Monday Munchies #48

Something Christmassy, or Gifty if you are not that way inclined, this week. The great thing is that you can make this dough, freeze it for up to three months, then defrost it the fridge overnight. Roll out and bake as you normally would at your leisure. I'm thinking possibly, one could cut out biscuit shapes and freeze them, they'd be ready to go!!

This is a generic gingerbread recipe, but it isn't too dry and floury. I also like treacle rather than honey or golden syrup, but you can choose!! When they are baked, they can be iced with some lemon glace icing, royal icing can be piped on, or some dark chocolate spread on the back. Or you could cut some smaller shapes out of the bigger stars and then sandwich two together.

Now I have some gingerbread dough stashed away in my freezer, ready for a day closer to Christmas!!

 

Gingerbread Biscuits   makes about 40

• 125g softened butter
• 100g or 1/2 cup firmly packed brown sugar
• 125ml treacle OR golden syrup OR honey
• 1 egg
• 2 1/2 cups plain flour
• 1 tbspn ground ginger (4 tspn)
• 1 tspn mixed spice
• 1 tspn bicarbonate of soda

You don't need to preheat the oven to 180*C until the dough goes into the fridge to cool.

Cream the butter and sugar until it is pale and fluffy, then add the egg and treacle and beat till combined.

Sift the dry ingredients together, and then mix into the creamed mixture with a spoon. It doesn't take very long at all.

Tip out onto the bench with a little plain flour and then knead lightly till smooth. Form a disc and refrigerate for 15-30 minutes. At this point you may also wrap the dough securely with clingwrap and then put it in a ziplock bag and freeze it.

Now preheat the oven to 180*C and line some trays with baking paper.

Roll the dough out between two pieces of baking paper until it is about 4 or 5mm thick. Using the baking paper means that no extra flour is incorporated and so the dough mantains its integrity. Dip a biscuit cutter into the flour and then cut out shapes and place them on the tray. Smoosh the leftovers together and then roll between the two sheets of baking paper again, ad infinitum, until it is all used.

Place on a tray and bake for 10 minutes. Cool on a rack. Decorate as desired.

Ho. Ho. Ho.

Comments

[dette]

MMMMMMM!!!These look yummy too. It's good that you can make ahead and freeze the dough. You can get all the messy stuff out the way before your friends come over ( I fear I may be giving away too much information about how messy I am as a cook! or home maker in general for that matter! :(
How long do these last once cooked - if you have some will power or no teenagers in the house?

[Monika]

I like the smell of freshly baked ginger bread cookies, or all of cookie baking. It's that what makes the time before Christmas so wonderful for me.

[Sarah]

This post is getting me in the mood for xmas baking! One of those would go so well with my latte right now...or a little eggnog this evening!

[Jan]

Ginger is one of my favourite flavours and we use a lot of it here, one way or another. Those look lovely and just right to go with a drink of milk or a good cup of tea or coffee.

[Pixie]

they look wonderful!!!

[drk]

i dont think one can ever have enough gingerbread really. you do make it look so easy!

[Rose Red]

oh these look delicious, and I love the big star with the cutout, what a great idea! And I have some treacle in my pantry...

[marti]

i'm not even going to think of baking for christmas...i'll stick to knitted ornaments thanks! just stopping by to say hello, hope things are going well.

[linda]

mmmmmmmm my favourite, I hope to bake lots of pressies this year, that's the plan anyway, not a lot goes to plan lately but I am hoping this does xxx

[lynne s of oz]

Oh boy, I think I'll have to go stock up on nuttlex and gf/df plain flour to make some of these. Nommy nom nom nom!
(and given my oven is having difficulty maintaining temperature (no wall behind it now) it will be fabulous to make flat bikkies in 8-)

[AmyP]

onomnomnomnom.....

[littleblackcrow]

Any left?
Howdy 2paw! look at all that Christmas goodies! Yum, I made gingerbread biscuits too, still have tones left over..I'm not going to eat them all, seems like I always eat the left overs!!
Thank you for your comment about my knitted tree...I was thinking people would have stopped dropping by my knitting blog since I haven't posted for ages!
Have a wonderful new year
Oh by the way my chocolate block socks are still going strong, a little faded but still my favorites.