I’m just getting around to posting the recipe for the cookies that my wife, Kathy, made for the Red Lodge Christmas Stroll, but here you go, just in time for Christmas!

Sometimes when you’re cooking with tea, the objective is to be subtle. In this case, it’s not. Kathy wanted to add ginger to her molasses cookie recipe, and it takes something strong to stand up to all of the flavor in these cookies. She selected the Ginger Cookie Chai from our shop, which is a caffeine-free, rooibos- and caramel-based blend with lots of ginger. You could use pretty much any masala chai blend for this, but if you want to duplicate these delicious results, pick one with caramel that’s heavy on the ginger!

Ingredients

• 4 tbsp ginger cookie chai (use loose tea, not syrup, powder, or tea bags!)
• 3/4 cup + 2 tbsp margarine
• 1 cup white sugar (to mix with other ingredients)
• 1/2 cup white sugar (to roll cookies in)
• 1 egg
• 1/4 cup molasses
• 2 cups all-purpose flour
• 2 tsp baking soda
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 2 tsp ground cinnamon
• 1 tsp ground cloves
• 1 tsp ground ginger

Process

1. Melt the margarine, stir in the loose tea, and simmer on low heat for 20 minutes. Water is good for extracting flavor from tea leaves, but the masala spices need the fats in the margarine (or butter, if you’re a purist) to pull all of the flavor out.
2. Pour the margarine through a strainer or cheesecloth, and squeeze out everything you can. You’ll lose a bit of margarine, but don’t worry about it – that’s what the two extra tablespoons in the ingredient list is for!
3. Mix the margarine infusion with 1 cup of the sugar and the egg. Mix until it’s smooth, and then stir in the molasses.
4. Combine the flour, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, cloves, and ginger, and then blend them into the molasses/margarine mixture. Cover and chill for at least an hour.
5. Preheat the oven to 375°F (190°C).
6. Roll dough into walnut-sized balls, and roll them in the remaining 1/2 cup of white sugar. Place them on ungreased baking sheets about 2 inches apart.
7. Bake for about 10 minutes, until the tops are cracked.
8. Cool on a wire rack.

This recipe makes about 3 dozen cookies.