Cookies for Santa

I love gingerbread. I love cookie cutters. I especially love making gingerbread cookies for Santa Claus.

I love gingerbread houses. I especially love gingerbread houses that are only 2 inches tall.

I love Christmas. I love baking. I especially love baking for Christmas! :)

Pretty much all of my Christmas presents were food-related which was fine by me! My mom gave me an Ina Garten cookbook and rolling pin. My mom gave me the french rolling pin a few days early and although designed to roll out pie crusts in a perfect circle, it worked great for making thin crisp gingerbread cookies--just the way I like them!

To make the cookies, I used Martha Stewart's recipe for gingerbread snowflakes. I halved the recipe and added less than half of the brown sugar so they wouldn't be as sweet. I love this recipe! I made it at least three times over the past three weeks of Christmas break.

Although I used Christmas-themed cookie cutters, these cookies could definitely be consumed year round. Just use differently shaped cookie cutters. I rolled the dough out so thin the last few times I made them, they turned out more like movorian (sp?) spice cookies than gingerbread cookies. So delicious!

Gingerbread Cookies

3 cups all purpose flour, plus more for work surface

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

1/4 teaspoon baking powder

1/2 cup (1 stick) of butter

1/2 cup packed dark-brown sugar

2 teaspoons ground ginger

2 teaspoons ground cinnamon

3/4 teaspoons ground cloves

few turns of finely ground black pepper

3/4 teaspoons coarse sea salt

1 large egg

1/2 cup unsulfured molasses

1. sift together flour, baking soda, and baking powder into a large bowl

2. cream butter and brown sugar in the bowl of a stand mixer with the paddle attachment until fluffy

3. mix in spices and salt, then egg and molasses

4. reduce speed to low and add flour mixture

5. divide dough in half, wrap in plastic wrap and refrigerate until cold--about an hour

6. preheat oven to 350 degrees

7. roll out dough as thinly as possible--or however thin you prefer--and cut with cookie cutters

8. bake until crisp--about 10 minutes

9. let cool and decorate as desired!

As Christmas approached, I made some to give as gifts to friends and neighbors. I was so happy just looking at them perfectly packaged on the kitchen counter. So Christmasy!

I have always wanted to make a gingerbread house but I always felt like it would require me to make a lot of dough, it would require a lot of work, blah blah blah. So I never got around to it. Finally, this year, I stumbled upon a post on tastespotting that featured little gingerbread houses that sat on the rim of your cup. I thought they were so cute! I had to give them a try. Here they are!

I used the same recipe as my cookies. I used the template from this site. Yes they sucessfully perched on cups but in the end, I just wanted to make a little village of houses :)

Guess who made the eccentric blue-sprinkles gingerbread house?

My boyfriend hehe. He must love me. He puts up with my OCD miniature gingerbread house making and still manages to feign interest in making his own. :)