I loved my Nana. She was strong and steady. She was practical and smart. She played a mean game of Scrabble. And boy, did she hate to cook (a fact I didn’t learn until years after she died).
Nonetheless, she was amazing at it. She made great pot pie (I’ve adapted her chicken pot pie to a vegetable version here: Vegetable Pot Pie Recipe). My grandpa was a farmer, and Nana was always canning something. Her creamed potatoes were to die for, and we ate her blackeyed peas like they were going out of style.
When I would go spend summers with my Nana and Papa, there was usually a canister of these cookies on the kitchen counter. She made them in the tiny oven of their white porcelain 1930s Chambers gas range.
Today I make them in my modern-home-standard-issue electric oven using her old recipe. I take a bite and find myself right back at that kitchen table, squared off against a robust gray-haired lady bent on my ultimate Scrabble destruction.
Miss you, Nana.
Nana's Molasses Cookies
Materials
- 3/4 cup shortening
- 1 cup unrefined sugar
- 1 egg
- 1/4 cup molasses
- 1 1/4 cups unbleached flour
- 3/4 cup white-wheat flour
- 2 teaspoons baking soda
- 1 teaspoon cinnamon
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 1/2 teaspoon ground ginger
- 1/2 teaspoon ground cloves
Instructions
- Cream together shortening and sugar.
- Add egg and molasses. Beat well.
- Combine flours, baking soda, salt and spices in a separate bowl.
- Add half of dry ingredients to molasses mixture and mix well. Add remaining dry ingredients; mix well.
- Chill dough for 1 hour.
- Preheat oven to 375 degrees F.
- Spray cookie sheet with nonstick cooking spray or line with parchment paper.
- Roll dough into 1-inch balls. Roll each ball in sugar.
- Place sugar-coated balls on prepared baking sheet.
- Bake for 10-12 minutes, until cookies are puffed and golden brown.
- Remove from oven and allow cookies to set on cookie sheet for 2 minutes before removing to a rack to cool completely.
- Store in a tightly covered container.