Overbooked Cook: Best, Best, BEST Molasses Cookie Recipe!

Molasses cookies have become my family's favorite holiday cookie.

Last year I went searching for the perfect molasses cookie recipe. 

Could not find one.

I gathered every recipe I could find - family, friends, the internet - and baked batch after batch...

Each recipe had a flaw. Either the cookies were too soft or too hard or didn't crinkle/crack when you baked them or were too "clovy" or had so much baking soda they left an unpleasant aftertaste of baking soda in your mouth within 2 minutes of eating them. (I will say my family greatly enjoyed the search - they got to eat a TON of cookies...)

So I got to work and experimented until I got the right balance of spices and just enough baking soda to make the cookies crack into that lovely crinkled surface we all love. (But not enough that it left an aftertaste.) My family thinks I came up with the perfect molasses cookie - here is the delicious result:

 

BEST MOLASSES COOKIE

 

  Ingredients:

1/2 cup shortening

1/4 cup butter, softened 

1 cup white sugar

1/4 cup molasses

1 egg

2 cups all purpose white flour

1 tsp baking soda

1 tsp  ground cinnamon

1 tsp ground ginger

1/2 tsp ground cloves

1/2 tsp salt

 

Using a mixer, cream together the shortening, butter and sugar until it makes a grainy paste. Add the egg and continue mixing at medium to high speed until fluffy. Add the molasses and mix until well combined.

Put all the dry ingredients in a separate bowl and whisk together with a fork or wire whisk until combined. 

With the mixer on low speed, gradually add the dry ingredient mixture to the molasses mixture until just combined. Do not over mix!

Using a cookie dough scoop make balls of dough and drop them into a bowl of white sugar. Roll the balls in the sugar until they are completely coated on the outside. Place the balls of dough on the cookie sheet and bake at 350 F. For best results, do not flatten the cookies before baking. For softer, chewier cookies bake only until the cookies flatten and crack on the tops. For crisper cookies cook 3 minutes more. Be careful not to overbake as the color of the dough makes it difficult to judge when the cookies are done.

This recipe is quick and easy - no chilling of the dough is required - and foolproof if you stick to the recipe above. Don't substitute or alter the ratio of the ingredients or you will not get the perfect cookie :-)