Gingerbread Cookies

Amelia Simmons seems to have been fond of gingerbread as she gives more recipes for it than any other contemporary cookbook. This particular gingerbread is raised with pearl ash (a potash that was the forerunner of baking soda). Potash could be made cheaply from the vast American forests and by the end of the eighteenth century it had become a substantial export, used in the manufacture of soap, cloth, and glass.

Three pounds of flour, a grated nutmeg, two ounces ginger, one pound s