Omas Ginger Cookies Food

OMA'S GINGER COOKIES

Steps:

• Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Grease 2 cookie sheets.
• Beat 1 cup sugar, butter, molasses, and egg together in a mixing bowl using an electric mixer.
• Sift flour, baking soda, ginger, 1 teaspoon cinnamon, cloves, salt, and nutmeg together in a bowl. Beat into butter mixture until combined.
• Combine 1/8 cup sugar and 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon in a shallow bowl. Roll cookie dough into 1-inch balls. Roll cookies in the sugar-cinnamon mixture to coat. Place on the prepared cookie sheet.
• Bake in the preheated oven until golden and edges are set, about 11 minutes. Remove from the oven and let cool at least 5 minutes before serving or storing.

GRANDMA'S® MOLASSES GINGER COOKIES

Steps:

• In a large bowl, whip together sugar, butter, molasses, egg, and vanilla. Mix in flour, baking soda, baking powder, and spices until dough comes together. Wrap well and refrigerate overnight.
• Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.
• Roll cookie dough into 1-inch balls and roll in sugar to coat. Arrange on rimmed baking sheets. Bake for 15 minutes.

OMA'S GINGERSNAPS

Steps:

• Cream shortening and sugar- mix dry ingredients in a separate bowl.
• Add molasses and egg to creamed mixture- add dry ingredients- stir or handmix.
• Roll dough into small balls- roll in extra sugar.
• Place on cookie sheet and flatten.
• Bake 350 for 5-10 minutes.

OMA'S GINGERBREAD HOUSE

Steps:

• Mix ingredients in order given.
• Flour liberally! It will start out a bit sticky. Just keep adding flour to your board and your rolling pin. Turn it often.
• Roll to a maximum thickness 1/4" (1 cm).
• Bake at 350°F until brown and slightly crisp. It is hard to give a time for how long to bake. It depends on how many pieces you have on your sheet, how thick they are, etc. I found that they all needed a minimum of 8 minutes. And then I just kept checking every 3 minutes after that.
• Dust the flour off of the pieces after they have cooled. A pstry brush works well for this.
• Glue: Melt a fair amount of sugar in a large heavy pan over low heat. Mom used a cast iron pan. We started with about 2 cups of sugar and ended up adding about another cup. Keep stirring and waiting. You want the sugar to get to the point where it is almost a clear brown. Be careful though, the "glue" burns BADLY if dripped on skin.
• Mom would simply "dip" the edge of the piece that she wanted to glue into the sugar and then press it with the other piece. When it cools, it is VERY hard and holds very well. It does cool quickly though, so work fast.
• For Icing: Beat egg whites until stiff. Slowly add in all of the icing sugar.
• To make cookies: Bake until lightly browned for soft cookies. Crisp cookies will keep better though.
• There is enough dough to make a house and a free form base to put your house on. Or you can simply make a bunch of cookies with the "leftovers".
• Mom has some hand drawn pictures of how to cut out the house. Here are her measurements and directions.
• Cut 2 side walls: 7" x 4".
• Cut 2 roof panels: 9 1/2" x 8".
• Cut 4 chimney pieces: 2 1/4" x 1 1/4" (in two of them, cut a 1" V into the bottom so that it will "straddle" the peak of the roof).
• Cut 2 end walls: 6" x 9" (4" up the sides, cut diagonally to the top center to make a point). In one end, cut out door and two windows. Bake the door along side.
• For the windows: Place foil underneath and fill with crushed lollipop. Bake as usual.
• Base: Simply roll out the leftover dough to make a free form base. Make sure that it is wide enough for the house.
• NOTE ABOUT CLEAN-UP: Don't fret! Your pan that you melted the sugar in is certainly not ruined! All you need to do is add some hot water, let sit for a little while (5-10 minutes) and then rinse it out. If for some reason, that isn't quite working, simply heat the pan full of water over low heat for a short while (again, about 10 minutes).