Ginger Spiced Butter Cookies Dipped in Dark Chocolate -

Ginger Spiced Butter Cookies Dipped in Dark Chocolate

Pre-heat the oven to 175°C. Prepare a large baking tray (you may need two) with grease-proof paper.
Beat the sugar and butter together until light and fluffy.
Sift the flour, vanilla sugar and spices together, then mix into the butter/sugar until a dough forms.
Using your hands, quickly work the dough into a ball, then divide it into two pieces. Take one piece and roll out between two sheets of grease-proof paper, until it is fairly thin. Take your chosen cookie cutter and cut out the dough, using a palette knife to help move the cookie onto the baking tray (keeping space between each on as they do spread a little). Do the same with the other half of dough.
Bake for around 8-12 minutes (dependent on their size), just until the edges are browning. The rest of the cookie will look pale and be fairly soft, but they will harden as they cool. Leave the cookies on the baking tray for ten minutes or so, then transfer to a wire rack to cool completely.
Melt the chocolate in a Bain Marie (double boiler), using a small but deep bowl if possible (it makes it easier to dip the cookies). Dip each cooled cookie in the melted chocolate, shaking off any excess, then place on a tray lined with grease-proof paper. Sprinkle over the cinder toffee (or whatever else you fancy). Allow the chocolate to set before eating. Enjoy!

I use vanilla sugar in my recipes. If this is not available where you are, here's some handy advice from Leaf for converting to vanilla extract.
Please note - I measure my ingredients using grams. To help my American readers, I use online resources to convert to cups. However, these conversions have not been verified by me.
The cinder toffee / honeycomb I used came from this recipe.