Soft Molasses Cookies - Recipe #4

This week I needed to find a recipe that was not a key part of a meal (most of my meals were out and about because of a busy rehearsal/performance schedule) and was fairly quick and easy: cookies!

Soft Molasses Cookies to be exact. I don't have strong feelings about molasses cookies either way, but the PM likes them quite a bit, so I made them for him because he let me use his car for 9 hours of driving to and from a rehearsal this weekend.

1 cup of sugar
3/4 cup of sour cream
1/2 cup butter
1/2 cup shortening
1/2 cup molasses
1 egg
3 cups flour
1 1/2 teaspoons baking soda
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1 teaspoon ground ginger
1/2 teaspoon salt
Fat sugar, if desired

- Beat the sugar, sour cream, butter, shortening, molasses and egg in a large bowl with an electric mixer on medium speed, or mix with a spoon.

- Stir in flour, baking soda, cinnamon, ginger and salt.

- Drop dough by rounded tablespoonfuls about 2 inches apart onto ungreased cookie sheet.

- Bake in an oven at 375 for 9-11 minutes or until almost no indentation remains when touched in center.
- Cool 1-2 minutes; remove from cookie sheet to wire rack.
- Sprinkle with fat sugar while cookies are still warm.

Review:

I didn't realize there were three kinds of molasses, and I don't know what the differences are in terms of baking. I picked up the "full flavor" version, figuring that was "regular." As it turns out, molasses is stinky. STINKY.  I had no idea.

I'm not a molasses cookie expert, so my judgment of this recipe is probably not the best. They were easy to make and taste like cookies, but I don't think they are anything to write home about. For my oven, 9-11 minutes were too long to bake them. The first cookie sheet that went in the oven produced overdone cookies. I've suspected that my oven may be calibrated wrong, it often seems to cook too hot. I also had trouble finding a good time to sprinkle them with the fat sugar (fat sugar is my term, the recipe just called for sugar). If I waited until after the 1-2 minutes of chilling on the baking sheet, most of the sugar rolled off of the cookie. If I sprinkled them while still on the baking sheet, the sugar melted onto the pan. There was sugar EVERYWHERE.

I would eat these with some tea in the afternoon as a snack if there was nothing else around and I really wanted something sweet, but I'm not sure I'd make them again for my own consumption. I think I'm just not a fan of molasses cookies.

Netflix Rating:
Me: 2.0
PM: Cookies. (The PM refused to play along with my Netflix Rating guide on this one and repeatedly responded with "cookies" when I asked him to rate them. Either the cookies paralyzed his brain with awesomeness or he was channeling Cookie Monster.)

Jan 31, Edited to add: I solicited another reviewer for these. My lunch buddy UB is a big fan of molasses cookies and she rated them a solid 3. She says the taste is a little off from what she's used to.

Feb 3, Edited to add: By special request, I sent a few of these cookies to my nephew, Rooster E 2.0. They were received today, and so I asked Rooster E 2.0 for a review/rating. Rooster E (the original) relayed back to me:
                    "Ok, well I think the reviewer has some confusion. He said he loved them and would eat them ALL!!! Munch munch munch and when I explained it, he said 1. I tried to show him again on my fingers and he said 'here let me show ya' and closed all my fingers one by one until there was only one left. 'One' he again replied and turned back to his playdough."