1. In a suitable container, combine sugar, honey, soda and cinnamon. Pour vegetable oil into them, mix well. Heat in a water bath, stirring constantly, until you get a bubbling mass of homogeneous consistency (10-15 minutes).

2. Add one glass of pre-sifted flour to the resulting mass, mix quickly and let the dough cool slightly. Add the rest of the flour in portions to the still warm dough, kneading well with a fork.

3. When it becomes difficult to knead with a fork, place the resulting mass on a table sprinkled with flour and knead with your hands into a not tight, but elastic dough. The amount of flour indicated in the recipe is approximate (you may need a little more) and depends on how much you have cooled the dough. If you pour flour into hot dough, you will need much more of it, and the dough will turn out tight.

4. Sprinkle the table generously with flour, roll out the dough on it to about 5 mm thick. Cut the dough into squares (you should get 8-9 pieces). Place jam on half of each square (distribute it so that all squares have the same amount), fold the other half to cover the jam, and press the edges with your fingers. The dough should stick together very well so that the filling does not leak out.

5. Place the resulting gingerbread pieces on a sheet of parchment greased with refined vegetable oil and placed on a baking sheet.

Honey gingerbread is a traditional Russian delicacy. They are not ritual dishes, like, for example, pancakes, therefore, without causing any associations, they can be served with tea on any day.

Honey gingerbread got its name because its recipe includes various spices: without them, gingerbread cannot be baked.

So you need to stock up on a mixture of spices in advance (the mixture is suitable for making mulled wine) or separately cinnamon, cardamom, cloves, vanilla, nutmeg, star anise, anise, allspice, ginger.

If you want, you can also add mint essence. Honey gingerbread without spices is like tea without steeping. Of course, you can bake them, but these are not gingerbread cookies, but cookies.

General principles for baking honey gingerbread

Honey dough is made raw and custard. In the first case, all ingredients are mixed cold. When preparing custard honey gingerbread, you should first prepare the syrup, then cool it to about 70 degrees and use it as a base. Eggs, sour cream or butter can be added to the dough. But there are many options for uneatable dough - it is used to make gingerbread cookies, which can be eaten during the fasting period.

Both methods are not particularly difficult and do not require much time. Gingerbread cookies are also baked for a short time, usually 10 minutes.

Many people like to add to gingerbread dough candied fruits, nuts, chocolate. They can also be used to decorate the top of the gingerbread by pressing it into the dough before baking. It’s a good idea to crush the nuts with a rolling pin and stir in. It’s worth trying to add raisins or dried cranberries minced through a meat grinder, other dried fruits, chopped citrus zest - the taste will be original and pleasant.

Honey gingerbread can be stored for a long time, they will remain tasty and aromatic for at least a week. This especially applies to custard gingerbreads. You can put the items in a paper bag and place them in the refrigerator, where they will wait until the holiday or simply be used as needed.

To further increase the shelf life of gingerbread, glazing is used. However, glazed honey gingerbreads also benefit from an aesthetic point of view, and children like them more, because they make them sweeter. You can also cover the products with fondant and decorate with drawing paste.

Gingerbread dough is necessary knead well: at least 10 minutes, ideally about half an hour.

Recipe 1. Raw honey gingerbread “In a hurry”

Such honey gingerbreads will not require a lot of time and ingredients, but they will also taste inferior to custard ones.

Ingredients

Flour – 300 g

Honey – half a glass

Egg - one whole

Butter – 50 g

Soda - about a third of a spoon, quench with a spoon of lemon juice

Spices in total about half a spoon

Cognac (or vodka, etc., taste is not important - this is to maintain fermentation) – 1 glass

Cooking method

Remove the butter from the refrigerator in advance so that it softens, but still does not become liquid. Mix it with spices, cognac, eggs, honey, add slaked soda. Now it's time to add flour, making sure that the dough does not become too dense, otherwise the gingerbread cookies will turn out tough. The dough should be soft, but not liquid, knead relatively well and not be extremely sticky. It will remain sticky anyway; honey gives it this stickiness.

Roll out the dough into a thick flat cake and bake for about 10 minutes.

Divide the layer that has not yet cooled down into two layers using a fishing line or a knife, layer with jam, and fold one on top of the other. It’s better to immediately cut the gingerbread into portioned pieces, because it cuts worse when it’s cooled.

Recipe 2. Honey gingerbread “Orange and nuts”

These honey gingerbreads usually turn out softer than those prepared according to other recipes.

Ingredients

Honey – 400 g

Wheat flour – 1 kg

Egg yolks – 4 pieces

Orange juice – 4 tablespoons

Granulated sugar - 0.3 kg

Vodka - a couple of glasses

Spices

Nuts (for example, almonds, cashews or, as a last resort, peanuts) – 200 g

Candied orange peels

Orange zest – 3-4 tablespoons

Soda – 10 g

Cooking method

Heat the juice, dilute honey and sugar in it. Beat the yolks a little, adding spices, alcohol and soda. Combine with honey syrup. Place chopped (ground) nuts, zest, finely chopped with a knife or scissors, and candied fruits. Add flour little by little until the resulting dough becomes soft and pleasant to the touch. Knead the dough thoroughly. Let it rest for five to six hours.

Roll out into a layer of medium thickness, cut out any shapes with a mold or knife and bake them in the oven for about 10 minutes. Cover hot gingerbread with orange icing or fondant.

Recipe 3. Honey gingerbread “Russian Souvenir” (custard)

This is, in fact, a traditional recipe for honey gingerbread.

Ingredients

Honey – half a glass

Flour – 3 cups

Fructose (you can use sugar, but fructose makes the dough softer) – ¾ cup

Sour cream 20-30% fat – 100 g

Vodka – 2 glasses

Egg - one piece

Water – 50 ml

Spices – up to 1/2 teaspoon

Cooking method

Stir honey and fructose (sugar) in water and heat to 70 degrees. Don't boil!

Add about 1/2 of all the flour and stir it immediately with a wooden spatula, without wasting time, otherwise the flour will form lumps.

Cool the mixture to a temperature cooler than your hands, add sour cream, vodka, egg, and spices. Little by little, while kneading, add the remaining flour, focusing on the consistency of the dough: it should not be hard, but not liquid, soft and pleasant to the hands. Knead for another 10-20 minutes, then immediately roll out, form gingerbread cookies and bake.

Grease hot honey gingerbread with glaze.

Recipe 4. Honey gingerbread “Oreshnik”

Ingredients

Sugar or fructose - half a cup

Honey – ¾ cup

Water - a quarter glass

Eggs – 2 whole and 2 yolks

Softened butter – 2 tablespoons

Amaretto – 2 tablespoons

Nuts crushed with a rolling pin - 3-4 tablespoons

Flour - about 3 cups

Sour cream – 5 tablespoons

Various spices, to taste - up to half a teaspoon

Cooking method

Put honey and fructose (sugar) into the water, heat with stirring to 70 or 75 degrees, but do not bring to a boil. Remove the saucepan from the heat, pour the syrup into a bowl and immediately stir in a cup of flour, avoiding the formation of lumps.

Cool the dough to room temperature, then beat in the eggs and one yolk, add sour cream, nuts, spices, melted butter, liqueur and mix in as much flour as needed to obtain a soft but dense dough that can hold its shape.

