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Gingerbread Men

By Chelsea Sugar
Gingerbread Men
36 servings
  • 227 reviews

  • Difficulty Easy
  • Prep time 20 mins
  • Cooking time 10 mins
  • Serves
    36
Ingredients

    2 cups Edmonds Standard Grade Flour (300g)
    1 cup Chelsea Soft Brown Sugar, Chelsea Dark Cane Sugar or Chelsea Organic Coconut Sugar (200g)
    1 Tbsp ground ginger 
    ½ tsp Edmonds Baking Soda
    150g Tararua Butter, cubed
    1 egg, beaten
    1 Tbsp Chelsea Golden Syrup

    Icing
    1 egg white
    1 ½ cups Chelsea Icing Sugar (225g)
    1 tsp lemon juice
    Water, if needed
    Gel food colouring (optional)

    Lollies or currants, to decorate (optional)

Method

    Preheat oven to 180°C bake (160°C fan-forced). Line two baking trays with baking paper.

    Place the Edmonds Standard Grade Flour, Chelsea Sugar, ginger and Edmonds Baking Soda in a bowl or food processor. Add Tararua Butter and rub in with fingertips or pulse in food processor until it resembles fine breadcrumbs.

    Add egg and Chelsea Golden Syrup and stir or pulse to form a dough. If the dough is sticky, add a little more flour until it forms a workable dough. Wrap in plastic wrap and refrigerate for 30 minutes.

    Roll out on a lightly floured surface or between two sheets of baking paper until 5mm thick. Cut out shapes using biscuit cutters and place on trays. Form leftover dough into a ball and re-roll and repeat cutting out until dough is used up.

    Bake for 8-10 minutes, until golden brown. Cool on a wire rack.

    Icing
    Make icing by beating egg white with a fork until frothy. Fold in the other ingredients to form a pipeable icing. You can test for the correct consistency of icing by dragging a knife over the surface. If the surface smoothes over in approximately 10 seconds, the icing is at the right consistency. Mix in water in very small quantities, until this consistency is achieved.

    Colour icing if desired. Place icing in resealable bags or piping bags. Snip off the corner and pipe decorations onto each biscuit. Use icing to attach lollies or currants, if using.

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Reviews

Average Rating
4.5227
(227 reviews)


Crispy on the outside, soft on the inside. Delicious recipe, easy to make and thats for me, a 10 year old! Great snack, this was a tasty treat for my whole family. Thank you so much to all the people who were involved in making this recipe, and to everyone on this beautiful world. Take care.

Made these today with my 6 year old so yum.

Really enjoyed making these gingerbread biscuits. Really easy recipe to follow. Tasted really nice with just the right amount of ginger in them.

My family loved them!! Easy to make, ours turned out lovely, not too crunchy- slightly soft, just the way we like them. Absolutely scrumptious

Good!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Easy and yummy mix

Yummy! Ginger bread tasty, I love ginger bread, my favourite❤️ My tummy and tongue
enjoyed it all

Yummy! Ginger bread tasty, I loovvee ginger bread, my favourite

Yummy I love ginger bread

The gingerbread man was the best tasting ever! I loved it so much that I had a another one.

I make these every year and love them my kids love decorating + cutting them

Great easy recipe, suitable for beginners and advanced biscuit makers. Delicious

great recipie we added more spices like ginger and nutmeg and cinnamon but it tasted great

Easy recipe to follow but a little too plain. Need to add more ginger and other spices to really taste anything.

The quantities (in cups) don't seem to be right? Too dry to bring together as a dough - I had to add a lot of extra liquid to get it to bind. Not very gingery either.

Hi do we sift the flour?

Easy recipe with great results

thebest

amazing

Added some cinnamon, tastes great.

Amazing this is the best gingerbread recipe ever!

I made these with my mother and we both loved baking & eating them so much. The only thing I would say is that you might want to add a bit more ginger - I found them a little plain.

I helped my mum bake dez

It's good but don't put it in the fridge for long

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Made them today with my boys and they are delicious!
We just put all ingredients into the food processor and blitzt them.
Super quick :)

looks delish havent even started but im exicted to crack on

looks delish havent even started but im exicted to crack on

This is such an amazing recipe. For someone who especially does not have a substantial amount of baking experience, this recipe is one of the best; I make it every other weekend.

