to combine. Continue to add milk several teaspoons at a time until the icing is thickened but still runny enough to drizzle off your spatula.
- Spoon icing into a piping bag fitted with a small circle tip or into a plastic baggie with one corner cut off into a tiny hole. Ice as desired.
Video
Notes
Yield – The yield varies greatly by the size of your cookie cutter. A 2 ½ inch cutter (like the stars or bells in my video) yield approximately 35 cookies with re-rolling all scraps.
Technique – For easy rolling, try rolling out the soft dough before chilling between two pieces of parchment paper. Refrigerate overnight and then proceed to the cutting step.
Variations – Decorate with raisins before baking or with a simple white icing after cooling.
Storage – Store baked gingerbread cookies in a ziptop baggie or tightly sealed container at room temperature for 10 days. Alternatively they can be prepared through cutting, then frozen between layers of parchment paper. Bake from frozen or allow to thaw slightly before baking.
Nutrition
Calories: 193kcal | Carbohydrates: 34g | Protein: 2g | Fat: 6g | Saturated Fat: 3g | Polyunsaturated Fat: 0.3g | Monounsaturated Fat: 1g | Trans Fat: 0.2g | Cholesterol: 19mg | Sodium: 88mg | Potassium: 171mg | Fiber: 1g | Sugar: 20g | Vitamin A: 175IU | Vitamin C: 0.003mg | Calcium: 30mg | Iron: 1mg