Form gingerbread cookies into any shape, place on a baking sheet, brush with remaining yolk and bake for about 15 minutes at a temperature of about 180 degrees.

Ready-made gingerbread cookies can be coated with glaze or decorated with patterns.

Recipe 5. Honey gingerbread for a gingerbread house

You can make a house from these honey gingerbreads - a traditional tasty decoration for Christmas. To do this, you need to bake “bricks” or “blocks” from which to build a house, holding them together with egg white-based glaze. You can decorate the house with marmalades, colored dragees, sprinkles, nuts, candied fruits, or you can simply paint it with tinted protein glaze or marzipan.

Ingredients(indicated only for gingerbread, excluding decorations and glaze for fastening)

Flour – 4 cups

Honey – ¾ cup

Sour cream – 100 g

Butter – 50 g

Powdered sugar – 1 cup

Rum or vodka – 1 glass

Egg – 3 pieces

Spices - up to half a teaspoon

Water - a quarter glass

Cooking method

Dissolve honey and powdered sugar in water (it is better to use fructose) and heat. Add a glass of flour and stir quickly, otherwise there will be lumps that will then be impossible to get rid of.

Remove and cool the mixture. Add sour cream, butter, 2 eggs, spices and alcohol. Add flour, stirring thoroughly. The dough should look like well-kneaded plasticine. Knead well, for at least 20 minutes, preferably 40. Of course, it’s difficult, but you don’t make a gingerbread house every day!

Having given the gingerbread cookies the chosen shape or simply rolled them into a layer from which the parts will be cut out after baking, place them on a greased baking sheet, cover the surface with the remaining egg and bake in the oven at 200 degrees until done (usually about 10 minutes).

Get the gingerbread cookies. If you decide to cut from a ready-made gingerbread layer, it is better to cut immediately while it is hot. But it’s better to build a house from cooled honey gingerbread.

Recipe 6. Honey gingerbread made from a mixture of rye and wheat flour

For honey gingerbread, it is generally better to take 2 grades of flour, and it will be even more interesting if you use rye flour in the ratio of 1 part rye to 2 parts wheat flour.

Ingredients

Wheat flour – 300 g

Rye flour – 150 g

Curdled milk – 1 glass

Sour cream with a fat content of at least 20% - 100 g

Egg yolks – 2 pieces

Honey – 400 g

Apricot jam for glazing

Spices

Cooking method

Heat the honey in a water bath until it liquefies, add rye flour to it and quickly stir with a spatula. Mix wheat flour with yogurt, sour cream, spices and yolk. Cool the honey mixture and mix with the remaining ingredients. Knead the resulting dough well.

Place the dough on a baking sheet and bake at 220 degrees for 7 or 10 minutes. Remove, cut into squares, let cool until warm and glaze with apricot or some other jam, spreading it thinly over the surface of the gingerbread. It is better to serve these honey gingerbreads right away.

Recipe 7. Lenten honey gingerbreads

Of course, even during Lent you sometimes want to pamper your homemade honey gingerbread. Our ancestors did not deny themselves such pleasure.

Ingredients

Flour – about 0.5 kg

Water – ¼ cup

Vegetable oil – 3-4 tablespoons

Honey – 350 g

Sugar or fructose – 150 g

Dried fruits – 100 g

Soda – 1/2 teaspoon

Vodka or liqueur – 2 tablespoons

Spices

Lemon or orange zest - 2 tablespoons chopped

Nuts, candied fruits, etc. – optional

Cooking method

Dissolve honey and sugar in hot water, reserving a little honey for glazing. Do not boil the mixture!

Quickly stir half the flour into the syrup, making sure there are no lumps. Let cool.

Grind dried fruits in a meat grinder. Add the remaining flour, butter, zest, alcohol, spices and soda to them. Combine the mixtures, add the remaining flour and knead well. Let stand for a couple of hours.

If you want to add chopped nuts or candied fruits, you need to do this now. Then make gingerbread cookies or roll out the dough and cut out the figures. Place on a sheet and bake in a hot oven (220 degrees) for 7-12 minutes.

Ready-made gingerbread cookies should be glazed with honey heated until liquefied, applying it with a brush.

Recipe 8. Honey gingerbread on rye breadcrumbs

Despite the unusual nature of the recipe, the honey gingerbreads it produces are very pleasant.

Ingredients

Rye crackers, crushed into crumbs - 2 cups

Cookies, crushed into crumbs - 1 cup

Syrup or jam with a sour taste (for example, currant) - 1 cup

Honey – half a glass

Flour – 1 tablespoon

Cognac – 1 tablespoon

Spices

Vegetable oil – 3 tablespoons

Sometimes egg yolk is added

Cooking method

Heat honey and jam, add spices, butter and mix in a spoonful of flour. Add crackers and knead the dough. It must be pretty cool.

Place the dough on a baking sheet and place in the oven, heated to 200 degrees and turned off. Dry thoroughly.

Cut out different figures from the layer and cover them with glaze.

Recipe 9. Regular glaze for honey gingerbread

It is better to cover honey gingerbread cookies with this glaze, applying it with a brush.

Ingredients

Water – 1 glass

Powdered sugar – 1 cup

Egg whites – 2 pieces

Cooking method

Pour sugar into water, dissolve and boil the syrup until the so-called soft ball test (that is, when a drop of syrup thrown into a glass of cold water begins to turn into a ball, soft to the touch).

Beat the egg whites thoroughly with a mixer and, without ceasing to beat, gradually pour in the syrup in a thin stream. Continue beating for a few more minutes. Add lemon juice or other flavoring. Gingerbread cookies should be coated with glaze at a temperature of about 60 degrees. This means that the finished glaze must either be heated or cooled to the desired temperature.

Recipe 10. Lenten glaze for honey gingerbread

Ingredients

Water with lemon juice – 3 tablespoons

Powdered sugar – 1 cup

Cooking method

Heat the water to 40 degrees and add powdered sugar. Mix very well.

• There are a huge number of recipes for honey gingerbread, the choice of them should be made in accordance with how you intend to use them. The most delicious gingerbreads are obtained when prepared according to the traditional recipe: with butter, egg and sour cream. Excluding these ingredients or replacing them with others will lead to some deterioration in the taste of honey gingerbread, as will an increase in the amount of sugar to the detriment of honey. So, if circumstances permit, it is better to prefer one of the traditional recipes.
• However, Lenten gingerbreads also turn out tasty and aromatic. But it's better to cover them with icing!
• Don't overheat the honey syrup! When honey boils, it loses its aroma and acquires a not very pleasant taste.
• They put a lot of spices in gingerbread, but not so much that they overwhelm the taste of the product itself.
• The zest should be chopped. It is better to take fresh orange or lemon zest.
• When cooking the syrup, you must ensure that it does not stick to the walls of the pan. Anything found there should be washed with damp (not wet!) gauze. If caramelized sugar does end up in the syrup, it will have to be digested by adding water.
• The most fragrant gingerbreads are made with buckwheat honey.
• Honey gingerbread cookies can be colored by adding a spoonful of burnt sugar to the dough.
• Gingerbread cookies can be coated with chocolate. To do this, melt the chocolate in a water bath, you can add a small piece of butter. Place the gingerbread on a fork and dip into chocolate. Place on a glass plate or cutting board.

Now the Nativity Fast is underway and many Orthodox Christians want to decorate their table with delicious gingerbread.
1. How can you make gingerbread lean without compromising its taste? (i.e. what can replace butter and eggs)?

2. What baking powder is better to replace soda? (since soda, even slaked with vinegar, gives the product a specific smell)?

There is a recipe for lean honey dough (no fat or eggs at all), from which you can make honey cookies, honey gingerbread cookies or honey cakes with filling (for example, with nuts).
If you do not add fat to the dough for honey cakes, then the finished honey cake must lie for some time to become crumbly and tender.
If you don’t like soda, then you can replace it with potash or ammonium (I’m not sure about the pleasantness of their smell, because I always cook with soda myself, but I usually take very little of it, 1/4 - 1/2 teaspoon - depending depending on the amount of other components).

Lenten honey dough:
0.5 kg honey or sugar syrup
0.5 kg flour
2 tablespoons rum - you can do without rum
0.3 teaspoon of soda or 10 g of potash (or ammonium)
spice mixture for gingerbread according to your taste:
a pinch of cinnamon, cloves, pepper, nutmeg,
or anise, coriander, cinnamon and cloves
or ginger with cinnamon and cardamom
0.5 teaspoon grated lemon or orange zest
chopped nuts, candied fruits, pumpkin seeds, almonds, etc. - as desired
a pinch of salt

Heat the honey until it becomes thinner.

Sift the flour, mix with salt and spices, add honey and nuts, lemon zest, ammonium dissolved in rum (or soda - it does not need to be dissolved in anything).

Mix everything thoroughly and knead the dough, it will be sticky.
This dough should be allowed to stand for 24 hours, then the honey cake will be tastier.
In addition, lean honey dough can be stored in the refrigerator for several weeks and baked into products as needed.

Roll out the dough to a thickness of 1 cm, cut out the shortbread using curly notches.
(you can roll it out thinner, starting from 2 mm - if desired).
Decorate each future gingerbread - sprinkle with nuts, seeds or poppy seeds, and bake until light golden brown at 180°C
(baking time depends on the thickness of the gingerbreads - about 7 minutes for thin ones, 15 minutes for thicker gingerbreads).

Important:
These honey gingerbreads become hard as a rock after cooling, so place the hot baked gingerbreads on a dish and cover with a towel (rather than cooling on a wire rack).
Cooled gingerbread cookies should be allowed to sit for at least a day so that they become softer - baking with honey has the ability to absorb moisture from the air.

If the room is very dry (relative humidity is less than 50% and the bread instantly turns into crackers), the gingerbread cookies need help, giving them a source of moisture.
For this:
wash 2 juicy apples,
cut into slices
place them along the “sides” of the dish with gingerbread cookies (try to ensure that the gingerbread cookies do not come into contact with the apples),
Cover the dish hermetically with a plastic bag and let the gingerbreads sit in the company of chopped apple slices for a day or two - they will become soft.

Then we take away the apple slices, and, if desired, cover the soft gingerbread cookies with glaze, let the glaze dry

Or immediately decorate with decorative sugar sprinkles - and you are ready to eat.

Christmas honey gingerbread cookies covered with chocolate glaze.

Chocolate glaze:
Melt 50 g of bitter dark chocolate (brut, 78% cocoa) in a water bath.

One of the oldest delicacies is gingerbread.

For weddings, name days, and on major and minor Orthodox holidays, gingerbread cookies were made in every city, and each variety had its own recipes, special shape and decorations.

The first written mention of honey cakes dates back to 350 BC. The Egyptians also made unleavened flatbreads and coated them with honey.

In Russian gingerbread, honey is contained in large quantities in the dough, and there is no such variety of gingerbread as in Russia in any other country in the world. The first gingerbread cookies appeared in Rus' in the 9th century. They were made from a mixture of rye flour, honey and berry juice. Such gingerbread cookies were called “honey bread.” This delicacy received the name “gingerbread” much later.

Already in the 11th-12th centuries, gingerbread acquired the composition of flour, honey and spices, which in subsequent centuries was enriched with new varieties, shapes and variants of skillful decorations.

In the 13th century, exotic spices from the Middle East began to appear in Russia, which, of course, were added to gingerbread. From that time on, the name “gingerbread” was finally assigned to Russian honey baked goods.

In the 18th and 19th centuries, gingerbread production flourished in Russia. The main “gingerbread” regions took shape: Tula, Tver, Vyazemsk, Kharkov, Ryazan, Novgorod. Gingerbread was made in the north - in Arkhangelsk and in the Urals - in Perm. Tver gingerbread makers even had their shops in European capitals.

The composition of the gingerbread is quite simple.

It is based on a mixture of rye flour and honey (in old recipes the ratio was equal, but then less honey was added), yolks and milk (in some types of gingerbread). Aromatic crushed spices rich in essential oils were used as flavoring and aromatic additives: cinnamon, cloves, star anise, cardamom, allspice, nutmeg, ginger, anise, lemon, vanilla or decoctions of aromatic herbs (oregano, mint). The essential ingredients in gingerbread are black and white molasses and burnt sugar. Gingerbread cookies were often prepared with berry filling (jam, marmalade); sometimes nuts, candied fruits, raisins and other dried fruits were added.

Most Russian gingerbread was made meatless (without eggs or milk). The main binding component of gingerbread dough was honey, molasses or sugar. If milk and eggs were added, then very little (1 glass of milk and 1-2 yolks per kilogram of flour). The components were mixed until smooth, after which the dough had to be kneaded into a homogeneous plastic mass. After kneading or, as they say, “beating,” the dough should be allowed to rest for about 15 minutes, and then the gingerbread cookies should be baked.

The high content of honey made the finished gingerbread crumbly, soft, aromatic and not stale for a long time. Honey acted as a natural leavening agent; sometimes a little sour cream was added (100-200 g per 1 kg of flour), which, in combination with honey, gives a light fermentation that loosens the dough. The effect of weak leavening is very important, because if you overdo it, the characteristic gingerbread density will turn into unnecessary softness inherent in shortbread cookies.

The first gingerbreads had several varieties, and most often they were “molded”, that is, hand-made products of various shapes. In the North, traditional “roes” were made, which were cut out of very dense dough and then decorated with multi-colored glaze. For the “roe”, a special component was prepared - “zhzhenka”, consisting of sugar syrup, brought to a very thick state, with a specific amber-brown color.

Over time, Russia appeared many types of gingerbread, which can be roughly classified

*according to production technology (raw, beaten, brewed);
*by appearance (written, curly, printed, embroidered);
*by composition and filling (mint, honey, almond, raspberry, molasses).

Most often, gingerbreads were distinguished by place of origin: Tula, Moscow, Vyazma, Rzhev, Gorodets. Although gingerbread had much in common (they all contained honey and rye flour), each locality used traditional flavorings. Gingerbread cookies from different regions could also be distinguished by their appearance: shape, printing and glaze.

Gingerbread cookies were called beaten from pieces of dough that were so large (a pound or more) that there was no way to knead it with your hands. The dough was beaten by several people with special sticks or bats.

