Slow as Molasses in January

Don’t you just love idioms? Especially when they are used as post titles and accurately indicate the contents of said post? You’re super welcome. Anyway, this is a recipe post for chewy molasses cookies – chewy molasses cookies covered in delightfully crunchy, sparkly sugar – that I made in January. You should make them. Set some butter out tonight so it’s soft enough tomorrow. I promise that’s the most challenging part of this gem of a cookie.

Chewy Molasses Cookies Covered In Sparkly, Crunchy, Wonderful Sugary Goodness

Slightly adapted from the inimitable Martha Stewart 

The Necessities:

• 2 cups all-purpose flour (spooned and leveled)
• 1 1/2 teaspoons baking soda
• 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/8 teaspoon ground black pepper (or to taste; this was my genius contribution to the recipe.)
• 1 1/2 cups sugar
• 3/4 cup (1 1/2 sticks) unsalted butter, softened (seriously, just set it out the night before-microwaving is a terrible idea.)
• 1 large egg
• 1/4 cup molasses (I’m totally going to use more next time.)

The Deed:

Turn your oven on! To 350 degrees Farenheit. Spray a cookie sheet up, too. Or butter it. Or wax paper it. Whatever works.

Grab a medium size bowl and whisk together everything from the flour to the pepper. Basically, all dry ingredients BUT sugar. What you can do with the sugar is put a 1/2 cup of it in a shallow bowl or plate w/ lip or tupperware thingy. You’ll need it soon but not yet.

This dough isn't as delicious as chocolate chip, but if you regularly tempt salmonella like myself, it's worth a bite or seven.

Put the butter and the rest of the sugar in your mixer. If you don’t have a stand mixer, stop reading this and go buy one. Ok, they’re kind of pricey. Save up. WORTH IT. Back to making things – beat the butter and sugar till the two become one and then add the egg. Once the trinity exists, spice it up by adding the molasses! Make the mixer purr by turning it to low and gradually add the bowl of dry ingredients. Don’t screw everything up by over-mixing it.

Now it’s time to get your most important baking tool ready – your hands! Pinch off the dough and roll it into balls, one at a time, of course. They should be about the size of a tablespoon. Once your balls are formed (haha), roll them in the shallow bowl/dish/thingy of sugar. Hooray! Now your balls are sparkly!  … Put your sparkly balls about 3 inches apart on your greased up cookie sheet. 12 per sheet’s pretty normal, and only do one sheet at a time. These guys are the crackle sort of chewy cookie, so chemical reactions and baking integrity matter.

Sparkly Balls.

Put it in the middle of the oven for about 12 minutes – the edges should look done, but the middle shouldn’t. Let them firm up a bit on the cookie sheet before transferring them to cooling racks to, well, cool. Repeat approximately two times and then admire the 36 little gems you just created!

AND DON’T FORGET to eat one freshly out of the oven. Like after the 1 minute resting part. To deny yourself this pleasure would be stupid. These store well in tupperware on top of whatever available surface your living space affords. They won’t last long, however. These beauties will disappear as fast as molasses in July!*

Easy. Chewy. Molassesy. Delicious.

*Note: I don’t know if molasses goes fast in July, but supposing molasses is really slow in January when things are cold, it’s pretty safe to assume the stuff moves fast during the hotter months. Right?