Gingerbread

Another recipe from Cookie Day 2010! This one is the multi-generational cookie recipe. I made the dough, my daughters cut out the shapes and my mom decorated them. Also, my mom had the wonderful patience to help my girls cut out shapes. I don't know if I could have sat there and done it, but she did and did it wonderfully. The girls had an awesome time cutting out cookies with grandma!

Ingredients:

3 3/4 cup flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
2 teaspoons ginger
1 1/2 teaspoons cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon nutmeg
1/2 teaspoon cloves
2/3 cup butter, melted
3/4 cup molasses, room temperature
1/3 cup white sugar
1/3 cup brown sugar, packed
1/4 cup water, room temperature
1 egg
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract

Mix flour, baking soda, ginger, cinnamon, nutmeg, and cloves in a small bowl. In a large bowl, mix butter, molasses, brown sugar, white sugar, water, the egg and vanilla. Once the liquids are thoroughly combined, slowly add the dry ingredients into the liquid ingredients, mixing as you go along. Chill the dough for at least 3 or 4 hours. I chilled for 2 hours, took it out to transfer it to my mom's and when they tried to make cut them out, it didn't work very well. We chilled it for another half an hour to an hour and cut them out again. We chilled the dough in between baking between batches.

Cut out the dough using cookie cutters (we used all sorts of different Christmas designs, but of course men are the most common). Bake at 350 for 10 to 12 minutes. Allow them to cool completely before decorating with icing. We used a white icing along with a red and green gel icing.