Have you ever wanted to built your own gingerbread house from scratch but felt too overwhelmed by just the thought of it? My goal today is to break the process down into (semi) simple steps that anyone can follow. Whether you want to make something elaborate or just keep it simple, you can have the outcome you want and start a new holiday tradition with your family.
The first Step is to decide how you
want your gingerbread house to look. I like to look up classic styles of houses
online to get ideas.
Second, it is a good idea to sketch a
picture of the house so you can decide exactly what you want to build.
You will now need to create templates
from cardboard for your gingerbread house walls and roof. Don’t forget smaller
details such as doors, front steps, etc. You can assemble the cardboard pieces
with scotch tape to make sure everything is the correct size. If you are making
a particularly large house it is a good idea to make an additional side wall or
two to be placed in the center of the house to help carry the weight of the
roof.
Gingerbread Recipe
1/2 cup sugar
1/2 cup margarine
1/2 cup dark molasses
1/4 cup cold water
2 1/2 cups flour
3/4 tsp salt
1/2 tsp baking soda
2 tbsp powdered ginger
1 tsp cloves
1 tsp allspice
Cream margarine and sugar well. Blend
in molasses and water.
Sift together remaining ingredients
and blend together until dough forms.
Knead for a couple of minutes, adding
a little more flour if it is too sticky.
Chill 2 to 3 hours. Depending on the
size of your house you will need several batches of this dough. I have used as
many as 15 in my largest house.
Roll dough out about 1/4 inch
thickness directly onto parchment paper or a baking sheet. You should not roll
out and then transfer the pieces to a cookie sheet as they tend to lose their
shapes in the transfer.
Use your templates as a guide to cut
the dough into the desired shapes. The best way I have found to get straight
edges is to use a pizza cutter.
Windows and doors can be cut out at
this stage as well if you plan to
make candy windows for an internally
lit house. The back of the house
should be plain with a hole large
enough to insert a set of mini lights.
The number of lights depends on the
size of your house. A set of 100 is usually enough for quite a large house.
Bake at 350 degrees F. These pieces
should be baked as long as possible without burning as the drier they are, the
stronger the pieces will be (upto 25 min for very large pieces). Aluminum
baking sheets are best for this, preferably the ones without rims.
Trim edges and windows as necessary
while the gingerbread is still hot. Straight edges are a must. The gingerbread can change shape slightly while baking. I like to set my
template on top of the gingerbread piece as soon as it comes out of the oven and run the pizza cutter along the edges
making sure everything is exactly the right size.
Cool on the baking sheet or another
completely flat surface. Prepare the pieces for making the candy windows by
placing them on cardboard covered in a few layers of plastic wrap, or better
yet, silicone baking mats.
Candy Windows:
3 cups sugar
1 1/2 cups white corn syrup
1 cup water
*Combine sugar, syrup and water in a
large saucepan with a candy thermometer. Cook over medium high heat until the
temperature reaches at least 260 degrees. The mixture will come to a boil
quickly, but then it will need to simmer for a while in order to get hot
enough. The temperature is critical because the hotter the sugar gets, the
harder the candy will set up later.
*Pour into the window spaces of your
baked gingerbread. Re-heat gently if the mixture becomes too thick to pour
easily. Be very careful while pouring hot candy, you can sustain a very serious
burn if you spill it on your skin. It’s best to keep the kids out of the
kitchen for this part.
Royal Icing
It is very important to use grease
free utensils and glass or metal bowl when making this icing. This icing dries
very hard and acts as the glue to hold your house together. To cover your roof in "snow",
the consistency will be somewhere in the middle where soft peaks form but it
does not run.
Royal Icing Recipe
4 cups (440 grams) confectioners'
(powdered or icing) sugar
3 large egg whites, room temperature
1/2 teaspoon cream of tartar
Whip all ingredients together until
very stiff and fluffy, preferably with the whisk attachment if your mixer has
one.
If you wish to "paint" your
house, you can do so by outlining all the edges of your pieces in Royal Icing
using a number 4 piping tip. This includes the entire perimeter of the piece
plus around any windows and doors. Trace the outline twice with Royal Icing to
double the height of your outline. Next, color more royal icing with food coloring
and add enough water ( or even better spoonfuls of egg white), a TBSP at a
time, to the royal icing so that it will pour into your outline easily but not
so thin that it will be too runny (I "painted" the back of my house first to be sure my icing was the right consistency). Leave this to dry for a couple of days to a week.
At this stage you may want to
decorate your windows with icing. You can create molding or shutters or any
other details you would like! This in another part where looking at pictures of
real houses can really help. I like to add wreaths (using a star tip) to some
of the windows at this point too.
You are now ready to assemble your
house! An extra set of hands may be helpful but it is not essential (I have
always done it on my own). A batch of very stiff Royal Icing is needed for
"glue". Using a #12 tip, pipe royal icing onto both edges to be
joined and on the bottom where it will adhere to the base, and push them
together. Run your finger along the inside corners to spread the icing tightly
into the corners. This will greatly help the stability of the structure. You
can even pipe extra Royal icing into these inside corners to add extra “glue”.
This is very necessary in larger houses. Continue until the outside walls (and
internal supports, if any) are in place.
Let these pieces dry for several
hours or overnight before attaching the roof sections in the same way. Don’t
rush to get the roof on, the whole thing can collapse if the "glued"
walls are not completely dry.
Finally! This is when the real fun
begins! Decorate your house however you want. I usually like to try for a realistic house as opposed to a
more traditional candy covered one.
You can get creative with what you
use to decorate your house. I like to walk through the candy, cookie, snack,
and cereal isles and just browse looking for anything that could work.
Some things I have found that work
particularly well are;
Malt-o-Meal brand golden grams for roof shingles
Licorice Nibs (cut in half) for bricks
Pretzel sticks for fences
Marzipan is wonderful for other
little details like snowmen or anything else you can think up!
If you like, you can landscape your house
with Royal icing trees. You can do this by using a star tip to pipe green royal
icing onto sugar ice cream cones. I usually cheat a little with my trees. I make cone shapes in different sizes out of paper and apply the icing right over the paper. I have read that you can use a foil covered cone and when the icing has hardened you can remove the foil so you are left with an icing only tree, but that has never worked for me. The icing dries so hard and sticks to everything it touches like cement! This is my one and only "cheat", if you know of a way to make 100% edible trees I'd love to hear it!
When you need colored icing (for trees, wreaths, etc.), I prefer to make them with white icing. Then when completely dried, I paint them with food coloring using a small paint brush. Mixing the food coloring directly into the icing makes it runnier which results in everything looking kind of melted. Dipping your brush in water from time to time adds more depth to the color and just makes it look prettier. This same technique can be used with anything you make out of marzipan.
I hope you can now feel ready to attempt a gingerbread house of your own!
If you have any advise that I did not mention here I'd love to hear it!
-Chloe
