Perfect for a cookie exchange during the holiday season or to decorate to leave out with a glass of milk by the fireplace, these old fashioned gingerbread cookies are a holiday favorite. Packed with warming spices and sweet brown sugar, these cookies are fun to make, decorate, and eat!
The dough is so easy to work with, making this the best gingerbread cookie recipe you’ll ever make. Easily decorated with some homemade royal icing, these soft gingerbread cookies are going to be your new holiday favorite. For more holiday baking recipes, try my yule log recipe, rugelach, or linzer cookies.
What You Need To Make This Recipe
Spices — I use a combination of ground ginger, ground cinnamon, and nutmeg. When combined, these spices give the cookies a traditional richly spiced flavor. For another spiced cookie, try my ginger snap recipe.
Butter — be sure to buy unsalted butter and not salted butter. Various brands of salted butter do not have a standardized amount of salt. Make sure the butter is soft enough so when you press into it, your finger leaves a dent. If it’s cold, it’ll be challenging to beat it into a smooth consistency.
Brown sugar — brown sugar gives the cookies a chewy texture. If you do not have brown sugar, see my guide on how to make brown sugar.
Molasses — I recommend using unsulphured molasses when possible as it yields soft cookies and a better-tasting gingerbread man cookie. I prefer this over blackstrap molasses.
Powdered sugar — the sugar sweetens and thickens the icing. If you do not have any on hand, see my post on how to make powdered sugar at home.
How to Make Gingerbread Cookies
1. In a large bowl, sift the flour, ginger, cinnamon, baking soda, nutmeg, and salt.
2. In a stand mixer fitted with a paddle attachment, cream the butter and brown sugar on medium speed and mix until it’s fluffy.
3. Add in the molasses, egg, and vanilla and then mix until combined. Scrape the bowl down and mix once more.
4. Gradually add in the flour mixture until a nice dough is formed. Roll into disks, cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate for about 4 hours or overnight. This dough really needs time to chill so don’t rush it!
5. Preheat the oven to 350F. On a well-floured surface roll out the chilled dough to about 1/4 inch in thickness. Flour the top and your rolling pin as well and make sure to move the gingerbread cookie dough around so it doesn’t stick.
6. Cut out the gingerbread people with a cookie cutter and transfer them to a baking sheet. Bake your gingerbread cookies for 10 minutes and let them cool on the cookie sheet before transferring them to a wire rack.
7. Make the icing of your choice, then transfer the icing to a piping bag fitted with a small round tip or with the tip snipped off. I love using royal icing, but my easy sugar cookie icing works great too.
8. Once your chewy gingerbread cookies are cool, pipe a shirt, pants, and facial details. Attach sprinkles for buttons and eyes. You can also add candy cane nuggets for gingerbread people with bent arms.
Decorating Gingerbread Cookies
Have fun with the designs! You can pipe simple lines around your shapes or fully coat and flood the cookies with royal icing or my easy sugar cookie icing. I like to use festive sprinkles and colorful sanding sugars to accent the piping, like the eyes, buttons, or attire on gingerbread men. Add shiny gold and silver sprinkles like ornaments on Christmas trees or use a bit of extra icing to stick candies or mini candy canes onto the cookies.
You can also color royal icing with gel food coloring and use different colors to create different designs or patterns on the cookies. For the best gingerbread cookies, let your creativity flow, and don’t worry about how perfect they look. They’ll be delicious no matter what!
Make Ahead Instructions
This gingerbread cookie dough stores very well in the fridge for up to 3 days before baking. For longer storage, place the wrapped discs of dough in a freezer bag and freeze for up to 3 months. Thaw in the fridge overnight before rolling, cutting, and baking.
Pro Tips For Making This Recipe
- Measure ingredients using a kitchen scale. Adding too much flour will lead to the cookies being dense and dry. The best and easiest way to measure the flour is to weigh it. If you don’t have one, then fluff your flour with a spoon, sprinkle it into your measuring cup, and use a knife to level it.
- No piping bags? You can use a zip-top bag and cut off the corner of the bag once the icing is inside.
- Adjust the spices to your taste. You can make the gingerbread cookie recipe spicier with more ginger or reduce the spices for a milder taste. You can even give them more kick with a bit of finely ground black pepper!
- Try a different frosting. Whip up a small batch of buttercream frosting and decorate with that instead. They will need longer to set, but your gingerbread men will be delicious and look great.
- Don’t rush the chill time! It’s very important as this is a soft dough. If you want a quick cookie then add the same spices to my no spread sugar cookie recipe!