Printed gingerbread cookies, as the name suggests, they were decorated with a seal imprint on the front before being placed in the oven. These are the famous Tula gingerbread cookies. The seal usually depicted fairy-tale characters or ornamental designs. Sometimes the city's coat of arms or other symbols could be found on the seals.

Custard gingerbread have been doing it for quite a long time. The dough was kneaded with hot molasses syrup at a temperature of about 65°C, mixed with honey and kept hot for some time. Then it was cooled to 25-30°C and left for several days to ripen.

Raw gingerbread made with a little more honey, mixing all the ingredients at the same time at a temperature of 20-22°C.

Nowadays the following gingerbread dough recipe is most often used:

Ingredients:

750 ml (3 cups) flour,
250 ml (1 glass) honey,
50 g butter,
2 eggs,
1/2 teaspoon baking soda (see NOTE and try to skip the baking soda)
1/4 teaspoon spice mixture (see below).

NOTE

If instead of soda in this dough (in choux - only after complete cooling) add fresh fat sour cream (in this recipe 50-150 g according to the consistency of the dough) and 2 tbsp. spoons of vodka, cognac or rum, then you will get real gingerbread dough without chemical leavening agents. The dough will loosen the weak fermentation of sour cream and honey, and the added alcohol will give the dough airiness.

In addition, real gingerbread can only be custard. Raw gingerbread is much less tasty and quickly becomes stale.

Excellent results are obtained by adding various ground berries to the gingerbread dough, as well as adding finely chopped or minced dried fruits to the dough - raisins, dried apricots, dates, prunes and others.

The gingerbread dough should be kneaded very vigorously (10-40 minutes depending on the size of the piece), then immediately cut and baked immediately. Gingerbread dough does not tolerate aging or storage!

Surprisingly, using low grade flour for gingerbread gives better results.

Preparation using the raw method:

Put honey in a saucepan, add pre-mixed butter, eggs and spices, mix or beat everything thoroughly. Add flour mixed with soda and knead the dough. The dough should be kneaded by hand (the longer, the fluffier and softer the gingerbread cookies will be).

Cooking using the custard method:

Put honey in a saucepan, add a quarter glass of water and heat to 50-60°C, add half the flour (after sifting it) and mix the dough vigorously until smooth. Cool the finished, kneaded dough to room temperature, add eggs, soda and the other half of the flour. Immediately mix everything and start kneading. The longer you knead, the better the gingerbread cookies will come out. When the dough is soft and pliable, divide it into pieces and bake.

Do not make the dough too stiff - the gingerbread cookies may turn out very hard and the dough will not rise. Too soft, on the contrary, will spread, the gingerbread will have an unclear shape, with flattened edges. The dough should be soft to the touch, plastic, easy to mold, take shape and retain it for a long time.

Any gingerbread is flavored with herbs or ground spices. This is an important part of cooking.

Aromatic additives (in gingerbread making they are called “dry perfumes”) are added at the dough kneading stage so that they properly saturate it with their odors. You can use the composition suggested below or come up with your own - the main thing is that the prepared spices are pleasant to you in the finished and mixed form. If any component seems out of place or you simply don’t like its smell, change it at your discretion.

35% coriander,
30% cinnamon,
10% cardamom,
10% nutmeg,
5% cloves,
5% star anise,
5% allspice.

All components must be thoroughly ground into dust and kneaded into the dough when it is still quite liquid.

As additional elements, you can add lemon zest, chopped roasted nuts (for example, walnuts), and a little vanilla to the gingerbread dough. If you couldn’t find rye flour, you can tint the dough with burnt sugar. Burnt sugar is added along with spices to the still liquid dough.

Previously, gingerbread filling was made from berries and a very dense marmalade was prepared. No sugar was used, as the natural sweetness of the berries allowed for a sweet and full flavor. Now the filling for gingerbread can be thick almost caramelized jam, thick jam or marmalade, pureed from the peel and seeds.

To give the gingerbread a beautiful shape, roll out the dough with a rolling pin on a large board or table, sprinkling the surface with flour. If you decide to make a gingerbread for the entire baking sheet, then roll out a layer about a centimeter thick. For small gingerbreads, the layer should be rolled out to a thickness of 5-8 mm. After rolling out, cut out pairs of figures, place the filling on the surface of one, cover with the other half, and seal the edges tightly.

Gingerbread cookies were often decorated with a seal or glaze, sometimes the seal and glaze were present at the same time. The glaze is made from sugar diluted in water and beaten with egg whites.

Real glaze (on egg whites)

Ingredients:

400 g sugar,
5 egg whites,
0.25 glasses of water,
lemon zest.

Preparing the glaze:

Dissolve sugar in water and cook until it becomes lipstick. Beat the whites until stiff and slowly pour the sugar into the whites, whisking continuously (do this with an assistant). Grease the gingerbread with the prepared mixture and dry in a very hot oven (or oven) until a dry crust appears.

After decorating, place the gingerbread cookies on a greased baking sheet. Brush the top layer of gingerbread with egg yolk and sprinkle with crushed nuts if desired. Bake small gingerbreads at a temperature of 220-240°C for 5-10 minutes, large gingerbreads or large gingerbreads - at 180-220°C for 15-20 minutes. Wipe the top of the finished gingerbread with a napkin (not paper) and cover with glaze again. Leave in the hot oven to dry the glaze.

A recipe for Tula gingerbread that has survived to this day. does not name the exact proportions, but it gives you the opportunity to experiment and try to make gingerbread, which was prepared three hundred years ago in the Tula province.

Add honey and eggs to the softened butter and mix thoroughly. Sift the flour and knead the dough using melted water and soda. For the filling, boil the jam with sugar until it becomes thick. Roll out the dough, fold it into two layers, place the filling between the layers. Place the dough in a hot oven for 1-2 minutes. Cool and bake for another 5 minutes in a hot (but not hot) oven. Cool again and apply glaze. Place the gingerbread back into the oven for one minute to allow the icing to set and harden.

Gingerbread is made not only in Russia. Chinese gingerbread is baked once a year for the Moon Festival, which is celebrated on September 19th.

A beautiful legend says that Chang E, a fairy living on the Moon, invented and was the first to bake such gingerbread cookies for her son, who grew up as an orphan on Earth and magically ended up with his mother on the Moon. It was on the 15th lunar day of the 8th month. The lunar ruler, having learned that a mere earthly mortal had ended up on the Moon, drove the boy away. Years passed, the boy grew up, became a powerful ruler and, in memory of his mother, ordered his subjects to bake gingerbreads round like the Moon every year on the 15th day of the 8th month.

Mooncakes.

In China, mooncakes are eaten during the Moon Festival. Mooncakes come with different fillings.

Here is the recipe for this Chinese delicacy.

Ingredients:

550 g flour,
400 g molasses,
150 g sugar,
100 ml corn oil,
125 g walnuts,
100 g almonds,
100 g melon seeds,
100 g sugar melon,
100 g sesame seeds,
120 ml water,
75 g rice flour,
75 g candied tangerine,
1/4 tbsp. spoons of dark soy sauce,
2 tbsp. spoons of brandy.

