Gingerbread

You know, the Christmas season just isn't the same without gingerbread baking in the oven, and this recipe was a newbie. I decided though, ultimately, that it is a fabulous recipe for gingerbread houses. If you under bake it slightly, you'll have a soft cookie, which in my mouth is always a plus. However, if you bake it just right or even a little longer so it's firm, it'd be puuurrfect for those gingerbread house walls and roofs! It would furthermore, pair up delightfully with all the frosting and candies required.


Currently our little apartment is a shipwreck: "winterizing" our fridge, cleaning, and packing our bags, gearing up for another lovely 5 hour flight for our holiday back in Utah. There, we will hug family and friends, teach Henry all about that flaky cold stuff on the ground, hit up this restaurant, that restaurant, and find some time with the slopes in between. I personally can't wait wait to see some mountains... bbbbuuuuuttttt, we leave our urban abode in Philly for a few weeks, which we'll miss. Such a bittersweet farewell!


With all this fun-ness going on, I munch on leftover cookies from this recipe, which you can find in a stupendous cookbook with fantastic concoctions: Always in Season; A Collection of Recipes from the Jr. League of Salt Lake City, a cookbook which captures the seasonal ingredients from Utah perfectly!

They are called, "German Gingerbread Cookies".


Ahem.


And while we're on the subject, don't let this recipe fool you into thinking that it must be how German gingerbread (aka lebkuchen) really tastes. It doesn't. At the least it's not how I remember Lebkuchen tasting. Actual German gingerbread, typically sells in large round circles with thin nuts on top, a much softer texture but frosty outside, and is a bit more "spicy".

Good, that's out of the way.


Here you are, dears.

German Gingerbread Cookies
(or sheets for a gingerbread house:))

1/2 cup shortening
1/2 cup butter
1 1/4 cup molasses
3/4 cup brown sugar
4 cups flour
1 tsp baking soda
2 tsp ground ginger
1 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp ground coves
1 tsp salt

In a heavy saucepan, combine the butter, shortening, molasses and brown sugar. Cook over low heat until everything is dissolved and liquefied. Remove from heat.

Sift all the dry ingredients together. Add the molasses mixture and mix well to form a dough. Chill for several hours.

On a lightly floured work surface, roll out dough into 1/8-1/4 inch slabs and cut as desired. Place on greased cookie sheets and bake at 375 until you reach the wanted texture. Cool on a wire rack. Eat at your own risk.