Frequently Asked Questions
You can use any size, but the bigger the cutter, the fewer cookies you’ll get out of the batch, and vice versa. For the best size of cookie, I recommend a cutter that’s no bigger than 4 inches in overall size.
Store leftover gingerbread men cookies in an airtight container for up to three weeks in the refrigerator. They can be left at room temperature for up to 4 days in an airtight container. Over time, the cookies will lose moisture and become drier.
Yes! Freeze undecorated, baked cookies for up to 3 months. It’s best to freeze them on a baking sheet or cooling rack and then transfer them to an airtight container or freezer bag. Add a sheet of parchment paper between each cookie to prevent sticking. Let them thaw at room temperature for an hour or two before decorating.
If you love this recipe try these out!
If you’ve tried this Gingerbread Cookies recipe, then don’t forget to rate the recipe and let me know how you got on in the comments below, I love hearing from you!
Gingerbread Cookies Recipe
Video
Equipment
- mixing bowl
- Electric mixer
- Baking Sheets
- Wire cooling rack
- Piping bag and tip
Ingredients
- 3 cups all-purpose flour (360g)
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- ¼ teaspoon salt
- 2 teaspoons ground ginger
- 1 teaspoon cinnamon
- ¼ teaspoon ground cloves
- ¼ teaspoon ground nutmeg
- ¾ cup unsalted butter room temperature, (170g)
- ¾ cup firmly packed light brown sugar (165g)
- ½ cup unsulphured molasses (120mL)
- 1 large egg room temperature
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract (5mL)
- Royal icing for decorating
Instructions
For the Cookies:
- In a large bowl, whisk together the flour, baking soda, salt, ginger, cinnamon, cloves, and nutmeg.
- Using a stand mixer fitted with a paddle attachment, cream butter and brown sugar on medium speed until fluffy, about 3 to 5 minutes Add in the molasses, then the egg and vanilla, and mix until combined. Scrape the bowl down and mix once more.
- With the mixer running on low speed, gradually add in the flour mixture gradually until a nice dough forms.
- Divide the dough in half and shape into disks. Cover with plastic wrap. Refrigerate for about 4 hours or overnight. (This step is important because the dough gets soft quickly and is very sticky when soft, so it really needs to be thoroughly chilled.)
- When you’re ready to bake, preheat the oven to 350°F. Line two large baking sheets with parchment paper or silicone baking mats.
- On a lightly floured surface, roll out one disc of chilled dough at a time to about ¼-inch in thickness. Dip the cookie cutter shapes of your choice in flour and cut out as many as you can. Carefully transfer each cutout to a baking sheet, leaving an inch between them. Reroll the scraps once.
- Bake the cookies one sheet at a time for 10 minutes. Let cool on the baking sheet for a few minutes before transferring them to a wire rack to cool completely.
For the Decoration:
- Place your icing of choice in a piping bag fitted with a small round tip or with the tip snipped off.
- Pipe decorations onto the cooled cookies with the icing.
- Attach sprinkles and or candies for added visual interest while the icing is still wet. Let the cookies sit until the icing is dry, 1 to 2 hours.
Notes
- Measure ingredients using a kitchen scale. Adding too much flour will lead to the cookies being dense and dry. The best and easiest way to measure the flour is to weigh it. If you don’t have one, then fluff your flour with a spoon, sprinkle it into your measuring cup, and use a knife to level it.
- No piping bags? You can use a zip-top bag and cut off the corner of the bag once the icing is inside.
- Adjust the spices to your taste. You can make the gingerbread cookie recipe spicier with more ginger or reduce the spices for a milder taste. You can even give them more kick with a bit of finely ground black pepper!
- Try a different frosting. Whip up a small batch of buttercream and decorate with that instead. They will need longer to set, but your gingerbread men will be delicious and look great.
- Don’t rush the chill time! It’s very important as this is a soft dough. If you want a quick cookie then add the same spices to my no spread sugar cookie recipe!
Nutrition
Thanks for sharing! I’m in Italy, how can I substitute molasses? Is honey ok? Same quantity? Thanks in advance!
You could yes, the taste and color will be a bit different though.
Is this a soft cookie or crunchy, is it spicy?
Do you have a book? If you don’t you need to published your own cooking book, I would love it!! 🙂
One day soon I hope!
Do you have a book? If you don’t you need yo published your own cooking book! 🙂
These are so amazing and traditional cookies for Christmas.
Thank you chef Kanell ??
Hi Shahnaz,
Thank YOU! I agree, these guys are great to have around for the holidays!
Best,
John
These look really nice!
Adorable!