Tessa’s Recipe Rundown
Taste: The perfect balance of sweetness and spice.
Texture: Thin and crispy, these cookies break in half cleanly and have a satisfying crunch.
Ease: Super simple 30-minute recipe. No chilling required.
Pros: The perfect easy, festive addition to any Christmas cookie box.
Cons: None.
Would I make this again? I make these cookies every holiday season!
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These Crispy Gingersnaps Cookies are the perfect classic, crispy gingersnap cookie.
Typically I prefer a chewy cookie, but every once in a while I crave that satisfying crunch and crispness of something sweet.
So, I tweaked my Chewy Gingersnap recipe (which is included in my cookbook – available on Amazon!) to make them thin and oh-so satisfyingly crunchy.
Free Cookie Customization Guide!
The science-based guide so you can bake perfect cookies every time!
These cookies are perfectly spice-forward, with that beautiful snap. Plus, they look so pretty next to beautifully iced Cut-Out Sugar Cookies and Christmas Brownies on your Christmas dessert table!
These cookies have become one of my most popular cookie recipes ever, with hundreds of wonderful reviews like this comment from reader El below:
Reader Love
My husband loved these cookies. He is a grumpy old man and doesn’t praise much of anything, so when he said, “These are the best cookies I have ever tasted!” I figured that was a super rubber stamp of approval. Great cookie!
–
Enjoy on a cozy day with a glass of milk or a cup of coffee or tea.
Sprinkle of Science
How to Make Thin & Crispy Gingersnaps
What are Gingersnaps?
Gingersnaps are just what they sound like: a cookie flavored with ginger, plus other spices that we’ll talk more about below. They are typically crunchy or have a brittle texture, thus the “snap”. The spiciness of the ginger and richness of the molasses pair perfectly with coffee, tea, hot cocoa, or mulled wine.
A year-round favorite all over the world, Gingersnaps are particularly popular to welcome in the fall and winter holiday seasons. Perfectly spiced, these cookies have the most beautiful cracked, sugary tops. I love these cookies in the fall, when the temperatures are slowly beginning to drop. They’re delicious with a glass of cold milk or even lemonade – and even better when used in place of graham crackers for over-the-top Gingersnap S’mores or to make ice cream sandwiches!
What Makes Cookies Crispy and Crackled?
- A heavy amount of baking soda interacts with the molasses in this recipe to encourage spread.
- This allows cracks in the dough to develop where moisture escapes, creating that beautiful crackled appearance and crunchy texture.
- Ensure your baking soda is fresh and active – learn how to test leavening agents for freshness here.
- There’s also much more granulated sugar than brown sugar in this recipe. White sugar encourages more spread and has less moisture to make for a crisper cookie.
- Lastly, a longer baking time ensures a crunchy texture all the way through the center of these cookies.
Why Roll the Dough in Sugar?
Rolling the cookie dough balls in sugar contributes to the overall texture of the cookies as well as the cracky tops. It helps to draw moisture out from the surface of the cookies while they bake, though the majority of the “crackliness” comes from the baking soda and molasses.
Feel free to skip this step if preferred, but your cookies won’t be quite as crisp and won’t look as pretty.
Measure Your Flour Correctly to Ensure Gingersnaps are Crispy!
- To avoid ending up with Gingersnaps that are thick, hard, or dense instead of perfectly crispy, make sure to measure your flour accurately with a digital kitchen scale.
- It’s so easy to accidentally add too much flour if you’re measuring by using cups.
- If you don’t have a scale, use the spoon and level method to measure.
- Just take a look at what a difference too much flour can make:
How to Make Flavorful Gingersnaps
- Make sure your spices, especially the ground ginger, are fresh and of high quality.
- If your spices no longer smell very aromatic, toss them and purchase new spices.
- The fresher the spice, the more flavorful it’ll be.
- While I haven’t tried it, you can also experiment with crystallized ginger, but expect your cookies to be a little more sugary.
- If you want more spice in your gingersnaps, add a tablespoon or two of freshly grated ginger.
- You can also add a pinch of cayenne pepper or a little black pepper.
- In addition to the spices, the molasses used is also important. More on this just below.
The Molasses
Make sure to use unsulphured molasses. Never use blackstrap molasses in baking, it’s extremely bitter. Brer Rabbit or Grandma’s in their ‘mild’ or ‘original’ flavors tend to work best.
Can I Make these Cookies Smaller?
Sure! Use a small 1 tablespoon-sized cookie scoop for small Gingersnap Cookies and reduce the bake time by a couple minutes.
Can I Double This Recipe?
Yes! Simply double all ingredients to yield about 56 medium-sized cookies. No other modificaitons needed.
Can I Use This Recipe to Make Gingerbread Men?
No – this recipe was written to be a simple drop-style cookie, so it won’t hold its shape well when rolled out and shaped using cookie cutters. Instead, try my Gingerbread Cookies Recipe!
How to Store Homemade Gingersnaps
Store baked, cooeld Gingersnaps in an airtight container at room temperature for up to 7 days.
