What is gingerbread?

In modern day gingerbread typically refers to a flavour profile for baked goods made with a combination of ginger, cloves, nutmeg, cinnamon, and molasses. The delicious, seasonal flavour has a long history that can be traced back to ancient Greeks and Egyptians who used it for ceremonies. The flavour then made its way to Europe in the 11th-century when it was brought back from the Middle East. As it got more affordable, gingerbread began to grow in popularity.

Top tips for making Vegan Ginger Molasses Cookies:

• Make sure your oven is fully preheated. To avoid over or under baking your cookies, be patient and place the cookies in the oven after its fully preheated. To ensure your oven is properly preheated, we highly recommend getting an oven thermometer.
• Beat the butter longer than you think. To get the proper texture and air in your cookies, make sure you beat the butter and sugar for at least 5-6 minutes.
• Don’t overmix the flour. Overmixing the flour can result in tough cookies. To avoid this do the bulk of your mixing at the butter/sugar stage and just mix the flour in just combined.
• Measure out your cookies with a cookie scoop. For a quick and easy way to make evenly sized cookies, a cookie scoop is a great kitchen gadget.
• Don’t use just any molasses. Molasses is a key ingredient to these cookies. We recommend using either fancy or blackstrap molasses. Blackstrap will give a more intense and robust flavour and a darker appearance, but fancy molasses (what we used!) has a lighter and sweeter taste. Choose between these two depending on the flavour profile you’re after.

About the ingredients and tools:

Aside from the regular baking basics, the key ingredients to these delicious cookies are a blend of spices and fancy molasses.

• Baking Staples – For this recipe you’ll need your favourite all-purpose flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt, and vanilla extract. Nothing fancy here, just your favourite brands should work.
• Vegan Butter – To replace dairy butter we use vegan butter, specifically Becel Plant Based Sticks. We test all of our recipes with this brand. Please note that each brand will differ so it’s important to use gram measurements to get the most accurate and best results.
• Flax Eggs – Eggs are super easy to replace in cookie recipes. We’ve tested multiple vegan egg substitutes and found that flax eggs are the best. It’s a mixture of 1 tbsp ground flax seed and 3 tbsp of warm water, then allow it to rest until it thickens and gels together.
• White & Brown Sugar – The perfect blend of white and brown sugar means you get a delicious chewy texture and just the right amount of spread. If you live in Canada like us, most sugar is vegan friendly.
• Fancy Molasses – Molasses is a key ingredient to these cookies. We recommend using either fancy or blackstrap molasses. Blackstrap will give a more intense and robust flavour and a darker appearance, but fancy molasses (what we used!) has a lighter and sweeter taste. Choose between these two depending on the flavour profile you’re after.
• Spices – Gingerbread is largely about the perfect balance of spices. We use our own ratio of spices including a blend of ginger, cloves, cinnamon, and nutmeg.

Cookies are one of the best baked goods because they can be made with fairly basic baking tools.

• Stand Mixer – We use a stand mixer for the best results, but you can also use a hand mixer. We don’t recommend doing it by hand as you need to cream the butter and sugar together until light and fluffy – about 7-9 minutes.
• Measuring Tools – For the best results measure out your cookies with a kitchen scale and measuring spoons.
• Baking Sheet – To bake our cookies we use an aluminum baking sheet. If you are using a darker baking sheet you may need to bake the cookies a little less than this recipe calls for.
• Silicone Baking Mat – Keep your cookies from sticking and your kitchen as low-waste as you can with aa silicone baking mat. If you don’t have one of these parchment paper can be used, but we recommend investing in a baking mat.
• Cookie Scoop – Without having to weigh out the cookie dough for even cookies, you can use a cookie scoop to get cookies as close to evenly sized as possible.

Recipe FAQ:

How do I make my cookies the same size and round?

The key to perfectly sized and round cookies is two tools: a cookie scoop and a round cookie cutter. We use a cookie scoop to get similar sized cookies and so that they bake evenly. Alternatively you can weigh out cookie dough balls. For round cookies, we like to use Cloudy Kitchen’s cookie scoot technique. Just use a round cookie cutter, slightly bigger than the cookie itself, and as soon as the cookie is out of the oven use the cookie cutter around the cookie to scoot it into a round shape.

Can you freeze cookies?

Yes! Cookies are one of the easiest baked goods to freeze. You can freeze them at multiple points in the recipe. You can freeze the dough in a log, or in pre-portioned cookie dough balls. They’re also freeze-able them after they have been baked. If you are freezing them after baking, allow them to cool completely place in an air-tight container and freeze. When ready to eat, remove from the freezer and preheat the oven to 250F. Once preheated, place cookies on a lined baking sheet and bake until just reheated, you don’t want to dry the cookies out.

Pin it for later: