These are my favorite all time cookies.

Seriously.

They are a sweet that is 100% irresistible to me. With a food blog like this people are often amazed that I don’t eat myself silly with all the food. Don’t get me wrong, I love to taste my creations and enjoy them but I don’t find myself sneaking back in the middle of the night to have another cupcake or cookie. These cookies are a different story. I LOVE them. I could eat them in a box, with a fox and here or there. I love them that much.

These cookies complete me. They are so much a part of me that I can’t remember the first time I ever ate them, they were always just there in my memory.

The blend of spices and the chewy texture are perfect. I am transported back to every wonderful memory I have of my childhood and warm cookies in a single bite.

It warms my heart that these cookies are now one of my children’s favorite cookies. They will rush downstairs as the scent wafts up. So it is easy to understand why I make them on the first day that the temperature in Phoenix dips into the high 90’s. Fall is here nothing says fall better than these cookies. I know many of you associate fall with piles of leaves changing colors but cactus spines don’t change color and I doubt you would find many willing participants in a jump in the cactus needle pile, so this is our version of fall.

I hope that these cookies will become a fall tradition for you.

Here’s the recipe:

3/4 cup shortening
1 cup brown sugar
1 egg
1/4 cup molasses
2 1/4 cups flour
2 tsp. baking soda
1/4 tsp. salt
1/2 tsp. cloves
1 tsp. ginger
1 tsp. cinnamon
2 tbsp. sugar

Cream the shortening and brown sugar together in your mixer until well mixed and fluffy. Add the egg and molasses. Stir in the dry ingredients making sure to not over mix.

When people asking me why my cookies are so much softer than theirs the answer is simple. Only mix your dry ingredients until they are mixed in, not more.

Put the 2 tablespoons of sugar into a cereal bowl and set aside.

Roll cookies into tablespoon balls. This is easy to do with a scooper. Roll balls in sugar and place on a parchment paper lined baking sheet.

Before putting your cookies in the oven put a drop of water from a wet finger onto the top of each cookie.

Bake at 350 degrees for 10-12 minutes. These cookies should stay a light brown, do not allow them to brown. You want to take them out of the oven once they “crinkle” on the top. If you leave them in too long you will have hard molasses crinkles and while they are good dipped in coffee the chewy molasses crinkles are the best.

Enjoy!