Looking for how to make Grama D’s cookies taste different, I looked up what I could substitute for molasses.

According to Cook’s Thesaurus: Liquid Sweeteners, corn syrup, honey, and molasses can be substituted for each other measure for measure. That’s what they said under “corn syrup.” Dark corn syrup has a light molasses taste, so that wouldn’t work. But honey and corn syrup are supposed to be equal to molasses, so I could go with light corn syrup, which has a more “delicate” flavor or honey, which is sweeter.

Under molasses, it says:

Substitutes: dark corn syrup OR maple syrup (works well in gingerbread cookies) OR honey OR barley malt syrup (weaker flavor; use 1/3 less) OR brown sugar (Substitute 1.5 cups brown sugar for every 1 cup molasses)

I can’t use brown sugar, because then there wouldn’t be any moisture in the cookies.

It also says that regular molasses, which is what I used, is much stronger tasting than light molasses. But the store didn’t have light molasses, so I just got regular molasses.

Also, it says molasses can come from sugar cane or sugar beets. But then it says that “golden syrup” comes from sugar cane and it is not equivalent to molasses, but is equivalent to 2/3 corn syrup and 1/3 molasses. Or half honey and half corn syrup.

I really want to try this. It needs to chill for hours, so I could make it tonight and put it in the fridge. But I wouldn’t know if it turned out till tomorrow. But it would be fun.

Update: Okay. I used 1 c honey to substitute for 1 c molasses.

Let me just say that the Cook’s Thesaurus is missing its mark there. 1 c honey left the mixture so hard to turn I almost burnt out my hand mixture.

I added 1 T of corn syrup, because the thesaurus said it is thinner and 1 T more of water. I still don’t think it is as moist, but I am not sure what else I can do to it. I don’t want to make it too wet.

Also, I don’t like coffee, so I cut the coffee with water. So I really added 1/4 c cold coffee and 1/4 c cold water. But I wouldn’t think adding water instead of coffee would make it harder to stir. Therefore it has to have been the honey that made it thicker.

I went back to Cook’s Thesaurus, reading up on honey, but it still says it should be a 1:1 ratio to substitute molasses.

So I have no idea if the honey cookies will turn out. Again I think they taste and smell too much like coffee, but the last cookies don’t taste as much like coffee as I expected them to, so I am hoping these won’t either.

I went ahead and put ginger in again, since I did in the last cookies.

Note: The honey worked, but the cookies still tasted like coffee. Next time try apple juice.

Note: The cookies LOOKED beautiful and they had a great texture. So I just need to make them taste like something Ron wants to eat.