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Mother Atwood's Molasses Cookies

From Margaret Atwood in A Fair Feast: 70 Celebrity Recipes for a Fairer World, compiled by Vicky Bhogal, published by Simon & Schuster.
In memory of my grandmother, Mrs Florence McGowan Atwood, of Nova Scotia, Canada.

½ cup Fairtrade sugar
1/3 cup shortening (butter)
½ teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon ground ginger
1 cup molasses
1 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda, dissolved in ¼ cup hot water
3 cups of white flour, plus flour for rolling

1 Cream the sugar and shortening together in a bowl.

2 Add the salt, ginger and molasses, and mix well. Add the bicarbonate of soda and then the flour. Mix and knead well into a dough.

3 Roll out the dough and cut out with a cookie cutter. Place them on a greased baking tray.

4 Bake the cookies at 180C for eight to nine minutes. Place them on a wire rack to cool.