Preparation:

Combine half a tablespoon of baking soda with molasses, corn oil and one tablespoon of water. Beat the dough with a wooden spoon and leave to stand for 4-5 hours.
After the required time has passed, add a couple of drops of soy sauce and, sifting the flour through a sieve, gradually knead the dough. The dough should not be very stiff.
After kneading, let the dough stand for 6-7 hours.
Divide the dough into equal parts (50 g each).
Combine nuts, chopped candied fruits, seeds, sugar, soy sauce, remaining water, rice flour and brandy. Mix well. Divide this mass into 100 gram parts.
With your hands dusted with flour, wrap each piece of filling in a piece of dough, place in a round mold to form an even circle and place on a baking sheet.
Bake at 180°C.

Today, honey gingerbread is prepared in Belarus, Poland, Northern Europe (something between shortbread and gingerbread), but gingerbread became most widespread in Russia in the 19th century. Such an abundance of types, tastes and aromas of gingerbread was not found anywhere else in the world in those days. Therefore, Russian gingerbread cookies at the end of the 19th and beginning of the 20th centuries were widely supplied to many countries in Europe and America. Then countless wars in the first half of the twentieth century killed the entire Russian gingerbread industry. Attempts to revive it began only in the 1950s.

But by that time, most of the recipes for Russian gingerbread were lost, and the modern Russian industry called “gingerbread” generally produces something rather faceless (see below for more on this), but with many chemical additives.

Nowadays, the concept of “Russian gingerbread” is associated specifically with Russian classical cooking of the 19th century.

But we must not forget that our Russian gingerbreads are quite worthy of not using modern industrial substitutes from the store, and baking your own homemade gingerbreads more often at home, not only on great holidays - after all, gingerbreads are simple and quick to prepare.

In your home kitchen, experiment more with various additives to gingerbread dough - and the taste of your gingerbread cookies will exceed all expectations.

The legend of Tula gingerbread

In ancient times, one prince, having tasted Tula gingerbread, set out to bake the same delicacy in his principality in order to surprise the embassy guests. He called a skilled gingerbread master from Tula-city and told him: “If you please me, if the gingerbread tastes like Tula, I will shower you with pearls and gold, and if you don’t please, I will drive you away in shame.”

The master agreed, because he walked in glory among the Tula gingerbread makers. He began to do magic and work, and when the gingerbread cookies were ready, he asked the prince to try the miracle delicacy.

The prince tasted it and his face changed, and in anger he called the gingerbread master an incompetent fraudster because the gingerbreads were not of Tula taste, and he drove away in disgrace.

The prince called another gingerbread maker from Tula and told him what he had told the first, who was driven out in disgrace. And the second master agreed, because he walked in even greater glory with the Tula gingerbread makers. This master looked at the well with flour, looked into the well and said the following words to the prince: “Give me, prince, Tula flour and Tula water, otherwise I don’t agree to work.” The prince thought and thought and answered: “Be it your way.” And he ordered his people to deliver to the principality what the gingerbread master required. When the flour and water were brought, the master began to perform magic and work, and then asked the prince to taste the miracle delicacy. The prince tasted it and his face changed, and in even greater anger he called the gingerbread master a swindler and drove him away in disgrace.

But the miracle delicacy did not leave the prince’s head, and he called from Tula the third gingerbread master, who had absolutely no equal, and told him the same words that he said to the first and second, who were driven out in shame.

The third master looked at the flour, tasted it on his tongue and said: “The flour is good.” He looked at the water, scooped it up with a ladle, took a sip, held it in his mouth and said: “The water is good.”

“Well, get to work and remember our agreement,” the prince told him. The master thought and thought and answered: “I’ll start, prince, but under this condition - in addition to Tula flour, and besides Tula water, bring here, prince, Tula air, then the gingerbread will taste the way you need.” The formidable prince thought. He understood that it was easy to bring flour and water from Tula, but it was impossible to bring air. The prince thought and thought and his face changed and brightened. He released the gingerbread master and rewarded him with a handful of pearls and a handful of gold for his resourcefulness.

Quoted from the text Kolesnik L.S., Sulimova T.N., Sokolova M.N., Kudryashova O.I. “Tula is the gingerbread capital. From the history of confectionery in Russia and Tula"

Now on the Internet there is such a recipe for Vyazma gingerbread at home:

Compound:

Flour - 160 g
- sugar - 130 g
- oil - 10 g
- almonds - 8 g
- honey - 50 g
- marmalade - 100 g
- molasses - 6 g (molasses should be replaced with strong fructose syrup, to which lemon juice is added to taste)

for syrup:

Sugar - 200 g
- water - 100 g

Cooking method:

Boil sugar syrup with honey until it boils and cool it. Knead the dough, add butter, grated almonds and diluted molasses and roll it all together.
Then roll out thinly and cut into pieces. Put apple marmalade or chopped candied fruit into the dough and fold the gingerbread into a closed book.
Pour sugar syrup over the finished gingerbread cookies.
Preparation of syrup for glazing: add sugar to water and boil until it boils down, skim off any foam that has accumulated on the syrup, cool slightly, flavor it if desired, and start glazing the gingerbread cookies or gingerbread cookies.
You can glaze with a brush; small gingerbreads can be dipped whole into a bowl with syrup. Place the glazed gingerbread or gingerbread cookies in a very warm place (50-60 degrees), place the products on sheets, drying them until a shiny crust with a white coating appears on them.

Note: boil the syrup “to the thread” - this means that if you take a few drops of syrup as a test with two fingers, then when you press one finger with the other, a thread should form between them.

The recipes for Gorodets gingerbread were taken from a brochure purchased at the museum. It contains several options for preparing gingerbread dough and useful recommendations.
The capacity of the glass indicated in the recipes is 250 ml.

So, gingerbread dough can be simple or choux. Products made from choux pastry do not go stale longer and are much tastier.

Ingredients:

3 cups wheat flour
- 1/2 tsp. soda
- 3/4 cup sugar
- 1/2 cup honey
- 50 g butter
- 2 eggs

Gingerbread "Starorusskie"

Ingredients:

Rye flour - 2.5 cups
honey - 1 glass
sugar - 1/3 cup
zest - 1/2 orange
alcohol - 1/3 cup
cloves - 1/2 tsp.
nutmeg - 1/2 tsp.
allspice - 1/2 tsp.

Preparation

Boil honey, cool, stir in spices, grated orange zest, whisking with a spatula, gradually add sugar, alcohol, flour, and when the mass has cooled, knead the dough.
After this, process the dough, folding and stretching until it turns white.
Let sit for 20-30 minutes, cut into round gingerbread cookies of regular thickness and bake on a floured baking sheet for about 15 minutes.

Oatmeal gingerbread

Ingredients:

Flour - 250 g
sugar - 200-250 g
ground oat flakes - 250 g
soda - 1/2 tsp.
citric acid, honey - to taste
egg - 2 pcs.
butter - 50 g
nuts - to taste

Preparation

Mix all ingredients except butter and nuts. Add butter and nuts and knead the dough.
Form gingerbread cookies, place on a baking sheet greased with margarine and place in a preheated oven for 30-40 minutes.

