It is so quick and easy to bake a batch of these kid-friendly Gingerbread Men Cookies and bring them to life with a simple icing or colorful candy decoration. This recipe creates soft and chewy classic Christmas treats and makes perfectly spiced, molasses, and brown sugar-sweetened holiday cutout cookies; a delicious delicacy for your festive holiday season.
Delicious Gingerbread Men (or Person) Cookies
This Gingerbread Men Cookies recipe has the perfect spice to sweetness ratio to appease all palates; they are mild enough to call kid-friendly, yet still festively flavorful for adults.
While the traditional treat often has a powerful bite that you either learn to love or love to hate, I decided to revise the original recipe to prove that these cookies taste absolutely delicious and look almost too cute to eat!
Tender in the center and crisp along the edges, these Gingerbread Men Cookies will change the way you think about the classic Christmas (hard and crumbly) cookie because this recipe creates a gingerbread with a surprisingly soft chewiness.
The dough is perfect for shaping and decorating with family and friends and it’s always fun to customize your cookie with smiles and eyes and dress them for the holiday with buttons and bow-ties.
If you love gingerbread, make sure you check out my other delicious Gingerbread Kiss Cookies and Ginger Cookies recipes.
Why We Love This Gingerbread Men Cookies Recipe
- Quick and easy to make and bakes in only 8 minutes.
- Uses simple ingredients to create a Christmas classic cookie.
- Kid-friendly because they are not overly spicy and sweet enough to call a treat.
- Soft and chewy and deliciously adorable.
- Fun for the whole family to make and help decorate.
- Smells like Christmas, tastes like Christmas, looks like Christmas!
- Perfect for a holiday party, cookie exchange, or dessert platter.
Ingredients / Shopping List
- All-purpose flour
- Ground ginger
- Pumpkin pie spice: You can use apple pie spice instead of pumpkin pie spice.
- Baking soda
- Salted sweet cream butter, softened
- Light brown sugar, packed
- Unsulphured molasses
- Egg, room temperature
- Vanilla extract
- Tinted sugar cookie icing: (see my recipe for Sugar Cookie Icing here). I used red and white to decorate my cookies.
Substitutions and Additions
- Swap The Spices: Instead of the pumpkin pie spice, try a mixture of cinnamon, ginger, cloves, and allspice
- Decorations: Feel free to use raisins, currants, cinnamon red hot candies, chocolate chips, or any other candy to create eyes and buttons for your gingerbread man.
- Cookie Cutters: If you don’t have gingerbread men cookie cutters, it is so easy to use this same recipe to make any other ginger cookie cutout. A star, Christmas tree, snowflake, or house-shaped cookie will look just as festive!
- Make Males and Females: Feel free to dress your cookie figure as a female! Put a bow on her head, give her a dress, or add some pretty sprinkle decor.
Recommended Tools to Make this Recipe
- Mixing bowl
- Measuring tools
- Stand Mixer or handheld mixer
- Baking sheet
- Rolling pin
- Gingerbread Man Cookie Cutter
SEE FULL PRINTABLE RECIPE CARD BELOW
How to Make the Best Gingerbread Men Cookies
It is so quick and easy to bake a batch of these soft and chewy, classic Gingerbread Men Cookies. Then bring them to life and have fun dressing them up for Christmas in festive holiday attire.
- Whisk together the flour, ginger, and pumpkin pie spice and set bowl aside.
- Beat the butter for 30 seconds with a mixer.
- Add the brown sugar, molasses, egg, and vanilla and beat until just incorporated.
- Add in the flour mixture and beat on low until well combined.
- Cover the dough and refrigerate for 30 minutes.
Pro-Tip: Make sure you chill your dough. Refrigeration makes the dough easier to work with. At any point during the roll/cutting process, you can stop and refrigerate it if it gets too sticky (be sure to cover dough with cling wrap). - Once chilled, divide the dough in half to make it easier to handle.
- Dust your work surface and rolling pin with flour.
Pro-Tip: Generously dust both the surface that you are working on and the rolling pin with flour. This will keep the dough from sticking, and any excess flour that remains on the dough will bake off in the oven. - Roll out your cookie dough and cut out shapes with your cookie cutter. Place shapes 2″ apart on cookie sheet.
Pro Tip: Dough should be ⅛ – ¼ inch thickness. Keep your cuts as close together to get as many gingerbread men out of your dough as possible. Once you’ve cut out as many cookies as you can, gather the scraps together and re-roll them out again. - Bake cookies at 350 degrees Farenheit for 8 minutes.
Pro-Tip: I recommend using parchment paper or a baking mat with this recipe to prevent the bottoms from getting brown too soon. - Allow the cookies to completely cool before decorating.
- Dress your gingerbread man with sugar cookie icing and candy. Have fun and enjoy!
