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Soft, chewy and slightly spiced, this is the Best Gingerbread Cookie recipe ever. A tried and true favorite for years, this classic gingerbread cookie dough yields the perfect cookie every single time. Totally fool-proof!
Why These Cookies Are The Best
One of the very first recipes I ever posted on this site was these Classic Gingerbread Cookies. Little did I know I’d morph this recipe into a million and one different desserts over the years. It’s positively the BEST Gingerbread Cookie Recipe ever and I will never change it, not for a million years. It’s one of those things that you know to leave it alone. If it’s not broken, don’t fix it. Did your mom ever say that?
Well, this is one of those recipes. We have morphed this recipe into the Gingerbread Mummies, or a Gingerbread Man or the Gingerbread Houses. It’s that good.
Ingredients For My Gingerbread Cookies
- Butter – Room temperature, unsalted butter provides the best flavor and texture for gingerbread cookies.
- Flour – All purpose flour makes the dough light and bakes into a soft cookie.
- Sugar – Granulated sugar is my go-to for sweetness.
- Molasses – The classic flavor of gingerbread comes from molasses, which is a thick, sticky syrup used as a sweetener. It’s made by refining sugar cane or sugar beet juice into sugar.
- Eggs – Egg is used as a binding agent, I have made these without eggs and the dough just needs to be kneaded a bit more to come together. The cookies without egg are more crisp so we do favor using egg for the recipe.
- Balsamic Vinegar – My secret ingredient is balsamic vinegar, it tenderizes the dough and adds a complex flavor to the finished gingerbread cookie.
- Baking powder – Baking powder helps the gingerbread cookies from rise while baking but it also helps with the dough spreading while in the oven. This is truly the magic to making cookies that hold their shape.
- Spices – Ginger, Cinnamon, cloves, nutmeg and salt give the cookies their signature warm spice.
For the full recipe ingredients and instructions, see the recipe card below.
How To Make Gingerbread Cookies
Gingerbread cookie dough is simple to make and best of all you can make it in advance. It freezes beautifully but, also, keeps in the fridge for up to 5 days.
- Beat the butter until light and creamy.
- Whisk together the dry ingredients and set aside.
- Add the sugar to the butter and beat until fluffy.
- Slowly mix in the molasses, egg and vinegar.
- Add the dry ingredients and mix until well combined.
- Cover and chill the dough for 2 hours or overnight.
- Divide the dough in half and roll it out using a rolling pin on a lightly floured surface into a 1/4 inch thick circle.
- Cut out gingerbread dough into shapes using cookie cutters.
- Place the cookies on a baking sheet lined with parchment approximately 1″ apart.
- Bake in a 400˚F oven for 5-6 minutes.
- Cool for 1 minute and then transfer to a wire rack.
- Decorate with icing, if desired.
How To Decorate Gingerbread Cookies
And now you can decorate your soft and chewy gingerbread with this Royal Icing that’s equally fabulous and perfect in every way. It’s the sugar cookie frosting that hardens so you can stack your little gingerbread men, gingerbread people or gingerbread snowflakes without worry that the frosting will smear and smudge.
This is the easiest step to decorated your gingerbread men. And it’s so fun, too because you don’t have to make the lines perfect and neat.
- Simply fill the pastry bag with frosting.
- Snip off the end.
- Pipe the icing in a zig zag pattern and glue on the eyes with the frosting.
- Allow the icing to harden, approximately 1-3 hours depending on the humidity.
If gingerbread cookies sound too tedious and you’re not really in the mood to cut out all those little gingerbread men or snowflakes or mittens or stockings, then you should definitely make these little Gingerbread cups, fill them with chocolate ganache and not share those, either.
How to Store Gingerbread Cookies
The beauty of this gingerbread dough is it can be made in advance. Roll the dough into a ball then press into a disk, wrap tightly in plastic wrap and transfer to a zip top freezer bag. Freeze the dough for up to three months. Thaw at room temperature and bake as directed.
To store baked cookies, transfer to an airtight container and store for up to 5 days at room temperature.
Gingersnaps vs. Gingerbread
The main differences between gingerbread and gingersnap cookies are that ginger snaps bake for a longer period of time to get their crispiness–and gingerbread cookies are soft and chewy (and almost always rolled out into different shapes like gingerbread men and other holiday figures).
