Gingerbread men and other shapes
Adding treacle and using dark brown soft sugar makes these gingerbread characters deliciously chewy!
• Mix together 25g butter and 125g brown soft sugar until fluffy.
• Stir in 175g treacle and 75g water.
• Sift 450g plain flour into a bowl with half a dessertspoon of bicarbonate of soda and a large pinch of salt.
• Also mix in a half a dessertspoon ground ginger, a teaspoon of cinnamon, and half a teaspoon each of other spices according to your taste – allspice and ground cloves.
• Add the flour and spices to the butter, sugar and treacle mix. Stir it into a dough, leave in its bowl and cover it over. Put this in a fridge for a couple of hours.
• Put the gingerbread dough on a lightly floured surface and roll it out with a lightly floured rolling pin, to about half a centimetre thickness.
• Place on a greased baking tray, with a good space between each biscuit.
• Bake for 10 minutes at gas mark 4 (180°C or 350°F). Add a couple of minutes if needed, but be careful not to burn them as they will harden a little more once they are cooling on a rack.
SAVVY TIP
For Christmas gingerbread men, decorate with white, red and green icing instead of just white icing.