Gingerbread Cookies – Egg Free

by Mrs Marvel
Young chef

Young chef

This may or may not be a vintage recipe, but I wanted to share all the same.  There are lots of people who like gingerbread but can’t have it when made with eggs. This happens to be my mother’s gingerbread recipe and it is egg free. My 7 year old daughter made these recently with only my basic supervision. They are very easy!

Enjoy!

Gingerbread Cookies – Egg Free

1 stick unsalted butter, soft
1/2 cup brown sugar packed
1/2 cup dark molasses
3 1/2 cups flour
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp ground cloves
3/4 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp ground ginger
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 cup water
Optional – shake of pepper

Blend butter & sugar until creamy. Beat in molasses. Sift flour with soda, cloves, cinnamon, ginger and salt, then add to butter mixture with 1/4 cup water. If too stiff ad a little more water.

Lightly knead dough until smooth and divide into three parts. Grease the bottom of a cookie sheet, then roll out dough to just less than 1/4″ – thinner will be too crisp. Bake at 350 for 8 – 10 minutes.

Icing
1/2 cup powdered sugar
Few drops of water
Food coloring

Combine sugar and water until it is a thick, smooth paste. Add food color as desired. Place into a plastic sandwich bag, then cut off the tip of one corner to make a pastry bag. The less you cut, the finer the tip.

All decorated, yum!

All decorated, yum! Yes we used some premade icing, too. It was late. :-)

Sprit Cookies

by Mrs Marvel
Notebook 28

Are these “sprite” cookies? Or “spirit” cookies? Or “spritz” cookies?

One of the challenges of handwritten recipes is that sometimes they come with spelling errors, mistakes and other little foibles that come along with being human. It also makes it part of the fun! This recipe is for spritz cookies, those not-too-sweet butter cookies that are so popular around Christmas time. They are also called press cookies because you press the soft dough through a cookie press, making it into various shapes, and then they can be decorated or left alone.

The name originates from the German Spritzgebäck, which is a traditional German Christmas cookie. They are dry, fragile and delicious. The verb spritzen translates as “to squirt” and so, we have squirted or pressed cookies.

6a00e5511e75a088330128766c3040970c-800wi

Just like Mom’s – borrowed image from Burford Designs

Cookie presses are still very popular, but I have fond memories of the Mirro press we used when I was a kid. My sister has it now – I have a new fangled one made of plastic with a trigger. The old style ones have a twisting screw that drives the press and forces the dough out the tip. While the new ones also have the twisting screw, they use a trigger to drive it. I don’t have a preference of one style over the other, except to say that the memories are better with the Mirro. With both types, I recommend letting your cookie pans cool thoroughly before you press more dough onto them. Warm pans seem to prevent the dough from sticking enough to release it from the press.

Sprit(z) Cookies

1 cup butter – part Crisco

1 cup powdered sugar

1 egg yolk

2 T sweet cream

2 1/4 cup flour

1/2 tsp vanilla

1/2 tsp almond

Bake 350

 

Oatmeal Cookies

by Mrs Marvel
Oatmeal Cookies, yum

Oatmeal Cookies, yum

These sound like a lovely cookie that would be delicious warm out of the oven. You could add raisins if you like. If you use Bob’s Red Mill or other certified gluten free oatmeal, these could be a delicious gluten free treat!

Oatmeal Cookies

1/2 c shortening

1 1/4 c sugar

2 eggs

6 T molasses

1 3/4 c flour

1 tsp soda

1 tsp salt

1 tsp cinnamon

Stir in 2 cups oatmeal

Bake 350

Molasses Cookies

by Mrs Marvel
Notebook 24

We called these molasses crinkles

We call these cookies Molasses Crinkles, and we make them all year round, but most often at the holidays. I think because they are like a spice/gingerbread cookie, they suit the autumn and winter months quite well. They are delicious – especially warm out of the oven. Yum!

Also, here’s a reminder that I have an entire page of Vintage Holiday Recipes compiled from all the recipes I have posted over the years. If there are any you think are missing, just let me know and I’ll find them! Great recipes for fruit cakes, pies and even cocktail party foods are all on one page.

There’s also a page for Reader Requests, where you can post a question about a lost recipe. The vintage recipe community is growing, and hopefully someone will recognize what you are looking for and provide the answer!

Molasses Cookies

3/4 c shortening

1 c brown sugar

1/2 c white sugar

1 egg

4 T molasses

2 cups flour

1/4 tsp salt

2 tsp soda

1/2 tsp cloves

1 tsp cinnamon

1/2 tsp ginger

Chill dough. roll in sugar and bake, 350 10 minutes

Jello Frosting

by Mrs Marvel
Notebook 23

I’m not so sure about this one

I’m not entirely sure about this recipe for Jello Frosting. The idea is interesting – a whipped cream frosting with a Jello flavor added to it, but to me it sounds horrible. However, I don’t like whipped cream frosting to start with, so there’s that.

Jello Frosting

1 pt cream whipped

1 pkg Jello

1/2 c powdered sugar

 

Whip cream partially – add jello and sugar. Finish whipping