Homemade with a short cut. . . starting with a yellow cake mix is easy. Adding ground ginger, cinnamon, cloves, and nutmeg spices up the cake!
Ingredients
1boxyellow-cake mix
1/2cupwater
1/2cupoil
1/2cupsmolasses
3large eggs
1t.ground ginger
1t.ground cinnamon
1t.cloves
1/2t.nutmeg
Instructions
Grease a gingerbread boy cake pan or 3 8" cake pans.
Set aside.
Preheat oven to 350º.
In the bowl of an electric mixer, add all of the ingredients.
On a medium setting, mix the ingredients for 5 to 10 minutes.
Pour into the prepared pans. If the gingerbread pans are different shapes, fill up half way. This allows for proper rising of the cake.
Bake for 30 to 35 minutes for the 8" rounds. Adjust the baking time for smaller or larger cake pans. Insert a toothpick into the middle of the cake. When it comes out clean, the cake is ready.
Remove from the oven and place on wire racks to cool. Place a wire rack on top of the cake pan. Flip over.
Allow to cool completely. Transfer to a serving piece.
Decorate with gumdrops, peppermint sticks, holiday candies, and royal icing.
Life is better with pancakes. For the holidays, make ginger pancakes with ginger, cinnamon, cloves and nutmeg. The gingerbread spices mixed with whole wheat flour, buttermilk and one secret ingredient. They rival my favorite gingerbread boys with much less sugar and butter. That’s how they became my new favorite holiday treat!
Brewed coffee adds another layer of flavor and blends well with the gingerbread spices!Life is better with pancakes . . . make some ginger pancakes for a festive holiday breakfast!
Delicious whole-wheat pancakes mixed with gingerbread spices are perfect to serve during the holiday season! Inspired by Dream Cafe's ginger pancakes.
Prep Time20minutes
Cook Time20minutes
Ingredients
2 1/2cupswhole-wheat flour
1/4cupbrown sugar, packed
1T.ground cinnamon
1t.ground ginger
1/2t.ground cloves
1/4t.nutmeg
1 1/2t.baking soda
1/2t.salt
2cupsbuttermilk
3large eggs, lightly beaten
1/4cupunsalted butter, melted and cooled
1/4cupbrewed coffee
Instructions
Combine the dry ingredients - flour, brown sugar, cinnamon, ginger, cloves, nutmeg, baking soda, and salt - in a bowl; mix well; set aside.
In another bowl, mix the buttermilk, eggs, butter and coffee.
Add the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients, blending until just incorporated.
Cook the pancakes on a lightly oiled, pancake griddle or in a cast-iron skillet for approximately 4 minutes on the first side and 1 minute after flipping.
Serve with fresh creamery butter and real maple syrup.
Decorating Gingerbread Houses is one of the most rewarding things that I have experienced.
When my first two children were just toddlers, we began the holiday tradition of decorating gingerbread houses. Over the years, our tradition grew to neighborhood gingerbread house parties and school events.
In 2008, I chaired a holiday event for TCU Dallas alumni. Families decorated gingerbread houses.
For six consecutive years, Laura Chudy with TCU’s development office and I planned this holiday event. We purchased a variety of purple and white candy (TCU’s colors), gingerbread houses and made arrangements with the venue. Prior to each party, TCU friends and I made purple and white trees, lollipop ponds, and mailboxes. Every year our Holiday event sold out. It was magical!
With an array of gingerbread house kits available at grocery stores, drug stores and craft stores it’s easy to buy and decorate a gingerbread house with the simple contents found in the kit. Sometimes, this is the best option. However if you are ready for an adventure, with just a bit of planning and following the tips and recipes on my blog, you can take your gingerbread house project to an entirely new level. Your family and friends will be dazzled! The wonder and joy of the holidays will fill your heart. I guarantee!
Happy National Cookie Day! Today, I am celebrating one of my favorite Christmas traditions, baking cookies!
Baking at the age 7, in my mom’s kitchen with my sisters, cousins and neighbors. We baked cookies for Christmas and every holiday throughout the year. This is the exact cookie recipe that we baked. It is a tried and true delicious Holiday cookie recipe. I guarantee you will love it!
Happy National Cookie Day – Best Cookie Baking Tips:
The day before, make the dough, wrap in wax paper and chill overnight.
Use room temperature unsalted butter.
Before sifting, measure the all-purpose flour.
Sift the all-purpose flour four times.
Lightly floured Silicone baking mats are the best surface for rolling out the cookie dough.
