Chocolate Gingerbread Cookies
These are the best chocolate gingerbread cookies and are perfect for icing with Christmas frosting and decorating. This homemade recipe is chewy, crisp, spiced, and mellow. With hints of cocoa, cinnamon, clove, and molasses all the flavors of the holidays are so tasty.
Equipment
- Rolling Pin
- Cookie Cutters
- Parchment Paper
- Baking Sheets
Ingredients
- 3 & ¼ C all-purpose flour
- ½ C cocoa powder
- ¾ C brown sugar
- ¾ teaspoon baking soda
- 1 TB cinnamon
- 3 tsp ground ginger
- ½ teaspoon ground clove
- 12 TB salted butter room temperature and cut into 24 small pieces
- 1 egg room temperature
- ¾ C molasses
Instructions
- In a large mixing bowl, combine flour, cocoa powder, brown sugar, baking soda, cinnamon, ginger, and cloves.
- Next, add the small butter pieces. Using a hand mixer, mix at low speed until the mixture is combined and the butter is combined in and looks like large grains of sand.
- In a small bowl, whisk the egg and molasses together. Add ⅓ of the egg mixture to the dry ingredients and mix on low to medium speed. While running the mixer, slowly add the remaining egg mixture. Mix until the dough comes together. This will not be a super moist/soft dough. It will appear a bit dry but that is ok and how you want it to so it is easy to cut and the shapes will stay together as they bake. Make sure it is all evenly combined and then the rest will be done with your hands as you divide and roll the dough later.
- Divide the dough in half on 2 large sheets of plastic wrap. You will likely scrape and dump it onto the plastic wrap. With your hands, bring the dough together into a rectangular shape. The warmth of your hands as you bring it together will help it stick and form the shape. Wrap the plastic wrap around it to form each into a rectangle that is about 1″ thick.
- Place each dough into the refrigerator for a least an hour or 15 minutes in the freezer. You want it firm but with just enough give that it will still roll out.
- Take one portion at a time from the refrigerator to roll the dough. Place between two sheets of parchment paper and using a rolling pin into a ⅓ inch thick layer.
- Using your cookie cutters, cut out desired shapes, and gently move the cookies to a nonstick baking sheet or a baking sheet prepared with cooking spray. They should be easy to move as they will still be chilled but if they are hard, use a spatula to move them. Gather scraps as you cut out your cookies and rechill. Add scraps from each batch all back together for a 3rd smaller batch of cookies. Remember to chill!
- IMPORTANT – Place baking sheet with cookies on them into the refrigerator for another hour or 15 minutes in the freezer to chill again. This is an important step because chilling the dough ensures it doesn’t spread while baking and the shapes come out perfect with straight edges. Repeat the chill, roll, cut, and rechill steps through all the batches of cookies.
- Preheat oven to 350°.Bake cookies for 9-10 minutes for a chewy cookie. Bake 10-12 for a crisper cookie.
- Let cool on the baking sheet for 1 minute before moving to a wire rack to cool.
- Once cool, decorate with Easy Cookie Icing, see link above for this recipe. This is the best icing for cookies since it is delicious, pretty, glossy, and it hardens perfectly.
- This recipe is for on average 30 cookies. It will depend on what size cookies and cookie cutters you use. Smaller cookies may yield up to 4 dozen and large gingerbread men will be about 2 dozen.
Notes
The nutrition is based on 30 cookies. Each cookie may vary based on the size of each cookie cutter & the amount of dough per cookie.
Nutrition
Calories: 142kcalCarbohydrates: 23gProtein: 2gFat: 5gSaturated Fat: 3gPolyunsaturated Fat: 0.3gMonounsaturated Fat: 1gTrans Fat: 0.2gCholesterol: 17mgSodium: 71mgPotassium: 174mgFiber: 1gSugar: 12gVitamin A: 149IUVitamin C: 0.01mgCalcium: 31mgIron: 1mg
Tried this recipe?Let us know how it was!
