Family is the theme this time of year and everyone is bringing something to the table. We’ve gone and brought two delicious cookie recipes that are sure to leave your relatives asking for more in the years to come.
To prove that anyone can attempt and succeed at these festive recipes the three of us, who are complete and utter novices when it comes to cooking, did it ourselves. We decided to pick two different recipes that had easy to follow instructions and recipes that wouldn’t break the bank. For our first recipe, we decided to visit The New York Times.
The first recipe that we visited was for the Gingerbread Snickerdoodles recipe. Written by Genevie Ko, sitting at a nice 4 star rating, which presents itself as a commonplace sweet treat.
To provide a little background on the Gingerbread snickerdoodle recipe, we are going to have to travel back a LONG period of time.
This recipe brings together two different cookies, as the name suggests its a mix of gingerbread and a snickerdoodle.
Snickerdoodle can be traced back to Dutch-German descent, but how the name “snickerdoodle” came to be is still unanswered. They originally were popular in the Mennonite and Amish baking communities, their popularity skyrocketed in 1891. While it may not be the perfect treat, it still has received minimal changes to its original recipe ever since its creation.
Gingerbread made by the ancient Greeks and Egyptians who had used it for ceremonial and medicinal purposes. They became popular with crusaders during the 11th-century and brought them to Europe.
Presented below is the original recipe, with minor modifications, that became so popular with crusaders.
Ingredients
Yield: 32 cookies
2½ cups/320 grams all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon cream of tartar
1 tablespoon ground ginger
2½ teaspoons ground cinnamon
½ teaspoon fine sea salt
¾ cup/170 grams unsalted butter (1½ sticks), at room temperature
¼ cup molasses
1¼ cups/250 grams sugar
2 large eggs, at room temperature
When it came to collecting the ingredients, we ran into some issues and minor problems, as not all of the ingredients were widely available or easy to access we had to make a few tweaks, more specifically molasses and cream of tartar. Now this arguably could have been our mistake as we lacked some proper materials, however we blame it on the recipe.
The process was relatively simple as beginners, but we did have a few bumps in the road, such as mixing up melted butter and softened butter, which lead to a thicker consistency for the dough.
Another issue we encountered was that we both over and under mixed the dough as some part of the dough became overdeveloped compared to other parts of the dough which seemed barely mixed.
The product however turned out to be relatively tasty according to us the bakers, which has a form of biases, the taste was a blend of “savory” and sweet.
In order to go against the biases we interviewed a handful of people on their opinions on our rendition of the holiday snack.
Here are a list of some of the reviews that we received from various teachers and students:
Mrs. Morris: “Not Too sweet, I am smelling the cinnamon […] But it has a nice texture”
Rating: 8/10
Allyson Ordonez Santos: “it’s very soft and chewy, […] Its pretty good”
Rating: 7/10
Notes: “I would like to try them when they are warm”.
Julius Barroso: “I’d say it’s on the dry side, definitely […] the texture is more cakey, and it crumbles apart. As for the taste, I can taste the ginger and the cinnamon.”
Rating: 6.5/10
Mrs. Butto: “It has a very soft texture, nice and squishy[…] its more savory than it is sweet.”
Rating: 7/10
Overall, we think our first recipe was a success, as it exceeded our expectations regarding predictions. We first believed the recipe would be a flop, but it turned out better than expected, thanks to luck. With an average rating of 7/10, this recipe is a tremendous first accomplishment.