Walnut gingerbread with candied fruits

Ingredients:

Candied fruits (lemon zest) - 90 g
candied fruits (orange peel) - 90 g
soda - 3 g
rum - 2 tbsp. l.
egg - 2 pcs.
sugar - 125 g
cinnamon - 1 tsp.
cloves (ground) - 1/4 tsp.
nutmeg color - 1/4 tsp.
salt - 1 pinch
zest (grated lemon) - 1 tsp.
almonds (chopped) - 100 g
hazelnuts (ground) - 125 g
chocolate (milk) - 150 g
ghee - 20 g
wafers (wafers with a diameter of 4-5 cm) - 40 pcs.
powdered sugar - 50 g

Preparation

Finely chop the candied fruits. Dissolve soda in 1 tbsp. spoon of rum. Beat eggs with sugar. Mix cinnamon, cloves, nutmeg, salt, zest and combine with the egg mixture. Beat for 5 minutes until a thick foam forms, and then add diluted soda. Mix almonds, hazelnuts and candied fruits, add to the egg mixture and leave the dough for about 2 hours.
Chop the chocolate and melt in a warm water bath. Add ghee, stir and allow to harden. Preheat the oven to 150°C.
Place the wafers on paper-lined baking sheets.
Make 40 balls of dough with a diameter of 4 cm, place them on the wafers and press lightly. Bake for 20 minutes, let cool.
Melt the chocolate. Mix powdered sugar with 1 tbsp. spoon of rum.
Cover 14 gingerbread cookies with chocolate and sugar icing.

Rum gingerbread

Ingredients:

For the test:

Honey - 225 g
brown cane sugar - 100 g
butter - 75 g
candied lemon peel - 25 g
candied orange peels - 25 g
lemon flavor
almonds (chopped) - 50 g
egg - 1 pc.
flour - 400 g
rum - 4 tbsp. l.
cardamom (ground) - 1 tsp.
cinnamon (ground) - 1 tsp.
baking powder (for dough) - 1 sachet

For sprinkling:

Powdered sugar - 150 g
rum - 1-2 tbsp. l.
glaze (chocolate-cream) - 100 g

Preparation

Dough: In a saucepan, stir together honey, sugar, butter, candied orange and lemon peel, and lemon flavoring. Stirring constantly, heat until the sugar dissolves. Cool the mixture.
Add almonds, eggs, rum and seasonings to the creamy honey mixture. Mix flour and baking powder, add to other ingredients and knead everything well.
Roll out the dough into a roller 3 cm thick and cut into slices 2 cm thick with a knife.
Roll each slice into a ball and place on a greased baking sheet.
Bake in an oven preheated to 175°C for about 15 minutes. Cool.

Rostov gingerbread

Ingredients:

Vanilla crackers (crushed) - 400 g
candied jam - 800 g
wheat flour - 1.2kg
sugar - 2 cups
ammonium hydrochloride - 6g
cinnamon - 1 tsp.
star anise - 1 tsp.
nutmeg - 1/2 tsp.
cloves (crushed) - 1/2 tsp.
cardamom (crushed) - 1 tsp.
sunflower oil (refined) - 1 cup
egg - 4 pcs.

Preparation

Boil the candied jam. Cover the syrup with crushed breadcrumbs and cool. Mix the resulting mass with flour, adding eggs, sunflower oil, spices crushed in a mortar, and ammonium hydrochloride.
Place the dough in a cool place for 3 days.
Then roll it out like a sausage on a board sprinkled with granulated sugar, cut into slices 3 cm thick and place on a baking sheet greased with sunflower oil. Bake in the oven at 100°C for 15 minutes.

Vyazemsky gingerbread

Ingredients:

Flour - 160 g
sugar - 130 g
oil - 10 g
almonds - 8g
honey - 50 g
marmalade - 100 g
molasses - 6 g
For the syrup:
sugar - 200 g
water - 100 g

Preparation

Boil sugar syrup with honey until it tastes like a “thin thread” and cool it. Knead the dough, add butter, grated almonds and diluted molasses and roll it all together. Then roll out thinly and cut into pieces. Put apple marmalade or chopped candied fruit into the dough and fold the gingerbread into a closed book.
After this, put the dough into a small wooden mold, fill it with a wooden mallet, trim the edges, remove the dough from the mold, place it on a sheet, and put it in the oven to bake.
Pour sugar syrup over the finished gingerbread cookies. Preparation of syrup for glazing: add sugar to water and boil until it tastes like a “thin thread”, remove the foam that has accumulated on the syrup, cool a little, flavor it if desired and begin glazing the gingerbreads or gingerbread cookies.
You can glaze with a brush; small gingerbreads can be dipped whole into a bowl with syrup. Place the glazed gingerbread or gingerbread cookies in a very warm place (50-60°C), place the products on sheets, drying them until a shiny crust with a white coating appears on them.
Note: boil the syrup until you feel like a “thin thread” - this means that if you take a few drops of syrup between two fingers as a test, then when you spread your fingers between them, a “thread” of syrup should form.

Light gingerbread

Ingredients:

Flour - 350 g
baking powder - 2 tsp.
ginger (ground) - 2 tsp.
butter - 100 g
brown sugar - 185 g
light molasses - 3 tbsp. l.
egg - 1 pc.

Preparation

Place flour, baking powder and ginger in a food processor. Cut the butter into cubes and add to the processor. Mix until the dough resembles crumbs.
Add sugar, molasses and egg, knead the dough.
Wrap and refrigerate for at least 30 minutes.
Bake for 12-15 minutes until the dough has risen slightly and is golden brown.
Let sit for 2 minutes and then transfer to a wire rack.

Dark gingerbread

Ingredients:

Pancake flour - 400 g
ginger (ground) - 2 tsp.
cloves (ground) - 1/2 tsp.
butter - 125 g
brown sugar - 125 g
dark molasses - 125 g
egg - 1 pc.

Preparation

Preheat oven to 200°C. Grease two baking sheets with oil.
Place flour and spices in a food processor. Cut the butter into cubes and add to the processor. Mix until the dough resembles crumbs. Add sugar, molasses and egg, knead the dough. Wrap and place in the refrigerator for 30 minutes.
Roll out the dough on a floured surface. Cut out cookies with cookie cutters and place on baking sheets.
Bake for 12-15 minutes until puffed slightly and golden brown. Let sit for 2 minutes and then transfer to a wire rack.

Latvian gingerbread

Ingredients:

Flour - 900 g
baking powder - 4 tsp.
ginger (ground) - 8 tsp.
cinnamon (ground) - 3 tsp.
cayenne pepper - 1/4 tsp.
salt - 1 pinch
butter - 500 g
powdered sugar - 400 g
light molasses - 9 tbsp. l.
egg - 3 pcs.

Preparation

Sift flour, baking powder, ginger, cinnamon, pepper and salt. Add butter, sugar and grind until the mixture resembles sand.
Add the syrup and enough beaten egg to make the dough quite thick and smooth. Form the dough into a ball and wrap in film. Place in the refrigerator and leave for at least 45 minutes to firm up.
Preheat the oven to 180°C.
Roll out the dough to a thickness of 3 mm. Cut out cookies using any cookie cutter.
Place on greased baking sheets. Bake for 10-12 minutes until golden brown.
Remove from the oven and let cool on the baking sheet. Decorate with sugar icing. Store in a tightly sealed container.

