…is super-fun to make, especially for the holidays! Food Network Magazine featured a recipe for perfect gingerbread men, and I couldn’t wait to make them!
For perfect gingerbread you need:
- 3 1/2 cups flour
- 1 tsp. baking soda
- 1 tsp. salt
- 2 tsp. cinnamon
- 1 tbsp. ground ginger
- 1/4 tsp. ground cloves
- 1/4 tsp. allspice (we just added extra cinnamon)
- 6 tbsp. melted butter
- 1 tbsp. melted shortening
- 2/3 cup brown sugar
- 3/4 cup molasses
- 1 egg
Sift the flour, baking soda, and spices together in a large bowl. In a separate bowl, combine the butter, shortening, brown sugar, and molasses. Beat the egg in with a mixer.
Mix the flour mixture into the wet ingredients in two additions. The dough will become crumbly and seems like it will never incorporate, but keep working with it!
Divide the dough in half, wrap each portion in Saran wrap and pat/roll it to 1/2 inch thick. Pop the dough in the fridge for a couple of hours.
Preheat the oven to 350 and lightly flour the counter. Roll each each of dough to 1/4 inch thick, dusting with more flour if you need it. Cut the dough into gingerbread men or whatever shapes you desire. If you can believe it, we actually don’t have a gingerbread man cookie cutter, so we used our Star Wars set with other random shapes. And, as you can see, Schatzi attempted his own gingerbread man.
And, the Star Wars gang was all there! We added chocolate chips and sprinkles to some of the cookies, and it made them taste all the better! When cookies have been cut, place them on parchment-lined cookie sheets and place back in the fridge for 15 minutes. Then, bake the cookies for 9-11 minutes and let them cool on a rack.
I highly recommend mixing chocolate chips and sprinkles to your batter-it is delicious! The Food Network chefs weren’t kidding when they deemed this perfect gingerbread–it’s soft, sweet, spicy, and just plain wonderful. Whip up a batch for the office in the last couple of weeks before Christmas!
*sc
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