Gingerbread Men

Ingredients

• Makes 24-30
• 2 1/4 cups all purpose flour
• 1/8 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
• 1/4 teaspoon ground cloves
• 1/4 teaspoon ground ginger
• 1/2 cup brown sugar
• 1/2 cup butter, at room temperature
• 3/4 cup dark molasses
• 1/2 cup milk

Directions

1. Preheat the oven to 350F. Line one or two baking sheets with parchment paper.
2. In a large bowl, stir together the flour, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, cloves, ginger and sugar.
3. In a medium bowl, beat the butter until creamy. Add the molasses and milk and beat in using low speed to combine.
4. Add the wet ingredients to the dry, using a beater on low to medium speed and mix to combine, scraping down the sides as needed.
5. Form the dough into a ball, leave in the mixing bowl, cover with plastic wrap and place into the refrigerator to cool for at least one hour.
6. Roll the dough out onto a clean, lightly floured surface and use cookie cutter shapes of your choice to cut out the cookies.
7. Lightly flour the cookie cutter, by dipping it into a little flour between cuts to keep it from sticking to the batter. Place the cut out cookies onto the baking sheet, with a metal flipper, leaving an inch between the cookies.
8. Bake only one sheet at a time in the preheated oven on the middle rack .
9. Bake for 10 minutes and remove from the oven. Place onto a cooling rack.
10. After 5 minutes, place each cookie from the baking sheet onto the cooling rack. Let cookies cool completely before icing. Repeat the rolling, re-rolling, cutting and baking process until you use up all the dough. The amount of cookies will vary depending on the size and shape of your cookie cutters. Keep cookies in a container with a lid.