The goodie: Dark, spicy Gingerbread
The goal was to bake a moist, dark, spicy gingerbread for the Brut Sun Bowl. Every winter, I get a huge craving for ginger in baked goodies. And what completes a cold winter day than gingerbread? So, I found a recipe off of Allrecipes and decided to go for it.
The first thing I noticed was the amount of molasses in the recipe: 1 whole cup! I'm not that big a fan of molasses...I find it a bit overbearing, but since the recipe was highly rated, I decided to go for it. After putting it in the oven, I set the time to what the recipe had suggested: 1 hr. Ok fine... it seemed a little long for the amount and the stickiness of the batter (1 9x9 square brownie pan), but I trusted the recipe and toiled on. About 45 min later, I went to check on my gingerbread. By now, I could smell the molasses wafting out of the kitchen. I opened the oven door, took out my pan, and poked at it. Rock solid. Crap.
In a moment of panic, I decided that I could just buy some gingerbread at Safeway and pass it off as my own. But I knew I couldn't make myself do that...and my ego was stopping me from it. Quickly, I changed plans to keep the ginger as the main ingredient and decided to fall back on a reliable choice: cookies! And voila! These big, soft, ginger cookies were born!
Might I say, that I think these turned out very well. So well, that, upon taking a bite, my friends were surprised that I had made them:
- Friend 1: These cookies are good! Did Ji make these?
- Friend 2: No, Penny did actually.
- Friend 1: Really??? Penny made these???
Don't worry. I wasn't offended. In fact, it gave my ego a giant boost after hearing that. So, hopefully these will bring you the same joy that it brought me and my friends on that cold Saturday afternoon.
- 2 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
- 2 teaspoons ground ginger
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- 3/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon
- 1/2 teaspoon ground cloves
- 1/4 teaspoon salt
- 3/4 cup butter, softened
- 1 cup white sugar
- 1 egg
- 1 tablespoon water
- 1/4 cup molasses
- 1/4 teaspoon orange extract
- 1 teaspoon of orange zest
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Sift together the flour, ginger, baking soda, cinnamon, cloves, and salt. Set aside.
- In a large bowl, cream together the butter and 1 cup sugar until light and fluffy. Beat in the egg, then stir in the water and molasses. Gradually stir the sifted ingredients into the molasses mixture. Shape dough into walnut sized balls, place the cookies 2 inches apart onto an ungreased cookie sheet, and flatten slightly.
- Bake for 8 to 10 minutes in the preheated oven. Allow cookies to cool on baking sheet for 5 minutes before removing to a wire rack to cool completely. Store in an airtight container.