A favourite family tradition! Baking Halloween Gingers with Coco...

One of our favourite family traditions at this time of year is baking together and Halloween always calls for our Halloween Gingers!

These are so easy to make and lots of fun to decorate, so forget the mess and get stuck in! 

These gingers also work perfectly at Christmas as little homemade gifts for loved ones and even as lovely decorations for the tree - they don’t last long though!

Ingredients:

350g (12oz) plain flour

2 teaspoons of ground ginger

1 teaspoon of bicarbonate of soda

100g (4oz) softened butter

175g (6oz) soft light brown sugar

1 egg

4 tablespoons of golden syrup

2 tablespoons of icing sugar

1 tablespoon of water

Chosen food colouring & decorative sprinkles

Method:

Heat your oven to 180c or use the baking oven on an Aga.

Prepare 2 oven trays using either greaseproof paper or magic non-stick liner.

Put the flour, sugar, ginger and bicarbonate of soda into a large mixing bowl, add the softened butter.

Rub the butter into the flour with your fingertips, until the mixture looks like fine breadcrumbs.

Break the egg into a small bowl and add the golden syrup then use a fork to beat them together really well.

Stir the eggy mixture into the flour with a metal spoon until it makes a soft dough.

Sprinkle a clean work surface with a little flour and put the dough onto it, stretch the dough by pushing it away from you.

Fold the dough in half, turn it and push it away from you until it’s smooth.

Cut the dough in half, sprinkle a little more flour onto the work surface. Roll out the dough until it’s about 5mm thick.

Use cookie cutters to cut out lots of shapes from the dough, then lift the shapes carefully onto the baking tray using a fish slice.

Roll out the other half of the dough and cut out the shapes from that and put it onto the second tray, Squeeze the scraps to make a ball and roll that out to make even more shapes.

Put the baking tray into the oven and bake for about 10-12 minutes, until they are golden brown.

Leave the biscuits on the tray for 5 minutes to cool and then lift onto a wire rack.

When cold, mix your icing sugar in a small bowl with water and add a little food colouring, you can always add more if you would like the colour darker or add more icing sugar if it’s too runny.

Carefully using a teaspoon put the icing onto the biscuit and then add your decorations.

These store really well in an airtight container.

I’d love to see your creations, so if you’re posting photos or videos please do use the hashtag #AskCharlie or tag me @askcharliehow, and let’s celebrate little family traditions together.

Love,