Ingredients: 1/2 cup Vegetable shortening 1 cup Sugar 3 Eggs 1/2 cup Cold water 2 tsp Baking soda 1 cup Sorghum or molasses All-purpose flour (5-6 cups) 1 tbsp Ground cinnamon 1/2 tsp Ground cloves 1 tbsp Ginger 1/2 tsp Salt
Directions:1 Preparation time: 30 minutes chilling time: overnight baking time: 10 minutes 2 Cream shortening and sugar in mixing bowl, beat in eggs, one at a time. 3 Mix water and baking soda in small bowl until dissolved. 4 Add baking soda mixture and sorghum to butter mixture. 5 Sift 5 ? cups of the flour, the spices and salt together. 6 Blend into dough. 7 Divide dough into 4 balls. 8 Wrap in plastic wrap. 9 Flatten and refrigerate overnight. 10 Heat oven to 350 degrees. 11 Roll 1 portion of dough out at a time on lightly floured surface. 12 Cut into desired shapes. 13 Bake on a greased cookie sheet until puffed, 10 to 12 minutes. 14 Do not overbake. 15 When cool, decorate with buttercream frosting and/or candies as desired. 16 Sorghum gives these cookies a special flavor, but molasses can be used as a substitute. 17 ann smith of plainfield won second place, and described how her gingerbread men left bohemia in 1872 and immigrated to the united states. 18 Smith"s great-grandmother, "babicka" novak, lived in a small czech-american town in south dakota where smith"s mother grew up in the 1920s. 19 At christmas time, her great-grandma would give her neighbors old world gingerbread men, reindeer and rocking horses. 20 "one year when great-grandma delivered the cookies, she brought along her teenaged grandson, who was visiting from a small ethnic czech community in nebraska," smith wrote. 21 "introductions made that day over the watchful eyes of the gingerbread men eventually lead to wedding bells for my parents a decade later. 22 Great-grandma novak probably had planned this all along!" from the chicago tribune second annual food guide holiday cookie contest december 14, 1989 |