“I hope your days are filled with countless tiny miracles unfolding continuously, sewn together in the mess you call life.”
CHRISTMAS IS THIS WEEK!!
Am I the most excited person in our house?! Absolutely! Am I hoping that in the coming years, Oliver will join me on the excitement train?! DUH! This has always been my favorite time of the year, there’s just no way around it. We have been binging all of the Christmas classics: Elf, The Santa Clauses, A Christmas Carol, terrible Lifetime and Hallmark movies, you name it! Oliver could care less, yet he has been becoming more and more attracted to the gifts under the tree, but he is still in his “I love dog toys” phase and “let me open drawers” phase.
While he may not be as keen about the holidays as I am (yet!), one thing that he does love is food! If we sit down for a snack, he needs a bite; if we have water, he needs a sip; if he sees something on our dinner plates that isn’t on his, he must have it—you get the picture! That being said, I have been waiting for this day, when I could bake with my little one, and it honestly was SO much fun! Oliver mainly just wanted to play with the dough and eat as many cookies as he could before I could stop him, but I rolled with it!
Growing up, making Christmas cookies and bread was quite an event! My mom would bake dozens of Challah and cinnamon swirl loaves to give to friends, tins and tins of spritz cookies, gingerbread, PB balls, galore! We would also always do a gingerbread house decorating contest (cannot wait for this in the years to come!), and I wanted to start some traditions with our little guy! That being said, I wanted to make a KID FRIENDLY recipe for Oliver. That means low on the sugar pole but stuffed with spices! We aren’t giving him chocolate just yet, he doesn’t consume that much dairy, and he seems to be ultra-sensitive to sugar, like he gets very hyper! Honestly, what would you expect with an (almost) 11-month-old?! So, I wanted to make these as low in sugar as I could, cutting the amount of molasses in half and using less brown sugar than normal. To me, I am all about the spices in a gingerbread cookie, so that is definitely not lacking whatsoever here! Due to cutting out some molasses, I added in some dairy-free milk to make sure these cookies are nice and moist! Overall, Oliver LOVED these (see below!), and I cannot wait until we decorate them next year with candies and icing and who knows what else! For now, I’m going to enjoy my sweet little bub and all of his craziness, hopefully we don’t eat all of them before Santa comes!
ingredients
Butter—4 oz, or 8 TBL
Brown Sugar—3.5 oz, or ½ C
Molasses—3.75 oz, or 1/3 C
Vanilla Extract—1 tsp
Egg—1
Flour—18 oz, or 3 C
Baking Soda—1 tsp
Salt—1 tsp
Cinnamon—1 ¼ TBL
Ginger—1 ¼ TBL
Cloves—½ tsp
Allspice—½ tsp
Dairy-free milk—2.5 oz, or 5 TBL
process
In the bowl of your mixer, cream the butter and sugar until light and fluffy, about 5-10 minutes.
Add in the egg, vanilla and molasses to the mixer, making sure to scrape down the sides of the bowl every few minutes. It will begin to look slightly curdled—that’s okay!
In a separate bowl, sift together the flour, baking soda, salt, and all of the spices.
With your mixer on low, add this to your creamed mixture, mix until just combined.
Slowly stream in your milk, mix for about 30 seconds so that a homogenous dough forms.
Wrap dough tightly in plastic wrap and put in the fridge to firm up, either a couple of hours or overnight.
When you are ready to bake your cookies, preheat the oven to 350˚F.
Knead the dough with your hands a bit so that it warms up and is easier to roll out.
On a floured surface, roll out the dough until it is about ¼” thick.
Using whatever cutters you would like, stamp out cookies and place on a baking sheet that is lined with either parchment, a Silpat or nonstick spray.
Continue to reroll the dough until you have used it all, making sure to keep the cut-out cookies in the fridge until you are ready to bake them.
Bake in your preheated oven for 10 minutes, rotate the pan, 4 minutes.
Allow to cool on a rack prior to either decorating or eating!
Bon Appétit!