Tips
- Make sure you chill your dough. Refrigeration makes the dough easier to work with. At any point during the roll/cutting process, you can stop and refrigerate it if it gets too sticky (be sure to cover dough with cling wrap).
- Generously dust both the surface that you are working on and the rolling pin with flour. This will keep the dough from sticking, and any excess flour that remains on the dough will bake off in the oven.
- Keep your cuts as close together to get as many gingerbread men out of your dough as possible. Once you’ve cut out as many cookies as you can, gather the scraps together and re-roll them out again.
- I recommend using parchment paper or a baking mat with this recipe to prevent the bottoms from getting brown too soon.
Storage Tips
- To Store: Store any leftover cookies in an airtight container, at room temperature, for up to 4 days. You can also store them in the refrigerator for up to 7 days.
- To Freeze: You can store the unbaked cut cookie shapes in a single layer, covered in the freezer for 2 months. Allow the unbaked cut cookie shapes to thaw before baking. Decorate after baking.
Frequently Asked Questions
You will know that your cookies are done baking when the edges are just beginning to turn a darker shade of brown. This will yield cookies that have slightly crisped exteriors and soft, chewy interiors. Be sure to let them cool a bit on their baking sheets before trying to move them to a cooling rack, otherwise they may break!
It is so easy to make your own icing. Click here for our simple Sugar Cookie Icing recipe–perfect for decorating Gingerbread Men Cookies!
You can absolutely use store-bought containers of cookie icing to decorate these cookies. The containers with the little tips make it super easy for everyone to draw their desired design on the cookies.
I prefer to use plain old unsulphured molasses for this recipe. Blackstrap molasses usually has a darker appearance and a stronger flavor.
Other Easy Christmas Cookie Recipes
- Christmas Light Cookies
- Jello Divinity Candy
- Meringue Wreath Cookies
- Christmas Cake Mix Cookies
- Melted Snowman Cookies
Gingerbread Men Cookies
Ingredients
- 3 cups all-purpose flour
- 2 tsp ground ginger
- 1½ tsp pumpkin pie spice
- 1 tsp baking soda
- 1 cup salted sweet cream butter softened
- ¾ cup light brown sugar packed
- ½ cup + 2 tablespoons unsulphured molasses
- 1 large egg room temperature
- 1½ tsp vanilla extract
- tinted Sugar Cookie Icing (see the recipe on our website) for decorating. We used red and white to decorate ours.
Instructions
- Using a medium size mixing bowl, whisk together the flour, baking soda, ground ginger and pumpkin pie spice. Set it aside.
- Using a stand mixer, or a medium size mixing bowl and a handheld mixer on medium-high speed, beat the softened butter for 30 seconds.
- Add the light brown sugar, molasses, egg and vanilla and beat just until the ingredients are incorporated.
- Add in the flour mixture, and beat on low until the flour is well combined.
- Cover the dough and chill in the refrigerator for 30 minutes.
- Preheat the oven to 350*. Line 2 baking sheet with parchment paper and set aside.
- Remove the cookie dough from the refrigerator. Divide the dough in half to make handling the dough manageable.
- Dust your work surface and your rolling pin with flour.
- Roll the cookie dough to ⅛ – ¼ inch thickness.
- Press down with the cookie cutter, and gently wiggle the cutter to help ensure a clean cut.
- Place the cut cookie shapes 2 inches apart.
- Bake for 8 minutes.
- Remove from the oven and allow the cookies to rest on the baking sheet 5 minutes before transferring the cookies to a cooling rack. Allow the cookies to completely cool before decorating.
Jenn’s Notes
- To Store: Store any leftover cookies in an airtight container, at room temperature, for up to 4 days. You can also store them in the refrigerator for up to 7 days.
- To Freeze: You can store the unbaked cut cookie shapes in a single layer, covered in the freezer for 2 months. Allow the unbaked cut cookie shapes to thaw before baking. Decorate after baking.
- Make sure you chill your dough. Refrigeration makes the dough easier to work with. At any point during the roll/cutting process, you can stop and refrigerate it if it gets too sticky (be sure to cover dough with cling wrap).
- Generously dust both the surface that you are working on and the rolling pin with flour. This will keep the dough from sticking, and any excess flour that remains on the dough will bake off in the oven.
- Keep your cuts as close together to get as many gingerbread men out of your dough as possible. Once you’ve cut out as many cookies as you can, gather the scraps together and re-roll them out again.
- I recommend using parchment paper or a baking mat with this recipe to prevent the bottoms from getting brown too soon.
Making the dough right now, but I realized in the written words you skipped the baking soda. If you have a chance update it so no one forgets to put it in!
I just bought unsalted butter for other cookies to make this Christmas. If I use it instead of salted butter, how much salt should I add?
Just add a touch of salt.
grandkids loved making the gi gerbread cookies