Ginger Drops
1 cup light brown sugar 2/3 cup butter 1/2 cup cold water 1 egg 2/3 cup molasses 1 large tablespoon ginger 1 large teaspoon soda Gold Medal flour to make thick batter. Drop by teaspoonfuls on a well greased pan, bake in moderate oven. These are very nice if properly made.
A drop cookie from the era when flour was added by feel rather than measure. The only real difficulty is deciding when the batter is thick enough.
- The flour is the whole problem"Gold Medal flour to make thick batter" means a dough stiff enough to hold its shape on the spoon but still soft enough to drop — perhaps 3 to 3 1/2 cups of all-purpose flour with this quantity of liquid, though the amount can only be judged by eye. Add it in stages and stop when a spoonful mounds instead of spreading; too much flour gives dry, cakey lumps.
- Moderate ovenRoughly 350 to 375F. At that heat, teaspoon-sized drops need about 10 to 12 minutes; they should be set at the edges and still slightly soft in the centre, since molasses cookies firm as they cool.
- A "large tablespoon" of gingerOld spoon measures ran generous, but a full modern tablespoon of ground ginger is already assertive and is what this recipe wants. The same applies to the "large teaspoon" of soda — a rounded teaspoon rather than a heaped one.
- Soda, not baking powderThe soda is here to react with the acid in the molasses and brown sugar, which is why there is no baking powder. Sift or whisk it into the flour rather than dropping it into the wet mixture, or you will get bitter yellow streaks.
- MolassesUse unsulphured dark molasses. Blackstrap is markedly more bitter than ordinary table molasses and will overwhelm the ginger.
- Cold waterThe half cup of cold water thins the creamed butter and sugar enough for a drop batter. Add it gradually with the egg and molasses; the mixture may look curdled, which corrects itself once the flour goes in.
- The panA well-greased pan works, but these spread and stick as the molasses caramelises. Parchment is easier, and leave two inches between drops.
- YieldAbout four dozen small cookies. They keep well in a tin and soften further after a day.
Ginger drops belong to the large family of molasses-and-ginger baking that dominated American home kitchens through the nineteenth century, when molasses was cheaper than refined sugar and ground ginger was one of the few spices reliably stocked in a rural pantry. The recipe names Gold Medal in its ingredient list, while the flour quantity is left to the cook's judgement. The closing line — "very nice if properly made" — reads like a quiet warning that the batter's consistency is the thing to get right.