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These gingerbread man cookies have a soft and chewy texture inside, with a slight crisp around the edges. Try these yummy spiced cookies, full of cosy warm scent from the molasses and brown sugar. Great for the Christmas season!

What are your favorite Christmas cookies and bakes? Gingerbread cookies seemed like a must-bake during Christmas time for me!

The favorite part of baking these gingerbread cookies, for me, would be the time when the warm spices smell come wafting out from the oven, as they bake in it.

How Do These Gingerbread Man Cookies Taste Like?

Biting into the cookie, you will notice a very slight crisp around the edges, with a soft and chewy texture in the center of the cookie!

You have to try making these cookies to find out how delicious they are!

If you don’t fancy much of the spices, you can reduce the amount of ground cinnamon. I’ve also reduced the ground ginger in this recipe as we prefer less spiciness from the ginger : )

What Ingredients Do I Need?

Here are the ingredients needed:

Unsalted Butter: We will need slightly softened butter to beat together with sugar and molasses.
Brown Sugar: You can use dark or light brown sugar. I used light brown sugar.
Unsulphured Molasses: Do not use the blackstrap ones as they are different.
Egg
Vanilla Extract: Try to use a good quality vanilla extract if you can! Otherwise you might want to omit it, or use vanilla essence.
Plain Flour
Baking Soda
Spices: We will be using ground ginger, ground cinnamon, allspice or nutmeg.

>> MORE YUMMY CHRISTMAS RECIPES:

Making The Gingerbread Cookies In Advance

The cookie dough will be very soft. So, before baking, chill the dough in the refrigerator:

For at last 3 hours, or
preferably overnight

You can also keep the cookie dough in the fridge for about 3 days.

If you would be baking only after 3 days, make the dough in advance and freeze it (up to 3 months). Let the dough thaw overnight in the fridge before baking.

Is The Dough Difficult To Handle?

The dough is quite soft, however thankfully, it is not sticky, so that’s great! You won’t get sticky bits of dough stuck to your hands while rolling and cutting.

Other than chilling the dough in the fridge to ensure it’s easy to cut the gingerbread men out, you will also need to generously dust your working surface with flour while rolling out the dough. Take note to not roll the dough too thin, as it will be difficult to move the (soft) dough to the baking tray. The dough should be rolled to a thickness of about 0.5 – 0.6cm.

Gingerbread Cookie Half — Airy, soft and chewy!

Finishing Touch For The Cookies

I left the cookies plain like these, but you can certainly add some Christmas fun by decorating the cookies with royal icing, M&Ms or melted chocolate. It will be super fun for the kids!

Gingerbread Man Cookies

Prep Time: 30 Mins
Cook Time: 8 Mins
Total Time: 38 minutes

Print Recipe

Description

Ingredients

Units Scale

145g unsalted butter, softened at room temp
150g dark or light brown sugar
200g unsulphured molasses
1 large egg, room temp
1 tsp vanilla extract
437g plain flour
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 tsp ground ginger
1.5 tsp ground cinnamon
1/8 tsp ground allspice or nutmeg

Instructions

In a mixing bowl, cream butter together with brown sugar and molasses with a handheld mixer until pale and fluffy.
Add in egg and vanilla. Beat on high speed till well-combined. Scrape down the bowl to ensure mixture is mixed well.
In another bowl, whisk to combine flour, baking soda, salt, spices together. Add 1/2 of the dry ingredients into the wet ingredients. Mix well. Add the remaining 1/2 portion and mix well, till no traces of flour is seen.
Divide dough into 2 portions and wrap well with cling wrap. Place cookie dough into fridge to chill for at least 3 hours, or preferably overnight (up to 3 days).
When the dough is ready, preheat oven to 175C. Line baking trays.
Remove 1 portion of the cookie dough from the fridge and roll it out to 1/4 inch thick. Dust the working surface generously with flour to prevent sticking.
Use your cookie cutter to cut out the dough and place on prepared baking tray. You may need the help of a dough scrapper to move the dough.
Re-roll dough scraps as needed. You can also use a smaller or various shaped cookie cutters.
Bake the cookies in preheated oven at 175C for 8-9 mins. If your cookie cutter is larger in size, add about 1-2 mins more to the baking time.
Once cookies are baked, let them cool in the baking tray on cooling rack for about 10 mins. Move the cookies to the cooling rack to cool completely before storing or decorate as preferred.