Haven't even started baking them yet but I know they will be good

Haven't even started baking them yet but I know they will be good

Very nice!

Very yum but would like to ask if I need to add lemon juice for icing?

CHELSEA SUGAR: Adding lemon juice may affect the consistency of your icing, but will be okay if gone without.

These are insane! This recipe was the first one I had used to make ginger breadmen, but have had 100s before so I knew what to expect, and they were scrumptious! Would 100% recommend, but if you like it a bit more gingery then maybe add a wee bit more, or even add a few more spices to your liking. Love you Chelsea :D

Sooo good my family loves them

It looked super easy simple and delicious

It looked super easy simple and delicious

So easy!!!!!!!

It tastes delicious

I am 9 and it is delicious
reccomded

Very nice and crispy

easy

easy

Such an easy recipe, even though I'm VERY good at mucking up recipes

Super duper easy to make. Brought them to a Christmas shared lunch and we’re a massive hit. We’re gone in seconds. 100% recommend.

So good taste amazing

good

good

good

This is now our tried and trusted annual Kirihimete cookie tradition. We too add a bit of cinnamon. Mīharo!

This recipe is sooooo good only halfway through making it but the mixture tastes yum!!!!!

mix mix mix

lickckc my

If using fresh hand ground ginger you could add another tablespoon for a bit more ginger kick.
Great recipe. Very moist. (I don't know what these other reviews are on about saying it's dry)

i like

very good and tasted really good, good!

very goffy ahh

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LordCluck42

AMAZING!!! I make it all the time but I add 1tsp of cinnamon for extra flavour.

delicious

This recipe was amazing it made a lot of biscuits mmm very yummy

I think that it’s very simple and proper

Great recipe 100% recommend!

yummmmmmmm!

yummy

yummy

yummy

Amazing

i made it to eat the dough. the dough was delicous (dont mind my spelling). 5 star!!

Thay are sooooo good and easy to make. Great for the holidays

I just wasted my time + food. It didn't work! I can't even roll it out, it just crumbles up. PLEASE HELP!!!

Yum

it was yum

Use this recipe one every few months because my whanaū are all horny as hell for ginger. It's excellent, I chill the dough in four or so sections so it stays cool. Nice and easy and you can add more ginger WHICH WE DID BECAUSE WE ARE RENEGADES

this recipe is poggers

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Absolutely amazing. Definitely my go-to recipe!

i loved it. so did my kids

I loved the ginger bread men we made it gf for my family and it was still amazing we love it thanks chelseas!

i loved it. so did my kids

Really tasty, but there was too much ginger.

I thought they were delicious. right texture and my kids and I ate them in two days! Definitely recommend for Christmas baking!

I thought they were delicious. right texture and my kids and I ate them in two days! Definitely recommend for Christmas baking!

I thought they were delicious. right texture and my kids and I ate them in two days! Definitely recommend for Christmas baking!

I thought they were delicious. right texture and my kids and I ate them in two days! Definitely recommend for Christmas baking!

I really like this recipe, but you should have mentioned that it need half an hour more to sit in the fridge :)

Very white, crumbly and tastes bland. Most of the broke before being frosted.

Delicious. Had a great time with my four year old cutting out the biscuit shapes. Thank you.

I replaced ginger with 1t MIxed Spice which worked really well and was more than enough spice!

What can I use instead of soft brown sugar, Darcy cane sugar and coconut sugar?

Do you freeze the mix before you roll it out?

Good stuff

This recipe is amazing!

Delicious

I love me and sister wife love make it

All i can say is YUM!

wuzz upppppp peeeeeps thuz recipe wuz awesome!!!!

Sooo good

quite delightful but a bit much ginger

very yyyyyyyyyyuuuuuuuuuuuummmmmmmmmmmm

I love it me and my brother love to make it

yummy not to dry not wet

so so good, taste really good

Lovely recipe! Whole family enjoyed! I added cinnamon and allspice for extra flavour, it makes a differance

Really easy recipie, added another egg as it was a bit dry

They are a bit dry… maybe more butter?

Made these today with my grandson (aged 4). Easy, no fuss recipe and delicious. We used the icing writing gel to decorate. No mess and lots of fun to make, decorate and enjoy after dinner

Grace (6) got a reader from school about a little girl who makes ginger bread with her mum. So we decided to give it a go. Its still in the oven but we really enjoyed licking the spoon and the bowl together. If the cake taste that good wet we are sure it will be delicious once cooked.

