A Christmas cut-out cookie with two personalities. The dough is gingerbread, warm with ginger, cinnamon, cloves and molasses, and it is also red velvet: a good spoonful of cacao and a drop of red colouring make it dark, rich and a little bit festive before you have even reached for the decorations.
The decorating is where it gets fun. Our son won’t touch a plain cookie, but he will happily eat any cookie covered in melted white chocolate, hazelnuts and crushed Oreos. So that’s how ours get finished, and it’s a good reason to let everyone at the table decorate their own.
What you’ll need
- 380g all-purpose flour, plus more for the work surface and rolling out
- 50g cacao powder
- 1 tsp baking soda
- 1/2 tsp salt
- 1 tbsp ground ginger
- 1 tbsp ground cinnamon
- 1/2 tsp ground cloves
- 150g butter, softened
- 170g brown sugar
- 1 large egg, room temperature
- 225g molasses
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
- A drop of red food colouring
To decorate: melted white chocolate, Oreo chunks, toasted hazelnuts, M&Ms, mini marshmallows.
Method
- Whisk the flour, cacao powder, baking soda, salt, ginger, cinnamon and cloves together in a medium bowl. Set aside.
- In a large bowl, beat the butter on medium-high speed until smooth, about 1 minute.
- Add the brown sugar and beat on medium-high speed until creamed, about 2 minutes.
- Add the egg, molasses and vanilla extract, and beat on high speed until combined, about 1 minute. Scrape down the sides and up the bottom of the bowl and beat again as needed.
- Add the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients, add a drop of red colouring and mix on low speed until combined. The dough will be quite thick and slightly sticky.
- Divide the dough into 2 equal portions and place each on a large piece of plastic wrap. Wrap each one tightly and pat it into a disc. Chill the discs for at least 3 hours (and up to 4 days).
- Preheat the oven to 180°C.
- Take 1 disc out of the refrigerator. Generously flour the work surface, your hands and the rolling pin. Roll the dough out to 6 mm thick and cut it into shapes with cookie cutters. Reroll the scraps and keep cutting until all the dough is used. Repeat with the second disc.
- Bake for about 10 to 11 minutes, until the cookies show small cracks on top.
- Once the cookies are completely cool, decorate them. Let the decoration set for 2 to 3 hours.
A couple of tips
- Don’t skip the chill. Three hours is the minimum, and the dough keeps in the fridge for up to 4 days, so you can make it ahead of a baking weekend.
- Keep the flour close. Even chilled, the dough can be sticky. Flour the surface, your hands and the rolling pin generously, and add more as you go.
- Watch for the cracks. Small cracks on top are the sign they’re done.
- Decorate only once they’re completely cool, then give the decoration 2 to 3 hours to set.
If you’d rather a red velvet cookie that skips the rolling pin, our Red Velvet Kinder Cookies are a drop-and-bake dough. On our counter, red velvet comes as the Red Velvet & Oreo chunky cookie, baked in-house at our brunch spots in Budapest, Bucharest and Belgrade. Walk-ins only, no bookings. #webelieveinhandmade