Sweet gingerbread

Ingredients:

Flour - 200 g
milk - 150ml
butter - 150 g
sugar - 150 g
baking soda - 1/2 tsp.
ginger (ground) - 1 tsp.
allspice (ground) - 1/2 tsp.
cinnamon (ground) - 1/2 tsp.
nutmeg (ground) - 1/2 tsp.
cloves (ground) - 1/2 tsp.

Preparation

Heat the butter and sugar until the butter melts. Pour flour and spices into it, heat milk and pour soda into it, stir, beat eggs. Add milk and eggs to the spiced butter. Mix everything well and beat until smooth.
Place the dough in the pan and bake on a wire rack at above-average power for 12 minutes.
Check for readiness and let sit in the pan.
It is good to seal the cooled gingerbread or wrap it in film and keep it in the package for 1-2 days - this will make it even more aromatic and tastier.

Gingerbread with poppy seeds

Ingredients:

Wheat flour - 1.5 cups
honey - 1/2 cup
spices for gingerbread - 1 tsp.
rum or cognac - 1 tbsp. l.
poppy seed - 3 tbsp. l.
mint (dried) - 1 tsp.
vegetable oil - 2 tbsp. l.
sugar - 1/2 cup
baking soda - 1 tsp.

Preparation

Combine honey with sugar and butter, heat the mixture, then cool. Mix the resulting mass with flour, add seasoning, poppy seeds, pour in soda dissolved in rum, knead the dough and leave it in the refrigerator for a day.
Roll the finished dough with a roller and cut into pieces. Bake the gingerbreads for 10–12 minutes at 180°C.
Sprinkle with powdered sugar before serving.

Honey gingerbread with cherries

Ingredients:

Honey - 5 tbsp. l.
powdered sugar - 150 g
chocolate - 20 g
semolina - 200 g
egg - 5 pcs.
water - 3 tbsp. l.
walnuts - 100 g
lemon zest - 1/2 pcs.
cherries (canned) - 300 g
cherry jam - 100 g

Preparation

Mix honey, eggs, water, grated lemon zest, grated chocolate, sugar and beat until foam appears. Add semolina, previously mixed with pitted and finely chopped cherries, and mix.
Pour the resulting mixture into a lined pan and bake in the oven over medium heat for 45–50 minutes.
Mix cherry jam with the remaining honey, add crushed nuts, brush the surface of the cooled gingerbread with this mixture and cut it into portions of the desired size and shape.

Fruit gingerbread

Ingredients:

Wheat or rye flour - 300 g
sugar - 700 g
baking powder (for dough) - 2 tsp.
vanillin, lemon zest - to taste
honey - 100 g
margarine - 50 g
egg - 2 pcs.
cloves - 2 buds
cinnamon, cardamom (ground) - to taste
allspice - 5 g
anise and star anise - 10 g each
nuts (shelled) - 50 g
figs (dried) - 150 g
prunes - 20 g
powdered sugar - 250 g
rum - 3 tbsp. l.
redcurrant jam

Preparation

Soak the figs and prunes for several hours. Crush the spices in a mortar. Chop the nuts. Dissolve honey in 200 g of water, add eggs, stir.
Keep the margarine at room temperature and beat.
Mix flour with sugar, baking powder and spices, add grated lemon zest, margarine and diluted honey, knead the dough. Add chopped nuts, chopped prunes and figs. Place the dough on a greased and floured baking sheet and bake over low heat in a preheated oven.
Cool the finished gingerbread, cut in half and layer with jam. Cover the top of the gingerbread with glaze.
For the glaze, pour 100 g of water into powdered sugar, add rum and heat until thick.

Gingerbread from Siena

Ingredients
:
almonds (peeled) - 100 g
hazelnuts (hulled) - 100 g
walnuts - 100 g
figs (dried) - 150 g
fruits (various candied) - 150 g
powdered sugar - 150 g
honey - 100 g
cinnamon (ground) - 1/2 tsp.
cloves (ground) - 1 pinch
coriander - 1 pinch
ginger - 1 pinch
nutmeg - 1 pinch
flour - 2 tbsp. l.
butter (for greasing the pan)
powdered sugar, cinnamon - for sprinkling

Preparation

Fry almonds, hazelnuts and walnuts in a frying pan without oil. Cool the nuts, chop coarsely and place in a bowl.
Cut dried figs and candied fruits into small cubes and mix with nuts. Add spices and mix well. Mix powdered sugar and honey and place in a water bath. Heat, stirring, until the mixture melts. Remove from heat and cool slightly, stirring occasionally. Preheat oven to 150°C. Mix honey with nuts. Add flour.
Place parchment paper in the mold, grease with oil and lay out the dough (the height should not exceed 2 cm). Bake for 30 minutes.
Remove the gingerbread along with the parchment and cool. Remove the parchment and sprinkle the gingerbread with cinnamon and powdered sugar.

Gorodets honey-sugar gingerbread

Ingredients:

3 cups wheat flour
- 1/2 tsp. soda
- 3/4 cup sugar
- 1/2 cup honey
- 50 g butter
- 2 eggs
- 1/4 cup water (or less if the eggs are large)
- 1/2 tsp. spice mixtures (you can add more spices, even almost a whole tablespoon)

For the spice mixture we take (in descending order of quantity): cinnamon, star anise, cardamom, cloves, allspice, nutmeg. Grind everything finely in a mill.

Preparation

Melt honey with sugar and butter in a water bath.
Mix flour with spices and soda.
Pour the hot honey-butter mixture into the flour and mix thoroughly. Let cool until lukewarm.
Beat the eggs into the dough and add water (preferably half a spoon at a time, keeping an eye on the thickness of the dough).
Knead soft dough. It shouldn't be too sticky, but it shouldn't be too tough either.
To achieve a beautiful color, burnt sugar is added to the dough, dissolved in the form of a thick syrup. But this is not important.
The booklet gives several options for preparing choux pastry. It is more correct to mix only half of the flour into the hot honey mixture, cool the dough a little, beat in the eggs, butter and the remaining flour. Although there is a recipe in the brochure in which it is recommended to boil all the flour, and in another recipe hot oil is mixed into the brewed flour. In a word, there are a lot of possibilities, you can choose and experiment.
Gingerbread dough must be cut and baked immediately. If it sits too long (“takes too long”), the products will turn out tasteless.
Now comes the fun part - molding the printed gingerbread cookies. We take a gingerbread board, which (if it is new) we have been preparing for work for several days. The preparation was simple. Lubricated with sunflower oil several times intermittently until completely saturated and then allowed to dry for 2-3 days.
Recipes recommend dusting the work surface with flour. Or, when working with any sticky dough, you can simply grease the surfaces and hands with oil.
We oil the board thoroughly, take a piece of dough, fill the mold with it and roll it tightly with a rolling pin. Remove excess dough from the edges. The workpiece should not “hang down”; it should evenly fill the entire form.
We turn our workpiece over onto a baking sheet covered with baking paper. Repeat the required number of times.
This recipe makes 2 trays of 12 gingerbread cookies.
Bake gingerbread cookies in an oven preheated to 200-220 degrees Celsius for 10-12 minutes (for small gingerbread cookies without filling).
Cool on a wire rack.
Gingerbread cookies should not be left in the oven, otherwise they will become “stone”.
Before baking, the pieces can be brushed with egg.
To make the gingerbread cookies shine, immediately after baking they are wiped with a napkin and greased with hot syrup (1/2 cup of water, 1 cup of sugar, boil until “stretchy”, quickly brush the surface of the gingerbread with hot syrup using a brush.
You can glaze with regular sugar glaze, ground from sifted powdered sugar and a small amount of fresh lemon juice.