My grandchildren love these biscuits. So easy to make and delicious.

I've used this recipe 3x now for a holiday club and it is fantastic. I do add a little bit of cinnamon. The biscuits are great, semi-soft texture and taste very nice. The kids get to ice them :)

Nice easy recipe, who ever wrote the review "they taste like tux dog biscuits" clearly must of forgot the sugar and got bummed out haha, they are nice, tastes just how a ginger bread man should :)

really good! But i think the icing is too sweet.

This is a great recipe! I've made them twice now and each time I've found the recipe easy to follow, with lovely results. I add a little more ginger, but otherwise follow it exactly. And use large eggs, it really helps. Yum, delicious, and my three-year-old loves them too, especially the decorating part.

The best in the world of chelsea!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

So delicious! I added allspice and cinnamon ( just a personal preference) it’s soft, crunchy and chewy all at the same time!

I love it, thank you for the recipe. Alexis

Very yummy wonderful recipe and icing, my kids loved it!

Do you have to bake the icing? It includes egg white... (Or you can eat the egg white raw but wont that taste weird)


CHELSEA SUGAR: Hi there, the icing is a standard royal icing recipe (no need to cook it). It's great for decorating cookies!

can i chill the dough overnight before using?


CHELSEA SUGAR: Hi there, yes we think this should work fine. Enjoy!

Personally we add alot more ginger , mixed spice and cinnamon.. definitely refrigerate in batches so you can work with a little at a time as it gets pretty hard to lift melted gingerbread shapes -also don't preheat oven to start as these need 30 mins minimum chilling , but good basic recipe! Especially kid friendly

Super tasty recipe. However my dough is super soft and barely workable, followed all the instructions to the T and cooled for over 2 hours but it still came out super soft. When cutting they either stuck to the cutter or the baking paper and when I tried to transfer on to the tray they were squished or became decapitated. Any thoughts on how this could be resolved because I love the taste but gingerbread circles aren't as cool as gingerbread men for the little kids to decorate.


CHELSEA SUGAR: Hi there, the dough for this recipe is usually really nice to work with. It sounds like you may have needed to add a little more flour.

yum so good so fun

Really easy to make, roll and cut into shapes - one of the best recipes we've found :)

Have not made it yet but i am so exited to make it

amazing just amazing

So good and chewy with all the ingredients all there at home

amazing i added cinamin and mixed spice made them so scrummy

the dough tastes very good!!

so we are eating raw eggwhites? is at ok?

They were amazingly delicious!

Love this recipe. Easy and the kids can make with very little help. Thank you

It was yum but extremely hard to work with, especially while I was trying to roll it.

to the people that think its yuck: you either have terrible taste buds or your baking wrong. these biscuits are delicious and the star to our table every christmas. 5 star!

Bleugh! Horrible recipe doesn’t work at all. Horrible. DONT USE IT

this is the best recipe ever my class are going to do it on wednesday thanks you so much for the work

This is a fantastic recipe, I had no problems at all - I made 1.5 times the mixture which made 44 120mm high gingerbread. I softened the butter and pulsed in the whiz. I mixed the eggs and syrup and then slowly added and kept pulsing until it created a smooth mixture and started to form balls. I didn't have enough golden syrup so of the 1.5 tbspns of syrup 1/2 tablespoon was blackstrap molasses which worked just fine. The mixture didn't spread/loose shape. Baked a little longer to get a more crispy finish.

I haven't tried this yet but my daughter is going on camp and I was wondering if they go bad in the sun. If they do, are there any other recipes that don't go bad. (If they don't go bad should I add the icing)? Thanks....

It is awesomely awesome and fun to make.

how soft are they?
CHELSEA SUGAR: Hi there, these gingerbread men are mostly light and crisp, just a little bit soft in the middle - you can alter this by adjusting the baking time slightly.

Well these taste like Tux dog biscuits, which I distinctly remember trying when I was a kid. They have no flavour. Yuck.

It is an awesome recipe that my whole family enjoyed.

It’s a great recipe!
Yum yum YUM!!!

it was amazing

Maybe change the instructions not to preheat the oven since you have to chill the dough for 30mins!

So yummy, easy, and I chucked in a bit of cinnamon too as I've been watching too many baking shows and believe I can alter any recipe like a pro.