How to Freeze Gingersnap Cookies
Store baked, cooled Gingersnap Cookies in the freezer inside an airtight container for up to 1 month.
Alternatively, portion out the balls of cookie dough, roll in sugar, place them on a baking sheet, and freeze for 1 hour or until solid. Transfer to an airtight container and store in the freezer for up to 2 months. Bake cookies from frozen, reducing the temperature to 325°F and adding a couple minutes to the baking time. Learn more about freezing cookie dough here.
More Christmas Cookie Recipes:
Crispy Gingersnaps
Ingredients
- 1 1/2 sticks (170 grams) unsalted butter, at cool room temperature
- 1 1/4 cups (250 grams) granulated sugar, divided
- 1/4 cup (50 grams) lightly packed light brown sugar
- 1/3 cup (113 grams) unsulphured molasses (NOT blackstrap)*
- 1 large egg
- 1/2 teaspoon fine salt
- 2 teaspoons baking soda**
- 1 1/2 teaspoons ground ginger
- 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
- 1/4 teaspoon ground cloves
- 2 1/4 cups (286 grams) all-purpose flour,
measured correctly
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350°F. Line baking sheets with parchment paper.
- In a large bowl, use an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment to beat the butter, 3/4 cup granulated sugar, and brown sugar until light and fluffy, about 2 minutes. Add the molasses and egg and beat until combined. Add in the salt, baking soda, ginger, cinnamon, cloves, and flour, and beat until combined.
- Place the remaining 1/2 cup sugar in a shallow dish. Scoop the dough into 1 1/2 tablespoon balls and roll in the sugar before placing on the baking sheet, leaving plenty of room for spread. Bake for 15 minutes or until the cookies are spread and the surface looks crackled.
- Let cool on the baking sheets for 5 minutes before removing to wire racks to cool completely. Store cookies in an airtight container at room temperature for up to 7 days.
Recipe Notes
This post was originally published in 2020 and has been updated with additional baking tips. Photos by Ashley McLaughlin.
I just started baking and I love these cookies so much. Thank you for sharing.
Forgive the ignorance of an old man just learning to bake: if I use an Oxo small cookie scoop, will that give me the 1 1/2 tablespoon-sized balls of dough your recipe calls for?
Hi John! No need to apologize – we all learned everything once! Oxo’s small scoop is typically 1 Tablespoon, and their medium scoop is 1.5 Tablespoons, so if you only have a small scoop, you could use one scoop + half another scoop from your small scoop, and roll them together, to make the 1.5 Tablespoon-sized cookies. Or, feel free to make smaller cookies using your small scoop, and just shave a couple minutes off the bake time. I hope that makes sense! Let us know what you think of these cookies once you have given them a try 🙂 Happy baking!
Hi I have made this recipe three times and they turned out great. My husband and I like the cookies crispy for dunking in milk. This recipe did not disappoint. I agree with author about cooking on parchment paper and definietly not a dark pan with no parchment. I did add little bit extra cinnamon, cloves, and ginger. Great recipe.
Delicious and easy! My husband described this as a superlative cookie so it’s definitely a keeper.
Can the baked cookies be frozen? If so, for how long?
Hi Carol! Tessa included freezing instructions for the both the cookie dough and the baked cookies, in the Tip Box just above the recipe! Let us know what you think of these cookies once you have given them a try 🙂
Just the kind of quick, easy one-bowl recipe that I try to keep in my arsenal! It’s delicious, too, and could be a real lifesaver in a time crunch.
can you freeze the dough?
Sure! Freeze and baking from frozen instructions are listed in the pink box above the recipe 🙂 Enjoy!
I first. made these cookies four days ago and again today. They are awesome, everyone, including the most difficult to please about the ‘crispiness’ of cookies was impressed.
I also just tried to make them vegan as requested by my children! I replaced the egg with 1 tablespoon of Chia seeds soaked in two tablespoons of water and unsalted plant based butter. They turned out just the same!
Thank you!
So happy to hear your substitutions worked perfectly, thanks for sharing!
This recipe is perfect! Give a nice crisp and flavorful cookie.
the best! I recommend this recipe
they were really fluffy, like I used to much flour when using exactly 2 and 1/4 cup. maybe it only needs 2 cups?
Hi Rose! The most common issue that results in puffy cookies is using too much flour; however, this recipe is accurate in using 2 1/4 cups, or 286 grams of flour. Do you use a digital scale to measure your ingredients? If you don’t have one, I’d suggest that you try out the Spoon and Level Method, as described in our article on How to Measure Flour here. That should help reduce excess flour used when using cup measures. Hopefully that helps for your next batch. I’d love to hear what you think when you give this recipe another try 🙂
I’m really interested in making these for Christmas Eve, but I’m going to be short on time. I was wondering if it could be possible to make the dough tomorrow morning (21), refrigerate it and bake them on the 23? Do you think this could work?
Hi Pamela! That should be just fine! Just be sure to keep the dough well-wrapped in plastic wrap, to prevent the cookie dough from drying out. Enjoy!