SweetSugarBelle's Favorite Gingerbread Recipe (2024)

FAQs

Can you substitute maple syrup for molasses in gingerbread cookies? ›

It helps hold them together and gives them a nice, chewy texture. Maple Syrup: We replace molasses with maple syrup in these gingerbread cookies. It adds sweetness and helps achieve the perfect soft and chewy cookie texture.

A 1:4 ratio of butter to flour makes the gingerbread strong. Corn syrup keeps freshly baked gingerbread pliable and soft, so it's easy to cut while warm. Rolling the dough directly on parchment makes it easy to transfer to the pan.

How long does gingerbread last? Baked gingerbread will keep for 5 days in an airtight container. If it's humid or moisture is present, the gingerbread will soften. You can freeze gingerbread either raw or cooked.

Originally gingerbread was made with honey and breadcrumbs

One of the earliest English recipes for gingerbread, written down in the fifteenth century, didn't actually contain any ginger! Instead bread crumbs or 'gratyd brede' were mixed with boiled honey and formed into a stiff paste with saffron and pepper.

Blackstrap Molasses

Though it's ideal for savory foods such as barbecue sauces and stews, Bourdon cautioned against choosing blackstrap for cookies. “Please avoid this dark and bitter molasses for your baking recipes,” she said. “It will make your cookies dry and quite frankly inedible.

Medium Or Dark Molasses

“It adds enough bold flavor and sweet notes with a hint of bitterness to any recipe, which is exactly what you want for making gingerbread cookies.” Bourdon added that it's also versatile and can be used for marinades, baked beans, sauces, breads and recipes for other foods.

The World's Best Gingerbread. Victorian cook Sarah Nelson invented Grasmere Gingerbread® in 1854 in the English Lake District village from where it gets its name. A unique, spicy-sweet cross between a biscuit and cake, its reputation quickly spread and it is now enjoyed by food lovers all over the world.

Mistake #2: Not resting your dough

After the gingerbread is cut out, Lomas recommends putting it into the fridge for at least 30 minutes and up to three days. Chilling the dough before it goes into a hot oven gives the butter a chance to firm up and reduces how much it spreads when baking.

Store for up to two weeks in an airtight container in a cool place. The gingerbread can also be frozen and if you are freezing leftovers then you may prefer to wrap individual portions with food wrap and then put these in an airtight container.

Is it okay to eat gingerbread in the house? ›

“Edible” is a loose term, apparently. A gingerbread house is about as edible as play-dough—you can eat it, but should you? These houses are usually left out for days (more on that later), drying out and crusting over.

A couple of weeks, you should be fine. The surface and taste test is still the best way to determine. Otherwise, gingerbread houses are mostly for decoration were cheap dough is used. If you use good dough (more expensive), it normally gets eaten within 3 days.

A fear that gingerbread men could be the agents of the devil also spread throughout Europe. In 1607, the superstitious magistrates of Delft in the Netherlands made it illegal to either bake or eat any of these molded and spiced cookies. This was also a time of religious upheaval.

​Superstitions about gingerbread flourished in the 17th century. Witches supposedly made gingerbread figures, ate them, and thereby caused the death of their enemies. Dutch magistrates went so far as to declare baking or eating molded cookies illegal.

Don't fret if you ever need to swap maple syrup for molasses (or vice versa). As a general rule, you can sub in molasses for maple syrup 1:1 as a liquid ingredient, but since molasses isn't as naturally sweet as maple syrup, keep that in mind for how it might affect the final flavor.

In the United States, molasses was more readily available and affordable, making it a natural choice for early American bakers. The strong, bold flavor of molasses also complemented the spices used in traditional gingerbread recipes, creating a distinctive American twist on this beloved treat.

Maple syrup has a higher sugar content and a lower mineral content than blackstrap molasses, but its sweet taste is more universal. Two teaspoons of maple syrup provide 22 percent of your daily requirement of manganese, a mineral essential to survival.

Golden syrup - if you're unable to buy golden syrup then you can substitute it for corn syrup, honey or maple syrup. Egg yolk - use just the egg yolk (rather than the whole egg) to make the perfect gingerbread cookie mixture!