Brilliant and yummy.

Such an easy recipe to make with my daughter's, turns out perfect every time.

Excellent recipe made with my 4 year old granddaughter. Really nice texture. Added extra ginger.

Thanks, I am doing this for my school while In lock down.

First ever making gingerbread men and was really happy how it turned out but the only thing that needed more was the flour. I noticed that when i rolled the dough out it was fulling apart. But overall i did well.

I've made these a few times as my family likes them. But after I finish adding all the ingredients, I find the "dough" to be quite crumbly. When I go to roll it out, it's not easy to work with. I've tried adding water and flour when needed but doesnt make much of an improvement. I try not to add extra flour as you can taste it in the end result. Any suggestions? I'm not sure what I'm doing wrong. Does egg size matter? P.S. I add extra ginger.
Chelsea Sugar:
You could try softening your butter more before adding it to the mixture. You could also try using larger eggs.

Have made this time and time again, an absolute hit in our house

This is a really good basic recipe. Foolproof

it good but too thick i couldn't spread em

how many does it make?
Chelsea Sugar:
The recipe can make 36 gingerbread men depending on the size of your cookie cutter.

So quick and easy. Kids played with dough, shaped their creations, cooked and ate their cookies with milk. Awesome evening treat

So Good. I love this recipe. Go Chelsea Sugar

Trash

good :)

Missing something from this recipe. When followed was literally like breadcrumbs still

They tasted good (I added cinnamon) but the texture of the dough was all wrong. First, the mixture didn't come together in the food processor - it was just crumbs. So I added water and ended up needing 5Tbsp to make it form a dough. Then it was slightly sticky to work with. The biscuits spread and lost their shape a bit, although the 2nd tray, which had been re-rolled a few times and had extra flour incorporated, held their shape ok. They were yum but quite soft and breakable.

This recipe didn't work, and had to be altered mid-stride. I followed the instructions and ended up with a dry, powdery mess that needed more moisture. Adding 2 tsp boiling water (recommendation from another recipe I found online) to the ingredients solved the problem.

does it make a difference if you don't put the dough in the fridge?

REALLY REALLY YUMMY!!!!!!!

:)
Chelsea Sugar:
Yes, the spread of the dough during baking will be impacted.

Great cookie, tasted delicious. You could use water instead of egg white.

Add more golden syrup

Just made these cookies and the only thing I could fault was the icing was yum, but quite hard to work with. Made delicious cookies though, and now my sister is begging for more!!

Love this recipe! I made them with my grandma over Christmas last year. Totally recommend!

easy and tasty

Didn’t taste like gingerbread

Quick and easy and very gingery. Not fiddly like some recipes.

Needs more ginger but a really good ginger men. REALLY YUMMY.

Yumm the best gingerbread and I used wholemeal flour because I ran out of plain and honey because I had no golden syrup still amazing. Can't wait to make the Ginger bread house next time.

Made these cookies yesterday and the recipe is perfect. The kids normally pick off the topping on my gingerbread men cookies and leave the rest behind but I am having to make a second batch because the kids ate half of them before I even iced them

Really good recipe, thank you.

This is the best recipe that I have come across for making gingerbread. It’s absolutely soft to eat. This will be my go to recipe from now on.

Yum

A gooey mess! Even though I had measured everything carefully then refrigerated the dough for over an hour, it was too soft. The gingerbread men stuck to the cutter shape and the baking paper beneath. The only sensible thing I found was to roll walnut sized pieces of dough between my hands and then flatten then on the baking tray to make something resembling ginger nut biscuits. I liked the taste of the biscuits.

Great tasting recipe, and easy to make (although needed a bit longer in the fridge to harden). Sadly, I didn't get many Gingerbread Men out of the batch because my 5yr old kept eating the raw dough :)

Yummy and it makes plenty of cookies I love this recipe

Cookies all spread and didn’t maintain their shape. Disappointing.

I've made these 3 times now and each time I've had the same issue.
While these taste nice, the mix is VERY dry - I had to add a good 2-3 tablespoons of water to bring this dough together.
Wont be making again...

So easy to make, and they taste delicious. My grandchildren were a bit skeptical at eating them, now its their favourite biscuits.

Preheat oven then put mixture in fridge for 30 minutes? Silly!

Was very sticky and difficult to work with when rolling. Tastes OK, but could be better. They are fluffy like a cake. 2 stars.

