Gingerbread Hearts with chocolate frosting

My son had a project at school and we had to make the gingerbread man . I had some leftover cookies dough so thought will try some heart shaped cookies. It came out pretty good.I am so happy to share this recipe with you all.Here is the recipe. You can eat the cookie as it is, but if you want to make it fancy and pretty coat the cookie with chocolate and do some buttercream icing decorations on the sides.

Heart Gingerbread Cookies

3 cups (420 grams) all purpose flour

1/4 teaspoons salt

3/4 teaspoon baking soda

2 teaspoons ground ginger

1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg

1/4 teaspoon ground cloves

1/2 cup (113 grams) unsalted butter, softned

1/2 cup (100 grams) granulated sugar

1 large egg/egg replacer

2/3 cup molasses

To decorate the cookie:

Semi sweet chocolate chips
Butter cream icing

Method:

In a large bowl, sift or whisk together the flour, salt, baking soda, and spices. Set aside.

In the bowl of electric mixer with the paddle attachment, cream the butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Add the egg/egg replacer and molasses and beat until well combined. Gradually add the flour mixture beating until incorporated.

Divide the dough in half, and wrap each half in plastic wrap and refrigerate for at least two hours or overnight.

Preheat oven to 350 degrees and place rack in center of oven. Line 2 baking sheets with parchment paper and set aside while you roll out the dough.

On a lightly floured surface, roll out the dough to a thickness of about 1/4 inch. Use a heart cutter to cut out the cookies. With an offset spatula lift the cut out cookies onto the baking sheet, placing the cookies about 1 inch apart.
Bake for about 8 - 12 minutes . They are done when they are firm and the edges are just beginning to brown.

Remove the cookies from the oven and cool on the baking sheet for about 1 minutes. When they are firm enough to move, transfer to a wire rack to cool completely.

To decorate the cookie:

Melt some chocolate in the microwave and with an angled spatula spread it on top of the cookie when cookies are cooled . Let it dry.
For the borders i used the store bought butter cream icing and decorated with star tip and used some fondant flowers to make it fancy.

PS: I am sending this recipe to the “Cookie Baking Event” at Neivedyam


and also to Poornima's "For the love of Chocolate" Event.