Honey-Gingerbread Cookies
Martha Stewart
These gingerbread cookies include a generous amount of honey, which gives them a pale golden color and a mildly sweet flavor. For the how-to to create different shapes, see Shaped Gingerbread Cookies.
To prepare gingerbread men shaped cookie ornaments as seen on "Mad Hungry" TV, add a small hole at the top of the cookies before baking. The gingerbread men can be turned into hanging ornaments by threading string through the hole.
Ingredients
Makes about 2 dozen town houses, 4 dozen deer or trees, or 6 dozen men.
* 5 1/2 cups all-purpose flour, plus more for dusting
* 1 teaspoon baking soda
* 1 1/2 teaspoons salt
* 4 teaspoons ground ginger
* 4 teaspoons ground cinnamon
* 1 1/2 teaspoons ground cloves
* 1 teaspoon freshly grated nutmeg
* 2 sticks (16 tablespoons) unsalted butter, room temperature
* 1 cup granulated sugar
* 2 large eggs
* 1 cup honey
* 1/2 cup unsulfured molasses
* Royal Icing
Directions
1. Whisk together flour, baking soda, salt, and spices in a medium bowl.
2. Beat butter and sugar with a mixer on medium-high speed until fluffy. Add eggs, 1 at a time, beating well after each addition. Beat in honey and molasses. Reduce speed to low. Gradually add flour mixture, and beat until just combined. Divide dough into 3 portions, and wrap each in plastic. Refrigerate for 1 hour.
3. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. On a generously floured piece of parchment, roll dough to a scant 1/4 inch thick. Brush off excess flour. Slide dough and parchment onto a baking sheet, and freeze for 15 minutes.
4. Cut out desired shapes. Transfer to parchment-lined baking sheets, and freeze for 15 minutes.
5. Bake cookies for 6 minutes. Remove sheets from oven, and tap them firmly on counter to flatten cookies. Return to oven, rotating sheets, and bake until crisp but not darkened, 6 to 8 minutes more. Let cool on sheets on wire racks.
6. Spoon icing into a pastry bag fitted with a very small plain round tip (such as Ateco #0 or #1). Pipe designs on cookies. Let cookies stand at room temperature until set, at least 2 hours (preferably overnight). Cookies can be stored between layers of parchment in airtight containers for up to 1 week.