I took a day off on Friday. I stayed home and my wife and I took care of our two grandsons for the day. I went early to the Minneapolis Farmers Market and bought a bushel of tomatoes. (More about them later.) Then I went by my son’s house and picked up Leo. Shortly after I got home, my son-in-law dropped off Trey. 
In the afternoon, after their naps, we made gingersnap cookies. I relied on my standby recipe from my Betty Crocker Cookbook. The poor thing is getting pretty old and worn. As you will see in the photo, the cover now is being held in place with duct tape. I positioned two of the cookies on the book cover just to show how they turned out. I once looked into getting a new cookbook. But I discovered that they’ve changed some of the recipes. So I guess I’ll just keep using this book that I bought more than 40 years ago.
Gingersnaps are my favorite cookie. Maybe the boys would have preferred chocolate chips. But no one complained. They had fun helping and then sampling the finished cookies.
Their parents and sisters came over for dinner on Friday, as is our usual family practice. We had gingersnaps for dessert. Toward the end of this post is a picture of my wife and me with all four grandchildren on the hammock outside.
Gingersnaps (from Betty Crocker Cookbook, copyright 1971, 9th printing)
3/4 cup butter
1 cup brown sugar
1 egg
1/4 c. molasses
2 1/4 c. flour
2 teaspoons soda
1 tsp. cinnamon
1 tsp. ginger
1/2 tsp. cloves
1/4 tsp. salt
Mix thoroughly butter, sugar, egg and molasses. Blend in remaining ingredients. Wrap in plastic wrap and chill for 1 hour.
Heat oven to 375 degrees. Shape dough by rounded spoonsful into balls. Dip tops in granulated sugar. Place balls sugared side up on baking sheet. Flatten slightly (using cookie press or back of spoon). Bake 10-12 minutes. Immediately remove from baking sheet to cooling rack.
Makes 4 dozen cookies.
Krik’s tips: OK, the Betty Crocker original recipe calls for shortening. But I work for Land O’Lakes, so I changed it to butter. The original recipe doesn’t call for flattening the balls of dough before baking. I do it to get thinner, crisper cookies. I’m also sort of compulsive about uniform size cookies. So I divide the dough into four pieces, and roll the pieces into a short log (about 1 inch diameter, 4 inches long). Then I cut each log into 12 pieces, and dip the tops in the granulated sugar. This process eliminates the step for flattening the balls. Also, you can take one or more of the rolls, wrap in plastic wrap, place in a freezer bag and then freeze. Then, anytime you want a dozen fresh cookies, just take out one of the logs, slice into 12 pieces, dip in sugar and bake.
2 comments:
My friend and former co-worker, Patty Miller, send me this comment. She said it's ok for me to post it as a comment on the blog:
Just read your blog entry about gingersnaps. They’re my fave cookie, too! And I use the recipe from the 1971 Betty Crocker Cookbook, which is also my go-to cookbook – and held together with duct tape. My parents gave it to me for Christmas the year I decided to go to Iowa State and major in Home Economics (that was before finding out about the Home Ec Journalism major.) I used to make gingersnaps with my grandmother. We’d flatten the cookies with a glass dipped in sugar, then sprinkle a little bit of water on the top. When the cookies baked, they got this great crackly top. She’d often have them in the freezer when we came to visit during the summer – nothing better than frozen gingersnaps dipped in milk!
Thank you so much! I grew up with that exact cookbook (it was my mother's). It was the cookbook that taught me how to cook. :)
I was looking for a ginger snap cookie recipe online, but none of them were *my* recipe. *This* was exactly what I was looking for. I spent the afternoon making ginger snap cookies with my 9 year-old. Thank you so much for helping to bring back memories from my childhood.
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