Ginger Snaps

If the weather outside is frightful, these cookies will be delightful. Ginger snaps are a richly spiced, crisp cookie that comes together so quickly with no chill time. Hey, you're watching Preppy Kitchen where I, John Kanell, teach you how to make delicious homemade dishes to share with your family and friends. These ginger snaps will be ready in a snap. So let's get started. We're going to sift two and a half cups or 300 grams of all-purpose flour into a large bowl. I'm using a scale, but if you're using measuring cups, just sprinkle the flour in and level it off. Do not pack that flour and that's a recipe for disaster. For leavening, we're adding two teaspoons of baking soda. So one and two. In you go. Three quarters of a teaspoon of salt. Give a nice balance to these cookies. And then it's time for the spices. One teaspoon of cinnamon. That is always a must for any holiday baking. And add two teaspoons of ground ginger. You get a lot of bite on these cookies. Half a teaspoon of clove. This is a really, really powerful spice. And if you're not a fan, I get it. Why don't you use half a teaspoon of all spice instead? Now, cardamom. It makes a big difference, but you could totally skip it if it's not for you. Sift it out. Look at these cl See these cl You don't want those cl Our scale is done. Thank you very much. Whisk it up and set it aside. It's time for our butter, sugar and molasses. Into the bowl of my stand mixer, fitted with a paddle attachment, I'm adding three quarters of a cup of unsalted room temperature butter, as well as the secret ingredient for this cookie, molasses. If you'd I find it horrific, but it does magical things in baked goods It'll add a lot of depth of flavor. So one quarter of a cup, it looks cool, but it looks kind of Look at that. Get it all out. And to that, we're going to be adding three quarters of a cup of brown sugar. This adds a lot of caramel flavor as well. And in case you didn't know, brown sugar is just regular sugar mixed with molasses. It's not So we're adding even more of the molasses flavor by using brown sugar. Cream it up until it's nice, light, fluffy, and yes, you probably have to scrape the bowl down. Let's take a look. This is a beautiful color and this is the perfect cookie for your holiday platter. And when we put our decorations up and I have a big cookie spread out, this is going to be one of the stars. Although I do have several holiday favorites. So I don't know, do I even have a favorite if I have several? How does that work? All right, now it's time to add in one room temperature egg, large if you can, and mix it up. While that's going, add two teaspoons of a nice vanilla. Now is when you want to scrape that bowl down. You could just keep mixing when you add the flour in, but you want these cookies to not be tough. Even if they're crisp, they're not going to be tough because the gluten in the flour will not be activated because we will not be over mixing. It's a lot of negatives, but it adds up to a positive. It's time to d And if you watch this channel, So just fold in the flour to your wet ingredients. It means less mixing, less flour explosions. I hate that. Now mix on low until just combined. It's almost combined and it's just combined. If there's a little bit of flour hanging out, you can just use your spatula and finish it off by hand. Just take a look in the bowl. I can see at the very bottom, there's a whole bunch of this powdery flour nonsense. So I'm going to work it in. The dough is all come together and there is no chill time for this recipe. So your oven should be set and heated to 350 already. I'll add a card about that at the very beginning of this video because I didn't mention that, but we're going to put this onto our baking sheet and pop them into the oven. It's as quick as that. I'm going to scoop all my dough out first, then roll it in my clean hands and finally roll it in some sanding sugar. The sanding sugar is optional. You could use regular granulated sugar. You could use cinnamon sugar. The nice thing is that you're going to get a little bit of crunch and sparkle on the cookie and it's Okay, they're scooped out. Roll them up. Doesn't have to be perfect, but it's nice to get kind of a more cohesive shape with less nooks and crannies. When you pick up the balls of dough, you'll feel if one is a bit heavier than the others and you can just pinch off a little bit of dough and use it on another cookie. So un This is holiday magic already. And just We only used three quarters of a cup of sugar for three cups of flour. So the extra bit of sugar on the edge will give you a little bit of that initial sweetness, which is really pleasant in a cookie. If you want your ginger snaps really flattened crisp, go ahead and gently press down on those dough balls right before you pop them into the oven. They'll bake up a little flatter and be a little crisper. It's time for these cookies to go into the oven at 350 degrees Fahrenheit for about 12 to 13 minutes. The edge will be set and the center will be a little bit soft and continue to set after baking. My ginger snaps are out of the oven and cool enough touch. I'm going to take a bite, but before I do, if you And now it's time for a bite. Look at this. It kind of exploded. It's just screaming holidays. I can see the trees with snow and all the ornaments in my mind eating this cookie. I really hope you get a chance to make this recipe. If you