I first made this cookies over ten years ago and I have made them every Christmas since. I usually create a sort of gingerbread UN, with gingerbread men from all around the world: a Scottish guy with a kilt, a Japanese woman wearing an elaborately decorated kimono, a French man with a striped shirt and a cigarette hanging from his mouth.

These are hands-down one of my favorite, and one of my most popular cookies. When my mom’s godson was smaller, we used to make these together and he’d always ask for them when he came to visit. One of my uncles always takes home three or four to eat with coffee. Because of all the molasses and spices, my college roommate used to call these the “bully of the cookie jar.” He meant that in the best of possible ways.