I love this recipe its great and all of my family loves it. All of the children beg me to make it and they decorate them themselves

This is the best Gingerbread Men recipe I have found. We use it all the time. I leave out the golden Syrup for a lighter colour and texture. Chelsea is the first place I come to for great baking recipes they tend to be the best.

I added a heaped teaspoon of cinnamon. It was a great improvement. My grandchildren loved the MM’s and declared they were better than bought ones..

I am a 13 year old girl with a passion for baking and these cookies just win in my book. I've tried so many recipes where we had to dump a whole batch in the the bin but these are just so crisp and soft in the centre. My family also loves the subtle taste of ginger so we never change the recipe for more ginger unlike many other people.

Great Christmas cookies. Easy to do.

Yummy, and so easy to make. To combat warm room temp, I place each tray of gingerbread in fridge for 5-10 mins before popping in the oven.

YUMMY! #number1, awesome cookies but i did add a bit more sugar because its really gingery :) (i made my one on a hot day and they turn out awesome)

Can’t make this on a hot day, it’s way too soft even after half hour in the fridge and doing it on small batches

Easy and perfect results mine only took 6 mins in oven

Really yum and gingery. Was a bit soft to roll so popped back in fridge a couple of times in between.

Very yummy .. a good recipe to save

Really amazing and easy !!!

My gingerbread men turned out very fat, don't add baking soda!

My 3 years old and I made them together. It was so easy to make, and they are very tasty. We love making them!!!

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This recipe works really well and is easy to follow!!!!!!!!!

Great! Sooo fun to make! Yummmm!

MY 2 AND A HALF YEAR OLD GRANDSON AND I HAD LOTS OF FUN MAKING GINGERBREAD MEN AND DECORATING THEM. EVEN MORE FUN EATING THEM! VERY TASTY INDEED.

It is a wonderful recipe!! My 3 years old son and I made them tonight! He loves them!!

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Received Christmas Tree ginger bread from our grandchildren, so yummy, had to get the recipe from my daughter-in-law. Thanks Chelsea and Sheryl for sharing the joy!

Yummy-best ever and fun to make. I freeze a whole batch in airtight container layered grease proof paper. Doesnt soften stays perfectly crisp! So you can look forward to one or two-sunday special treat. Thanks Chelsea

Totally worth making

Hands down the most flavoursome gingerbread recipe I've ever found. Made a double batch two nights ago, making another batch today, far too delicious to not do so.

These are very easy to make and I made about 40 cookies using a Christmas tree cutter....
And my wonderful partner helped me make them as well and we had to put them in the oven for 12 minutes they came out really good nice and crunchy.......

What an awesome recipe, quick and easy, best of all very tasty.

I doubled the ginger and added 1 tsp cinnamon, 1 tsp allspice and 1 tsp vanilla essence. Cut these thin to make crisp gingerbread and thick to make a delicious, soft and chewy gingerbread. I bake twice a year so I'm not an expert but these were soooo easy to make!

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My daughter loved decorating the cookies (and eating the dough as well)!

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Simple and very good recipe. Crisp little gingerbread men. Am making another batch now to make my gingerbread house. Thank you. So glad I found an uncomplicated but lovely recipe.

The recipe was very easy to make and yum....

Yummy

So easy to make. Delicious, though I think I will use more ginger as it was quite subtle.

:) we are going to try these soon they sound the best

This is the best recipe that I have ever heard I do it all the time.

This makes the best gingerbread men. LOVE this recipe.

love your food and baking so good 1 is never enough!

its in da oven yummy yum yum yum

Love it great recipe

Big fave in our household! Esp with skittles or sour skittles

Hi there, My name is Linsey I'm an Occupational Therapist and I used this recipe in an on-ward group.

Nice recipe, but needed to double the ginger and even then it wasn't quite to my preference :) Good for those who like a more mild gingerbread man, though, but if you like to taste the ginger I would add at least 2 Tbsp of ginger!

these are so good to make with your kids and also they taste AMAZING!!!

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I added a little cinnamon and mixed spice to mine. Tastes amazing!

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very amazing

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Easy with a 3 1/2 wee girl.. Esp when using the processer... great treat to leave out for Santa.. :0)

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My 2.5yr old had a great time helping me make these, loved eating the dough as well, but made some great shaped cookies. Thanks

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