How to Stop Gingerbread Biscuits Spreading (and Burning on the Bottom)

I rolled out a whole batch of gingerbread men last December, cut them out one by one, and pulled them from the oven twelve minutes later as a tray of puffy blobs. One had lost an arm. The kids said it was a snowman and ate it anyway, but I'd spent an hour on it and I was a bit cross.

I used to blame the recipe. It's usually the warm dough or the tray I put it on, and you can fix both.

Why gingerbread biscuits spread

Spreading is butter melting before the biscuit has set. If the dough goes into the oven soft, the butter runs out sideways first, and the edges blur before the flour and egg have firmed up enough to hold them.

Handling the dough too much warms it up, extra flour added to a sticky dough throws the balance off, and a warm tray straight from the previous batch starts melting the butter before the oven has done anything.

Chill twice, not once

Everyone says to chill the dough, and they're right, but once isn't enough for me. I chill the dough for an hour after mixing, so it's firm enough to roll without flouring the worktop to death. Then I cut the shapes, lift them onto the tray, and put the whole tray in the fridge for another fifteen minutes before it goes in the oven.

That second chill is the one that saved my gingerbread men. Cold shapes hold their edges long enough for the outside to set.

The dough

This is a plain gingerbread dough that makes about twenty gingerbread men from a medium cutter. It's firm on purpose: a soft, buttery dough is the one that spreads.

• 350g plain flour, plus a little for rolling
• 1 tsp bicarbonate of soda
• 2 tsp ground ginger
• 1 tsp ground cinnamon
• 125g cold butter, diced
• 175g light soft brown sugar
• 1 large egg
• 4 tbsp golden syrup

The tray is half of it

A thin tray that has warped in the oven heats unevenly, and the dough slides towards the low spot as it softens. One side of the biscuits ends up thick and the other thin, and the thin side is the side that burns. A dark, thin tray also burns the bottoms before the tops have coloured, which is the other thing people ask about.

You want a flat tray that stays flat in a hot oven, with enough space around it for the air to move. Our cookie sheet is a quarter-sheet size, 32 x 22cm, made from flat carbon steel that resists buckling. It has a non-stick coating made without PFOA or PTFE, and it's covered by our 10-year warranty. If you want to know what to look for in any tray, our guide to the best baking trays in the UK goes through it.

I still line mine with baking paper for gingerbread, because the sugary dough sticks and caramelises at the edges. A quick wash and a thorough dry is all the tray needs, as our care and use guide explains.

Browse the rest of our baking trays if you want a second one, because baking in batches means one tray is always cooling while the other is in the oven. Cool the tray before you put the next batch on it, or you're back to melted butter.

Other things that go wrong

Biscuits that come out hard were usually baked too long or rolled too thin, so check at eight minutes next time. If the bottoms are dark but the tops are pale, move the tray to the middle shelf.

If you're after other bakes you can make early, have a look at make-ahead mince pies and parkin in a loaf tin.