Gingerbread Shredders

Gingerbread Shredders

We think about cookies a lot, we’re guessing that if you’re reading this, you probably do too. To spread the cookie love this season, we wanted to share some of our favorite holiday recipes, and this super soft and slightly chewy gingerbread recipe was top of the list. These fluffy little shredders are the right amount of spicy, just like us.


PNW GINGERBREAD SHREDDER COOKIES
(Adapted from the King Arthur Flour Gingerbread Cookies Recipe)
Yield: 3 Dozen 3 inch Cookies

You could make a paper pattern of our Gingerbread Shredder to cut these rad shapes, but for best results maybe just settle for regular gingerbread people + some sweet bikes, a bicycle cookie cutter suggestion can be found here.

INGREDIENTS

  • 12 Tablespoons (170g) unsalted Tillamook butter

  • 3/4 cup (159g) dark brown sugar, packed

  • 3/4 cup (255g) molasses

  • 1 teaspoon kosher salt

  • 2 teaspoons cinnamon

  • 3 teaspoons ginger

  • 1/4 teaspoon cloves

  • 1 large egg

  • 1 teaspoon baking powder

  • 1/2 teaspoon baking soda

  • 3 3/4 cups (450g) All-purpose Flour

INSTRUCTIONS

  1. In a medium-sized bowl measure out the brown sugar, molasses, salt, and spices. We recommend doing this on a scale to save on equipment and molasses clean up.

  2. In a saucepan set over low heat, or in the microwave, melt butter, then stir into the brown sugar, molasses, salt, and spices.

  3. Let the mixture cool to lukewarm, and beat in the egg.

  4. In another bowl whisk the baking powder and soda into the flour, and then stir these dry ingredients into the molasses mixture. The dough will be very soft and sticky, but don't be tempted to add more flour; it'll firm up once it's chilled.

  5. Divide the dough in half, and pat each half into a thick rectangle. Wrap well, and refrigerate for 1 hour up to 2 days. The dough will be sticky and difficult to roll if not thoroughly chilled, so make sure it's thoroughly chilled before continuing.

  6. Preheat your oven to 350°F. Get out several baking sheets; there's no need to grease them, though lining with parchment saves effort on cleanup.

  7. Once the dough has chilled, take one piece of dough out of the refrigerator, and flour a clean work surface. Roll the dough 1/8" to 1/4" thick; the thinner you roll the dough, the crispier the cookies will be. Flour both the top and bottom of the dough if it starts to stick.

  8. Cut out shapes with a floured cookie cutter, cutting them as close to one another as possible to minimize waste.

  9. Transfer the gingerbread cookies to ungreased baking sheets. Bake the cookies just until they're slightly brown around the edges 8 to 12 minutes, or until they feel firm. Let the gingerbread cookies cool on the baking sheets for several minutes, or until they're set. Transfer them to a rack to cool completely. Repeat with the remaining dough.

  10. Decorate the gingerbread cookies with Royal Icing once completely cooled.

ROYAL ICING

Yield: 3 cups

This is a simple and classic royal icing recipe that sets nicely but doesn’t get overly hard. Perfect for decorating sugar cookies and gingerbread.

INGREDIENTS

  • 4 cups (480g) powdered sugar, sifted
  • 3 Tablespoons meringue powder
  • 9–12 Tablespoons room temperature water
  • If you’d like to color your icing, use gel food coloring for the best results

INSTRUCTIONS

  1. Sift the powdered sugar into a large bowl, then add meringue powder, and 9 Tablespoons of water to the sifted sugar.
  2. Using a hand mixer or a stand mixer fitted with a whisk attachment beat icing ingredients together on high speed for 2 minutes. When lifting the whisk up off the icing, the icing should drizzle down and smooth out within 5-10 seconds. If it’s too thick, beat in more water 1 Tablespoon of water at a time. The longer you beat the royal icing, the thicker it becomes. If your royal icing is too thin, just keep beating it to introduce more air, or you can add more sifted powdered sugar if that’s not doing the trick.
  3. Once you have your icing to the desired consistency, transfer it into a piping bag and apply the icing to the cooled cookies. If using coloring, separate into different bowls and blend in the desired amount of coloring, before transferring to piping bags.

Icing Notes:

Icing completely dries in about 2 hours at room temperature. If the icing consistency is too thin and runny, it will take longer to dry. If the icing is applied very thickly on cookies, it will also take longer to dry. If you need to speed up the drying time pop them in the refrigerator.

When you’re not working directly with the royal icing (for example, you are decorating cookies but you still have some icing left in the bowl that you intend to use later) place a damp paper towel directly on the surface of the royal icing. This prevents it from hardening.

 


One day we were joking around in a PNW Marketing Meeting, as we do, and we asked our experimental AI software to make us a photorealistic gingerbread person riding a mountain bike. The results varied from inspiring, to sinister, to downright terrifying, so here is one for you to enjoy.

Please make these cookies, but please make them look better than what the robots did here…

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