Double-Ginger? Oh Snap!

Culture in a Cup, Palate Pleasures, StayHomeStaySafe, Terrifying Transitions

If you give your kid a book of cookies, which one will he pick?

The hardest recipe? Not necessarily.

But he might pick an unexpected one.

I’ve had this William Sonoma cookbook for quite some time (copyright is 2002), but I’ve never had a reason to open it before today.

There’s something about being stuck in your house that invites excuses to bake.

(Probably the fact that we ate the last chocolate chip cookie was inspiration enough. Or maybe it’s the hours spent watching The Great British Bake Off?)

Owned for ten years, first time used!

My son inhales pretty much any cookie you put in front of him. But when I plunked the William Sonoma cookie cookbook in his lap and showed him some options he might like to make, he zeroed in on the picture with rounded heaps dusted with crystallized sugar chunks.

I tried to talk him out of it.

“Honey. This cookie has chunks of ginger in it. You probably won’t like them. And, anyway, we don’t have any candied ginger.”

One finger pointed at the only page he was interested in, much like the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel, wherein Michelangelo depicts God creating Adam.

Now replace Adam with a plate of cookies and you get the picture.

It’s surprisingly hard to find a good digital copy of this image. I would use one I took, but at the time, the guards had a real no-nonsense, no-photographs, we-carry-guns-for-a-reason attitude. Plus it’s a ceiling in a dark chapel. Kind of hard to get a good surreptitious shot with your average camera.

This stilled my arguments.

While the kid worked with an ABA aide, I spent an hour learning how to candy ginger. (Ignore what the book says about it. It is lacking in detail and steps.)

Thank you, Alton Brown, for showing me how to make Candied Ginger right.

Candy is Dandy, but Ginger Makes Your Tongue Whinger

I was short a little as I hadn’t planned on any kind of ginger cookie while crisis shopping and only had a medium sized chunk of ginger in the fridge.

No worries. I used some candied pineapple to make up the difference. It wasn’t noticeable in the end product, so I doubt it harmed the recipe.

And because he picked it, he had to actually make the recipe himself and roll a few balls to fulfill the expectation of ‘DOING SCIENCE’ and ‘FOLLOWING DIRECTIONS’ from his ABA aide.

Despite the kid’s every effort to escape from his choice of chore, he measured and mixed (with some help) all the ingredients to make the dough.

Then came the hard part. Convincing him to pick it up and brush it with egg white and sprinkle on the crystallized sugar.

[Sidebar: Note if you make this recipe, that the “Extra Egg White” isn’t suppose to go into the dough. Instead, it is whipped and then brushed as a coating to make the sugar particles stick to the raw product. If you do accidentally put it in the bowl though, the cookies turn out okay anyway. You’ll just need a third egg for the wash.]

Not the most appetizing looking in their raw state.

Double-Ginger Snaps are quite something when they are done.

When they start to have the signature ‘crackled’ appearance, they are done enough to take out. But they’ll need to cool a bit before you can transfer them to the wire rack to cool. They are pretty soft.

I wouldn’t have picked these as my first choice – particularly with the added step of having to create one of the signature ingredients – but the kid made his choice and I am woman enough to stand by my promise to make a cookie.

Come hell, highwater, or an absence of ginger, moms come through!

It’s kind of what we do.

HERE’S THE RECIPE – FOR AS LONG AS WILLIAM SONOMA WILL LET ME POST IT:

William Sonoma – in these days of struggle and isolation, only a heartless corporation would sue an individual for posting a recipe from your lovely cookbook.

16 thoughts on “Double-Ginger? Oh Snap!”

  1. Yum. I have a particular fondness for crystallized ginger, and in these difficult times, I would be prepared to make my own. On second thoughts, I probably won’t have to; I can’t quite imagine a version of the apocalypse that involves panic-buying crystallized ginger.

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    1. This time of year it’s practically nonexistent. Typically it only comes out at Christmas—unless you shop a specialty store! It was surprisingly easy to make. But quite messy and time consuming. But the leftover sugar is amazing. So, it you live ginger I’d suggest you plan to make it someday. Perhaps when going outside doesn’t mean taking your life in your hands!

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      1. It’s in our supermarkets pretty much all year round, and my local greengrocer sells a particularly nice brand. I try not to buy it too often — it is my candy and I can demolish a bag of it in waay too short a time.

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  3. Mmmm. I would LOVE those cookies. Both of my kids are baking this week. We’ve got fudge and cake right now, and my daughter was talking about another pan of fudge. Luckily, I’m getting a lot of extra exercise as well.

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  4. I love that you’re loving #GBBO ! One of my favourite programs and absolutely the best for these troubled times. And if it encourages you to bake biscuits that taste as good as those look… what better antidote? 😌 Keep baking 🍰

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  5. I’m bookmarking the recipe! This winter, I’ve been noshing on candied ginger – for us, too, it is readily available.

    But since we are out, I may just try these without the added bite.

    LOVE your Sistine Chapel modifications. [giggle]

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