More Christmas Cookie Ideas
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Gingerbread Cookies Recipe
Equipment
- 1 cookie sheet
- 1 silicone baking mat or parchment paper
- 1 cooling rack
Ingredients
- 1/2 cup unsalted butter, at room temperature
- 1/2 cup granulated sugar
- 1/2 cup molasses
- 1 large egg, at room temperature
- 1 tablespoon balsamic vinegar
- 2 1/2 cups all purpose flour
- 1 teaspoon baking powder
- 1 teaspoon ground ginger
- 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
- 1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
- 1/2 teaspoon ground cloves
- 1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg
- 1/4 teaspoon kosher salt
For the Frosting
- 2 cups sifted powdered sugar
- 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 2 tablespoons whole milk
Instructions
Make the Cookies
- In a bowl of an electric mixer, beat the softened butter until light and fluffy.
- Add the sugar to the butter and beat until light and fluffy. Turn the mixer to low and mix in the molasses, egg and balsamic vinegar.
- In a separate small bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder, ground ginger, baking soda, cinnamon, cloves, nutmeg and salt.
- Slowly add the dry ingredients to the bowl and continue mixing until thoroughly combined.
- Cover and chill about 2 hours or until the dough is easy to handle.
- Preheat oven to 400 degrees.
- Divide the dough in half and turn out onto a lightly floured surface. Roll each half of the dough to 1/4″ thickness adding flour as needed, the dough is very sticky so use flour liberally to prevent your cutouts from sticking to the surface.
- Using cookie cutters, cut dough into shapes and place on a baking sheet lined with parchment approximately 1″ apart.
- Bake in a 400 degree oven for 5-6 minutes. Cool on baking sheets for one minute and move to a wire rack.
To make the frosting
- In a small bowl, combine the powdered sugar, vanilla and milk. Whisk to combine.
- Spoon mixture into a pastry bag or zip top bag and snip off the tip. Add two small dots of icing where the eyes should be and then press one eye on each dot. Decorate the cookies and allow to dry for 2-4 hours or overnight.
- Store in an airtight container.
Video
Notes
Nutrition
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
Best I’ve ever made. They were perfect and I didn’t adjust anything the recipe called for.
Thank you so much! I’m so happy you enjoyed them. We’ve been making them for longer than I care to share. 🙂 Have a wonderful holiday!
Love this recipe! I made these for my cookie decorating party and they turned out perfect— great icing recipe too!! Very beginner friendly.
Thank you so much! I’m so happy you enjoyed them!
I have found the ultimate gingerbread dough here. Will never use another!
Perfection. Thank you!!
Thank you, thank you! So happy you loved it!
My 8 year old granddaughter and I just made these! I’ve never made gingerbread cookies before, and they are better than the ones we get at our favorite bakery!! Thank you so much for this amazing recipe that we loved making, and for giving me and my granddaughter such a fun baking afternoon! We will start looking at and trying your other recipes as well!!!
I’m so happy you enjoyed them! She may also like to make our candy cane cookies….they’re super fun to make with kids. https://thesuburbansoapbox.com/candy-cane-shortbread-cookies/
Cookies turned out great! Not too sweet and not too strong of spices like some gingerbread. Very consistent results using the same cooking time. Holds their cut out shape very well. I will use this recipe again! I doubled the recipe which made about 3 dozen small, medium, and large cookies.
Thank you so much for your comment! They’re our favorite!
Suggest adding more ginger, the cookies lack taste.
Ok….we haven’t found that but perhaps your ginger was older. Always be sure to check the expiration date and use fresh spices when baking these cookies. Otherwise, add more ginger as you want. Sometimes it helps to taste the dough before baking.
Incredible cookies!
Thank you so much! They’re our favorite!
I made these today and they are the best gingerbread cookies I’ve had. Thank You!
thank you so much! I’m so happy you enjoyed them. Happy Holidays!
A lot of people claim they have “the best” recipe when it comes to cookies. Very few have I found to be accurate. This one it is completely accurate though. Easy to mix, easy to roll out. Cookies turned out AMAZING. fluffy yet crisp. These may be the best oven baked cookies I have ever made. (your pizzelle recipe was pretty great too!)
Oh thank you so much! I’m so happy to hear that. I do, personally, think they are the best so it is a big claim but I’m glad you enjoyed them, too!
Thank you for sharing this recipe! This dough is super easy to work with, and I love that the cookie isn’t overly sweet. Perfect, perfect, perfect!
Thank you so much! enjoy!