2 c All-purpose flour
1 tb Ground ginger
2 ts Baking soda
1 1/2 ts Ground cinnamon
1/2 ts Ground cloves
1/2 ts Salt
3/4 c White vegetable shortening
1 c Sugar
1 Egg
1/4 c Molasses
Sugar for rolling
Preheat oven to 350F. Into a medium bowl, sift together flour, ginger,
baking soda, cinnamon, cloves, and salt.
In a large bowl with electric mixer, beat shortening until soft, 1 minute.
Gradually add sugar and continue beating until mixture is light and fluffy.
Beat in egg and molasses until well-blended.
Stir in flour mixture until completely mixed.
Place a little sugar in a medium bowl. Scoop out heaping teaspoonfuls of
mixture. Using your palms, roll into 3/4-inch balls and drop into the
sugar. Roll to cover the surgace completely; then place balls 2 inches
apart on ungreased baking sheets.
Bake until cookies are slightly rounded and tops appear lightly browned and
crackles. Remove baking sheets to wire racks to cool slightly. The, using
a metal pancake turner or palette knife, remove cookies to wire racks to
cool completely. Repeat with remaining cookie dough and sugar. Store in
airtight containers.
Source: “The Complete Cookie Book” by Elizabeth Wolf Cohen
Notes: The cookies have 70.4 calores (42.7% from fat) and 3.4g fat each.
They were delicious and easy to make.
The Chef’s Comments: “Yesterday i took a cookie recipe that I wanted to
try, and I made exactly according to the recipe (it was great!) and then I
made another batch, using the Prune Butter technique. For cookies, the book
suggests replacing all of the fat with Prune Butter, and removing as much
sugar as 1/2 to 2/3 the amount of Prune Butter used, to keep sweetness
consistent witht he original recipe. The low-fat recipe was a difficult
texture to work with, and they didn’t spread out nicely when cooking. They
remained little clumps. But they did taste very good. I have a hard time
telling the difference between the two, believe it or not. Who would have
thought substituting prunes for crisco was a wise choice??” – Lisa
Yields
4 Dozen