Photo by Olivia
Very delicious, but I may not make these for awhile. I made a batch of molasses cookies a while back and they didn’t turn out the way I thought they should have, but I posted them anyway. Then Eva made it and hers were perfect. I had some suggestions and I made it again and still my cookies were not what they should have been. In the meantime Jim said they were yucky and too spicy, also I didn’t want them caved in or flat. And yes, I agreed the baking soda was too much, I could taste it. I made several half batches, I divided one egg, I whisked it, I measured it out in grams, and I divided again EXACTLY. This has to be the last half batch I thought yesterday; it was my fourth try after all. It’s a pretty big statement from a perfectionist, but I almost had enough of these cookies. I still don’t know the reason for my molasses cookie woes. It could have been the fact that I sifted the flour before measuring with the half cup ‘scoop and sweep’ method. In other words, there may not have been enough flour in my previous cookies. Perhaps I beat too much air into the dough. Maybe I didn’t chill it long enough. Maybe I lost that magic touch. As I kept playing with the recipe and feeding it to the pail under the sink, a slightly different recipe evolved. I ended up using un-sifted cake and pastry flour and added an additional 2 tablespoons of all purpose. I reduced the salt and the baking soda and replaced the spices with the milder pumpkin pie spice. It made a soft yet stable dough that rolls without flour or chilling. Finally, finally all the effort got paid off. These are nicely rounded and soft and chewy and crinkled and mildly spiced. Taking Elisabeth’s cue we dipped them into white chocolate. also I had precious help yesterday… and in the end that may have made all the difference.
WHITE CHOCOLATE DIPPED MOLASSES COOKIES
2 cups cake and pastry flour, unsifted
2 Tbsp all purpose flour
2 tsp baking soda
1-1/2 tsp pumpkin pie spice*
1/2 tsp salt
3/4 cup shortening
1 cup sugar
1/4 cup molasses
1 large egg
1 pkg. white Baker’s chocolate [6 squares]
or you can use white dipping chocolate: it is cheaper and easier to handle, but not as richly white chocolaty as good quality white baking chocolate.
• Preheat the oven to 350F.
• Line a baking sheet with parchment paper.
• In a medium bowl, combine the flours, baking soda, pumpkin pie spice and salt; set it aside.
• In a separate bowl beat the shortening and sugar until fluffy.
• Beat in the molasses and the egg and beat it on low speed just until just combined.
• Gradually add the flour mixture beating the batter all the while.
• Form the dough into 36 balls.
• Arrange the balls leaving at least 2 inches apart on the prepared baking sheet.
• Ever so lightly press down on each ball with your three middle fingers.
• Bake for 8 minutes in the preheated oven.
• The cookies will be still soft when you take them out of the oven.
• Let them solidify on the baking sheet and then transfer to a wire rack to cool.
• Place clean parchment paper or wax paper on top of the counter. You will place the chocolate dipped cookies on these. The white chocolate will solidify at room temperature and will not stick to the parchment or wax paper.
• Next bring water to boil in the bottom pot of a double boiler [or in a small pot with a small stainless steal bowl placed on top]. If using a bowl, make sure the bottom of the bowl does not touch the boiling water.
• Add half of the chopped white chocolates to the bowl.
• Stirring with a metal spoon, melt the white chocolate almost completely.
• Promptly remove the top pot or the bowl from the heat and place it on a trivet.
• Add the remaining chopped white chocolate to the bowl, stirring until all the chocolate melts in the residual heat.
• Dip half of the cookies into the hot melted chocolate and place them on the prepared parchment or wax papers to solidify.
Yields 36 cookies
*If you can’t get pumpkin pie spice replace with a mix of 1/2 tsp cinnamon and 1/4 tsp [each] of ginger, nutmeg, allspice and cloves.
Photo by Olivia
