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These Molasses Cookies are dark, spicy, crackly around the edges, and tender in the middle. With a sugar crust and warm cinnamon, ginger, and cloves, they’re a simple, unfussy cookie you’re going to love. They’re perfect with coffee or whenever you want a cozy homemade treat.
Why You’ll Love It
- Simple, unfussy dough — cream, mix, roll, sugar-coat, flatten, and bake.
- Crackly sugar crust — each cookie has a delicate crunch before the soft, chewy center.
- Warm, balanced spices — cinnamon, ginger, and cloves add depth without overpowering the molasses.
- Small-batch friendly — the recipe makes about a dozen cookies without an all-day baking project.
Ingredient Notes
The original way I learned this uses shortening made from one stick of margarine and half a stick of butter. It sounds a little old-school because it is. Margarine gets a bad rap now, but it gives these cookies a particular softness, while the butter adds flavor. I use that combination when I have it on hand. If I don’t, I don’t panic. Nobody needs that kind of energy over cookies.
For the molasses, use regular unsulphured molasses, not blackstrap. Blackstrap is fine in some things, but here it can make the cookies bitter and a little too intense.
The spice mix matters. Ground cloves, ginger, and cinnamon are what make these feel like proper molasses cookies instead of merely brown sugar cookies with a personality crisis. Check that your spices have some life left in them. If your cinnamon smells like dust and vague disappointment, replace it. I know, spices are expensive now. Everything is expensive now. But stale cloves will not do you any favors.
You’ll need granulated sugar for rolling the dough and for dipping the bottom of the glass before flattening. It’s not listed separately in my brain because it’s just always there, but make sure you have a little extra in the bowl.
Ingredients
- 3/4 cup shortening — I use 1 stick margarine and 1/2 stick butter
- 1 cup granulated sugar, plus a little extra for rolling and flattening the cookies
- 1/4 cup heaping molasses — regular molasses, not blackstrap
- 1 large egg
- 2 teaspoons baking soda
- 2 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
- 3/4 teaspoon ground cloves
- 1/2 teaspoon ground ginger
- 1 teaspoon cinnamon
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
Instructions
Heat your oven to 350°F and grease a cookie sheet well. I know many of us use parchment for everything now, and I do too sometimes, but these cookies were made on a greased sheet long before parchment became the queen of the kitchen drawer. Use what you like, but do make sure the pan isn’t dry and sticky.
Cream the shortening and 1 cup of sugar together in a large bowl. I use my hand mixer because my wrists have opinions these days, but a sturdy wooden spoon will work if you’re feeling energetic or annoyed at somebody. Cream it until it looks light and blended, not just mashed together in sad lumps.
Add the heaping 1/4 cup of molasses and blend it in well. “Heaping” is a word I love in old recipes. It means someone trusted you to use your judgment. Add the egg and beat until the mixture is smooth.
In another bowl, sift together the flour, baking soda, salt, cloves, ginger, and cinnamon. Yes, sift. I don’t sift flour for every recipe—who has the patience?—but with baking soda and all those spices, it helps keep little bitter pockets from sneaking into the dough. I learned that the hard way at a holiday cookie exchange. One batch Tasted like somebody had dropped an aspirin into it. Not my finest hour.
Add the dry ingredients to the molasses mixture and mix until everything comes together into a soft dough. Don’t overwork it. Once there are no streaks of flour left, stop. The dough should be easy to roll, though a little sticky is normal.
Form the dough into one-inch balls. Mine are never exactly one inch. Some are plump little golf balls, some are more like walnuts. It all works out. Place some granulated sugar in a shallow bowl and roll each dough ball in it until coated.
Put the sugared dough balls on your well-greased cookie sheet, leaving about 2 inches between them. They spread a bit, and crowded cookies have a way of fusing together when you’re not looking. Then you get one giant molasses continent. Delicious, yes. Attractive, not especially.
Dip the bottom of a juice glass in sugar and gently flatten each cookie ball. The sugar keeps the glass from sticking and leaves that pretty sparkly top.
