Shirley's Gingerbread Cookies: A Classic Recipe

A Family Favorite for Four Generations

This often-requested recipe was passed to me by my mother, from her mother Amanda. Three tips, if I may (you'll thank me): Lard is the secret to the success of these soft, thick marvels, so do not substitute. Use the best fresh spices you can find. Don't bother to frost or decorate; these make wonderful eating on their own. Bake them weekly and your home will infused with their scent during the entire holidays. -- visit me at www.paulklenk.us


How could we possibly have felt deprived, with such good food in the house, and in such abundance? This was doubly true at Christmastime.

Each December, Mom baked upwards of, perhaps, twenty different cookies and other treats, in batches large enough to feed our family of nine, with plenty to share and ship to loved ones. Sugar cookies, Russian tea cakes, caramels (highly coveted), peanut brittle, pizzelles, yulekake, krumkake, spritz, rosettes, kranzekake, lefse, Anice candy, Italian fig cookies... and something rolled in coconut. She stored them in boxes, tins and Tupperware tubs lined with wax paper, and stacked them in our drafty front hall closet (conveniently chilly during Minnesota winters).

And just out of view of her kitchen. My brother Steve and I, as well as our friend Dennis, were in and out of that closet several times a day (not that she didn't notice). The cookie we were most likely to snatch in fistful after fistful, our mid-afternoon meal, was...


SHIRLEY'S GINGERBREAD
1 cup ea. of

  • sugar
  • lard (do not substitute)
  • dark molasses

2 eggs

5 cups all-purpose flour

1 tsp. baking soda
2 tsp. baking powder

2 tsp. cinnamon
2 tsp. cloves
3 tsp. ginger

DIRECTIONS

  1. Cream the lard, eggs and molasses well.
  2. Blend in the sugar.
  3. Blend the remaining dry ingredients separately, then thoroughly mix into the dough by hand.
  4. If time allows, chill the dough.
  5. Roll it out thickly with a cloth-covered, flour-dusted rolling pin, on a large board lightly dusted with flour.
  6. Cut with a cookie cutter, or, for extra large batches, into squares to save time.
  7. Place on cookie sheets lightly greased with lard.
  8. Bake at 350 degrees F for 8 to 10 mins. until golden brown and bready, not dark or crispy.
  9. Remove and let cool briefly on the sheets; then place on cooling racks until room temperature.
  10. Serve immediately or store in an airtight container, in a cool place.