The Walking Gingerdead

If you’re shamelessly addicted to AMC’s The Walking Dead like I am, then you might be experiencing withdrawals since the show is on their mid-season break. Rather than counting the days until February when the show returns, feed your ravenous appetite with some cookie carnage! Inspired by my own zombie gingerbread tattoo, I put a morbid twist on the classic Christmas cookies! They’re a lot of fun to create and even more fun to devour!

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(makes approximately 30 cookies)

Ingredients:

3 cups all-purpose flour

1 ½ tsp baking powder

¾ tsp baking soda

¼ tsp salt

1 Tbs ground ginger

2 tsp ground cinnamon

¼ tsp ground cloves

½ cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, softened

1 cup dark brown sugar

1 egg

¼ cup maple syrup (you can also use molasses)

2 tsp vanilla extract

8-10 drops of green food coloring (feel free to add more for a more zombie-like appearance)

For decorating:

Multiple colors of cooking frosting/icing

Candy sprinkles

*Side note: If you want to create “victims” as well as gingerdeads, then cut your recipe in half and only add green food coloring to one batch. You can also make one batch of each, giving you 60 cookies total.

(1.) In a medium sized bowl, whisk together flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt, ginger, cinnamon, and cloves. (2.) In a large bowl, beat together butter, brown sugar, and egg with an electric mixer. Add maple syrup, vanilla extract, and food coloring and mix until blended in. (3.) Slowly stir in dry ingredients until completely mixed in. Cover dough with plastic wrap and let it stand at room temperature for 2 hours. You can also make dough ahead of time (4 days maximum), cover and refrigerate. Allow 2-3 hours to stand at room temperature before using.

Preheat oven to 375 degrees F (190 degrees C) and line a large baking sheet with parchment paper.

(4.) On a clean floured surface, use a floured rolling pin to roll out a portion of the dough to about ¼ of an inch thickness.

Use a gingerbread cookie cutter to cut out your gingerdeads and/or victim cookies.

Place on the baking sheet about 1 inch apart from each other. Place in the oven to bake for 8-10 minutes. Remove from the oven and transfer cookies to a cooling rack to cool for 10-15 minutes.

When cookies have completely cooled, decorate as gruesome as you like! I used a knife to carve off bits of the cookies, primarily used red and white frosting, and used small chocolate candy bits for the eyes and buttons.