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.
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 modifications 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, cooled 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:
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Ingredients
- 1 1/2 sticks (170 grams) unsalted butter, at cool room temperature
- 3/4 cup (150 grams) granulated sugar, plus 1/2 cup (100 grams) for rolling
- 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 sea 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.
Notes
This post was originally published in 2020 and has been updated with additional baking tips. Photos by Ashley McLaughlin.
Can you freeze these in dough form and bake later?
Yep! Check out Tessa’s tips for freezing the cookies (in dough form or baked) above the recipe here 🙂
Made these, and then I had to exert massive self control and not inhale them. Love how they are lightly buttery and crispy with the ginger/molasses taste!
The ultimate compliment! So happy you loved them, Marin 🙂
I’m allergic to eggs, so I substituted the egg with a tablespoon of milk and they came out beautifully. I forgot to roll them in sugar, so I sprinkled some sugar over them when they came out of the oven. They still taste amazing
Thanks for sharing your substitution, Sara Jane! Your cookies look beautiful!
Unfortunately it didn’t turned out good at all. I’m assuming it’s because I used Truvia sugar blend. It made cookies very soft and they got burnt. Tasted good but the crispiness I was after wasn’t there at all. I need to find out which sugar substitutes wouldn’t affect on the texture.
I followed the recipe to the tee but they are chewy and not snappy. Where did I go wrong.
Hi Carol, thanks so much for giving these gingersnaps a try! Without baking alongside you it’s tough to say for sure, but if they turned out chewy instead of crispy, a few things may have happened. Too much flour (so easy to accidentally add too much without a digital scale) can prevent them from spreading thin enough to snap, while old baking soda can reduce that crackly effect (learn how to test it here). It’s also possible they just needed a touch more time in the oven, since every oven bakes differently. Tessa shares more about what gives these cookies their crisp, crackled texture in the tips above the recipe here. I’d love for you to try them again, and hopefully something stands out as the culprit and your next batch comes out perfectly snappy!
This is the recipe I’ve been looking for all my life! Thank you for your explanation of how the baking soda helps to flatten/crisp the cookie. I did cut the butter down by 1/4 cup and they turned out perfectly.
The time of 15 mins was way too long. I had my timer set for 12 and went to look and my first batch was burned. Other than that the recipe was good.
Agreed. 12 minutes was perfect
This is an awesome recipe. My husband adores ginger snaps, and I’ve tried a few different recipes and this was his favorite. Thank you for putting this out there.
Can you use fresh ginger? Or does it have to be the dried out stuff?
This recipe is my go to recipe for Ginger Snaps. I roll the dough in sugar with more ground ginger. I also add sweetened ginger bits to the batter. Perfect for the diehard ginger lovers.
In your soft and chewy sugar cookie recipie, you separate the granulated suagar amount for rolling in the recipie list. You didn’t do that in this one so I ended up using too much sugar. I measure everything in grams, so I didn’t catch the discrepancy in my measurement until it was too late. I even read the recipie beforehand but didn’t catch it since I don’t measure in cups. Unfortunately the dough was tossed. I’ll have to try again.
I’m so glad you said that! I would have done the same thing! 1/2 a cup “extra” sugar in the recipe is way too much!
Rebekah, thank you so much for your feedback — and I’m so sorry for both the delay in seeing your comment and that your dough got tossed! You’re absolutely right that separating out the sugar for rolling makes the recipe much easier to follow, especially when measuring by grams. We’ve updated the ingredient list to clarify this, so future bakers won’t run into the same issue. I really appreciate you taking the time to point it out and for giving the recipe a try. I hope your next batch of gingersnaps turns out perfectly!
Solid recipe! I added a quarter cup of chopped candied jalapeños and rolled them in jalapeño sugar.