Before rolling out, lightly flour the cookie dough’s surface. Prevents sticking to the rolling pin!
Use one cookie cutter per batch. The cookies will bake evenly.
After cutting out the shapes, leave the cookies on the silicone baking mat and remove the cookie dough betweenthe cookies.
Gather the dough, gently knead it and roll it out for another batch. Once for re-rolling the dough, maybe twice because it becomes dry when too much flour is worked into it.
Slide the silicone baking mat onto a cookie sheet.
Preheat oven to 350Fº.
Set a timer for each batch of cookies – 10 minutes. Check and reset the timer for 1 or 2 minutes. Watch carefully!
Underbaked cookies are the secret to softness. However, decorated cookies need to be cooked long enough to hold their shape!
The look of doneness is very light brown around the edges. Be careful not to over bake!
When the cookies are done. Place them on wire cooling racks to cool. After about 10 minutes, remove and place directly on the wire racks.
Best Cookie Recipe’s Secret Ingredients:
Three tablespoons whole milk makes the cookies moist.
Lemon zest gives a citrus flavor to the cookies.
The acid in the cream of tartar reacts with the liquids in the cookie dough to produce carbon-dioxide gas bubbles, which break apart the gluten in the flour and lift the cookie dough.
The perfect ratio of butter to shortening! Butter provides flavor! A bit of shortening makes the cookies taller and more tender.
If for any reason the recipe is unclear or you are disappointed with your cookies, please DM or email your question. I will get back with you asap! I’m on Instagram – MyTexasKitchen_ or susanapple@me.com.
Adapted from Cook's Tour, Junior League cookbook of Shreveport, Louisiana.
Prep Time30minutes
Cook Time10minutes
Chill overnight.2hours
Ingredients
3 1/2cupsall-purpose flour
1t.baking soda
1t.cream of tartar
1cuproom temperature unsalted butter (2 sticks)
1/3cupshortening
1cupsugar
3T.whole milk
1large egg
1t.vanilla
1t.lemon juice
1 zest of 1 lemon
1/2t.salt
Royal Icing: 5 cups confectioners' sugar, 4 egg whites and 1 t. cream of tartar
Instructions
Measure the flour. Sift the flour, baking soda and cream of tartar four times; set aside.
Cream the butter, shortening, sugar, milk, egg, vanilla, lemon juice, lemon zest and salt.
Slowly add the dry ingredients to the creamed ingredients.
Shape into a disk, wrap in wax paper and chill. Best chilled overnight.
Preheat oven to 350F®
Roll out on a lightly floured silicone baking mat. Cut into shapes. Remove the cookie dough between cookies.
Bake for 10 - 12 minutes, until lightly brown.
Cool on wire racks.
Decorate with icing:
1. Outline each cookie with the thicker Royal icing.
2. Fill in with the thinner icing.
3. With a chop stick, smooth out the icing to fill in all surfaces of the cookie.
4. Set aside to dry overnight.
Royal Icing: Beat the ingredients. Add the food coloring. Add the #3 tip to a cake-decorating bag, fill with the thicker icing to outline the cookies. Add a #5 tip to a cake-decorating bag, fill with the thinner royal icing.
Meaningful gifts that can change someone’s life capture the true meaning of Christmas. This year, people are saying they really want to give a gift that helps somebody!
For several years, I have been a fan of Honduras Threads. Having endured two recent hurricanes as well as the coronavirus pandemic, this social enterprise owned by beautiful, talented, hard-working women in rural areas outside Tegucigalpa needs our support more than ever.
Through the support of Honduras Threads, these women earn money in their own communities to help themselves and their families by making beautiful hand-embroidered products in a safe environment.
Gifts That Can Change Someone’s Life:
Table Runners
Pillows
Greeting Cards
Christmas ornaments
Placemats
Holiday sales make up over 60% of their annual income. Every purchase directly supports their work. Prices range from $10 for a greeting card up to $250 for a table runner. All items are available online at www.hondurasthreads.org and at St. Michael & All Angels Episcopal Church in Dallas, Texas.
Store Location:
St Michael & All Angels Episcopal Church, 8011 Douglas Ave, Dallas, Texas 75225
Store dates and times:
Wednesday, December 2, 2020 10:00 – 2:00pm
Friday, December 4, 2020 10:00 – 2:00pm
December 7th – 11th – by appointment
Gifts that change someone’s life . . . make every purchase count!
Life is better with pancakes . . . make some ginger pancakes for a festive holiday breakfast!
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