Bake for 8 to 10 minutes. Watch the first batch closely because ovens are liars. Mine runs hot in the back corner, and the oven at our old house ran so cool I could practically have stored leftovers in it. The cookies are ready when they’ve spread, look set around the edges, and still seem soft in the center.
Remove them from the baking sheet right away and cool on clean toweling or wire racks. I prefer wire racks, though I have absolutely cooled cookies on a folded dish towel when every rack was occupied by something else. That is real life. Let them cool enough that you don’t burn your mouth, if you can manage it.
Variations
A little orange zest in the dough is not traditional but is very good—brightens the whole thing up. You can also make them slightly smaller so they’re more like two-bite cookies, which sounds civilized until you realize people just eat twice as many.
I have tried adding chopped crystallized ginger once. That batch was not bad, exactly, but it crossed the line from cozy spice cookie into something that tasted like it had a strong opinion about herbal tea. I didn’t repeat it.
You can make these a little more festive by pressing a few extra grains of sugar on top after flattening, but they honestly do not need much dressing up. They have enough going on already. Like certain people at a family dinner.
Storage & Reheating
Keep the cooled cookies in an airtight container at room temperature for several days. They stay soft surprisingly well, especially if you don’t leave the lid sitting crooked—which I have done more than once, then blamed the weather.
If you want to keep them longer, freeze them in a tightly sealed container or freezer bag. Put parchment or wax paper between layers if you’re stacking them. They thaw quickly on the counter, usually in less time than it takes to make a decent cup of coffee.
You can warm one in the microwave for just a few seconds if you like that fresh-from-the-oven softness. Be careful, though. Molasses gets hot in a sneaky way.
Final Notes
There are recipes you make because they impress people, and there are recipes you make because they make the day feel a little less jagged. These are firmly in the second category.
I like them best on a quiet afternoon, with coffee gone lukewarm beside me and a stack of things I should be doing nearby. Bills, laundry, some form from the insurance company that appears to be written in ancient code. The cookies don’t solve any of it. But they sit there in their little tin, smelling like cinnamon and dark sugar and older kitchens, and for a minute that’s enough.
Make them when the weather turns. And if the first batch spreads too much or one cookie comes out shaped like Nebraska, well… eat that one first.
Molasses Cookies
Ingredients
- 3/4 cup shortening I use 1 stick margarine and 1/2 stick butter
- 1 cup granulated sugar plus a little extra for rolling and flattening the cookies
- 1/4 cup molasses heaping; use regular molasses, not blackstrap
- 1 large egg
- 2 teaspoons baking soda
- 2 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
- 3/4 teaspoon ground cloves
- 1/2 teaspoon ground ginger
- 1 teaspoon cinnamon
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
Instructions
- Heat your oven to 350°F and grease a cookie sheet well, or use parchment if you prefer, making sure the pan is not dry and sticky.
- Cream the shortening and 1 cup of granulated sugar together in a large bowl until the mixture looks light and blended, not just mashed together.
- Add the heaping 1/4 cup of molasses and blend it in well, then add the egg and beat until the mixture is smooth.
- In another bowl, sift together the flour, baking soda, salt, ground cloves, ground ginger, and cinnamon so the spices and baking soda are evenly distributed.
- Add the dry ingredients to the molasses mixture and mix just until everything comes together into a soft dough with no streaks of flour left.
- Form the dough into one-inch balls, place extra granulated sugar in a shallow bowl, and roll each dough ball in the sugar until coated.
- Place the sugared dough balls on the well-greased cookie sheet, leaving about 2 inches between them so they have room to spread.
- Dip the bottom of a juice glass in sugar and gently flatten each cookie ball, using the sugar to keep the glass from sticking and to leave a sparkly top.
- Bake for 8 to 10 minutes, watching the first batch closely, until the cookies have spread, look set around the edges, and still seem soft in the center.
- Remove the cookies from the baking sheet right away and cool them on clean toweling or wire racks before serving.