Maritime Gingersnaps

Halcyon Eve's Note:

From "The Anne of Green Gables Cookbook": "'No, indeed! The rosebud tea set! Well, what next? You know I never use that except for the minister or the Aids. You'll put down the old brown tea set. But you can open the little yellow crock of cherry preserves. It's time it was being used anyhow--I believe it's beginning to work. And you can cut some fruit cake and have some of the cookies and snaps.'" (From "Anne of Green Gables by L.M. Montgomery). Times are estimates; cooking time includes chilling time, but cooling time for both molasses mixture and cookies (beyond the first 5 minutes) is not included.

• Total Time: 1 hrs 30 mins
• Prep Time: 20 mins
• Cook Time: 1 hrs 10 mins

Ingredients:

Serves: 16-24

Yield: 48.0 cookies

• ½ cup molasses
• ¼ cup shortening
• 1 ½ cups all-purpose flour
• ¼ teaspoon baking powder
• 2 teaspoons ground ginger
• 1 teaspoon cinnamon
• 1 teaspoon ground cloves
• ¼ teaspoon salt

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 375°F.
2. Combine molasses and shortening in a small pan; heat, stirring constantly, just to boiling over medium heat. Remove immediately from heat and allow to cool.
3. Meanwhile, measure remaining ingredients into a large bowl. When molasses mixture has cooled, pour over flour mixture and mix well to combine. Chill dough for 10 minutes.
4. Shape into small (about quarter-sized) balls and arrange 2 inches apart on baking sheets. Flatten with bottom of a drinking glass or with fingers.
5. Bake until dry and crisp, about 8-10 minutes. Watch carefully as they may easily burn.
6. When done, place pan on cooling rack and cool cookies on baking sheet for 5 minutes. Remove from baking sheet to cooling rack and cool completely.
7. Once completely cooled, store in an airtight container.

Reviews

[wicked cook 46]

I only got 18 cookies but I did roll the balls a bit bigger. The cloves overpower the ginger alot. They are a very heavy dense cookie. I was surprised to see no eggs in them LOL I think I will try these again but with some tweaking. I am from the Maritimes and we love our gingersnaps LOL made for Everyday is Holiday tag

[Chef #1336639]

The flavor of these cookies was all right, but not a winner with the kids and menfolk, who were expecting a somewhat sweet cookie. If you follow the directions, you get very hard little crunchy cookies with a dark spicy flavor. I made the cookies very small - about a nickel diameter ball - and only got out 30. There's no way you could get 48, as the recipe says. Pass by this recipe.