Magda Autumn, Christmas, Cookies, Winter

Triple Ginger Cookies

Dear blog,
I know I had been a bad blogger. I also know that I shouldn’t say it at loud, because blogging is a serious business. But you are mine, so I can do what I want.
But this time I have a good excuse, well even two.
Ladies and gentlemen meet Mutu and Filo.

koty-5.jpg

These guys are 3 months old and they have been with us for 3 weeks. They weight twice as much as the day we got them. As you can see we have pretty good time. Don’t be deceived, it’s not that they are only sleeping, but the winter light isn’t good enough to catch their quick jum as lighting movement.

koty collage

So instead of cooking, baking and photographing I was staring as these two guys are playing or sleeping.
But Christmas is coming so I decided that is about time to bake cookies. I have baked these gorgeous cookies for third year in the row. I was convinced that the recipe comes from Heidi’s Swanson recipe, but somewhere in the process I added chocolate to them, why? I don’t know, probably because chocolate is good.  Anyway, if you look for cookies to spice up your Christmas, it’s a good way to go.

ginger cookies-6770

Ginger Cookies
based on recipe from 101 Cookbooks blog

  • 1/2+ cup large-grain sugar (i.e. turbinado)
  • 245 g spelt flour OR wholemeal flour or plain flour
  • 1 tsp baking soda
  • 1 tsp star anise, finely ground
  • 4 1/2 tsp ground ginger
  • 1/2 tsp fine grain sea salt
  • 113 g unsalted butter, room temperature
  • 60 g molasses
  • 100 g cane sugar
  • 1 1/2 Tbsp fresh ginger, peeled and grated
  • 1 large egg, well beaten
  • 1 cup crystallized ginger, then finely minced
  • lemon zest from 2 lemons, grated
  • 100 g dark chocolate, finely chopped

Preheat the oven to 180°C/160°C fan.

Place the large-grain sugar in a small bowl, and set aside.
In a large bowl whisk together the flour, baking soda, star anise, ground ginger, and salt.
Heat the butter in a pan until it is just barely melted.
Stir in the molasses, natural cane sugar, and fresh ginger.
The mixture should be warm, but not hot at this point, if it is hot to touch let it cool a bit.
Whisk in the egg.
Add the flour mixture and the crystallized ginger (make sure it isn’t too clumpy), and lemon zest.
Add the chopped chocolate. Stir until just combined.
Form the dough into bit sized balls. Roll them in the sugar. Place it on a parchment lined baking sheet leaving some space between.
Bake for approx. 10 minutes (it depends on the cookies size) or until cookies darken a bit.
Transfer the cookies to a wire rack to cool.