Gorodets honey gingerbread with walnuts

Ingredients:

1 cup flour (flour is added until the dough reaches the desired thickness)
- 1/4 tsp. soda
- 1/2 cup honey
- 1/4 cup sugar (brown is better, but not necessary)
- 1 egg
- 1/2 tbsp. l. butter
- 1/2 tsp. spices (as in the previous recipe)
- 1/4 cup finely chopped walnuts

Preparation

Melt honey and sugar, cool slightly, add to flour and mix thoroughly. Cool the dough.
Grind the egg, mix into the dough along with melted hot butter, add spices and nuts.
Dissolve soda in 1/2 tsp. water, stir into the dough.
Knead into a soft dough. Form gingerbread cookies.
Bake at 200 degrees Celsius. Baking time is the same as for “almond gingerbread” (see above).
It may take more than 1 cup of flour. You need to achieve such a consistency that the dough can be molded, but it is not too thick. When molding, grease your hands and mold generously with oil!
In total, I get 8 gingerbread cookies, 150-160 g each. From the remains of this dough, you can form molded gingerbread figures.
Or simply roll out the “sausages” and twist them into spirals on a plane.

And one more option, completely without honey.
It's more like a cookie, but delicious.

Almond gingerbread

Ingredients:

1/2 cup wheat flour
- 2 eggs
- 1/2 cup sugar + 1 tbsp. l.
- 1/4 cup almond flour
- zest of 1/2 lemon
- 1/8 tsp. soda

Preparation

Beat the egg with sugar, add flour, soda, almonds and zest. Knead into a loose dough.
Form gingerbread cookies.
Bake at 200 gr. Celsius in a preheated oven until done.
Baking time depends on the size of the gingerbread. For small ones, 5-7 minutes is enough, for medium ones - 10-12 minutes, for 150 gram ones, 15 minutes is enough.
Wheat and almond flour may require more - the amount depends on the quality of the flour and is determined by the consistency of the dough.
The gingerbreads are cooled on a wire rack. You need to handle it carefully; the finished gingerbread cookies are quite soft and can be broken.
You can coat the finished products with glaze or syrup.

Honey gingerbread with nuts

Ingredients:

2 tbsp. l. honey,
140 g powdered sugar,
350 g (or more) flour,
2 eggs,
5 g baking soda,
50 g candied orange peel (candied peel),
100 g nuts.

Preparation

Beat eggs, sugar, honey and spices until foam appears. Add flour, soda, finely chopped candied fruits.
Knead the dough on a board sprinkled with flour and let it stand for 2-3 hours.
We then form the dough into balls the size of a nut, which we place on lightly greased baking sheets at some distance from each other.
Bake in the oven over medium heat until golden brown.
When the gingerbread cookies have cooled, cover them with cocoa glaze and sprinkle with ground nuts.
Place the gingerbread cookies wrapped in foil into baskets.

Folk honey gingerbread

Ingredients:

500 g honey,
500 g flour,
1/2 cup sour cream,
1 glass of milk, 2 - 3 yolks,
10 g burnt sugar,
1 tsp. ground cinnamon,
1/2 tsp. baking soda.

Preparation

Mix flour with cinnamon and soda and add burnt sugar, milk, and sour cream to the honey. Beat the yolks and then thoroughly mix all the products. Add flour and knead the dough.
We cut out the shapes, which we place on baking sheets, greased and sprinkled with flour. Bake in the oven.

Honey gingerbread with nuts

Ingredients:

300 g honey,
500 g flour,
70 g powdered sugar,
100 g nuts,
3 yolks,
1/2 tsp. soda,
1 tsp. ginger, cinnamon and anise.

Preparation

Mix honey, sugar, yolks, spices, soda thoroughly, add nuts and 1/3 of the flour.
On a lightly floured board, knead the dough, let it rest for 3 - 4 hours, roll out a sheet 4 mm thick, from which we cut out figures. Bake them in the oven over high heat until golden brown. Grease with egg.

Honey gingerbread with filling

Ingredients:

2 tbsp. l. honey,
450 g flour,
130 g powdered sugar,
70 g butter,
2 eggs,
1 tsp. cinnamon and cloves,
1/2 tsp each anise, soda.

Preparation

Place flour and spices on the board; mix soda with eggs, add to flour, then mix in honey, heated oil, knead the dough and let it sit for 3 hours.
Then sprinkle the board with flour, roll out a layer from which we cut out hearts.
Bake in the oven over high heat until golden brown.
Grease the cooled gingerbreads with pre-prepared cream and connect two at a time.
Cover with chocolate glaze (see below), sprinkle with ground nuts and decorate with a glaze of powdered sugar whipped in egg whites using a cornet.

Honey gingerbread squares

Ingredients:

250 g honey,
500 g flour,
60 g powdered sugar,
40 g butter,
80 g ground nuts,
1 tsp. anise, cinnamon, cardamom and cloves,
1 egg,
5 g baking soda.

Preparation

Place the flour on a board, add the egg, honey, sugar, heated butter, nuts and other ingredients.
Knead the dough, pass it through a meat grinder, knead again and let it rest for at least 2 hours.
Then we roll out the layer to a thickness of 3 - 4 mm, cut out squares, which we bake on a greased baking sheet over high heat until golden brown.
After the gingerbread has cooled, glaze with rum glaze and decorate with candied fruit.

Gingerbread for wine

Ingredients:

50 g honey,
1 kg flour,
400 g sugar,
2 eggs,
3 tbsp. l. water,
1 tsp. cinnamon, anise, cloves,
200 g nuts,
100 g candied fruits,
15 g soda.

Preparation

Dissolve sugar and water over the fire to make syrup, pour warm syrup into honey and add flour; mix well and let the mixture sit for 24 hours.
Then add eggs, ground nuts, candied fruit and soda.
On a board sprinkled with flour, knead the dough.
From pieces of dough we roll out layers 4 mm thick, from which we cut out various figures.
Bake on lightly greased baking sheets over high heat and in a well-heated oven until light yellow.
After the gingerbread cookies have cooled, dip them into the glaze and dry them in a warm oven.
Serve with wine.

Honey gingerbread roll with filling

Ingredients:

2 tbsp. l. honey,
500 g flour,
150 g powdered sugar,
150 g nuts,
2 eggs,
1/4 tsp. soda,
100 g candied fruits,
100 g prunes (pitted),
1 tsp. cinnamon, anise, cloves,
150 g currant jam,
half a glass of milk.

Preparation

Mix honey, flour, eggs, sugar, spices on a board with milk in which soda has been dissolved. Knead the dough, cover and let stand for 3 hours.
Pour boiling water over the prunes, cut them into small pieces and mix with candied fruits and finely chopped nuts.
Divide the dough into two parts, roll each into a rectangular sheet, grease with jam and sprinkle with finely chopped fruit.
Roll each sheet into a roll.
Place two pieces of roll on a greased baking sheet at a distance of 4-5 cm from each other and bake over medium heat until golden brown.
While the rolls are still hot, brush with beaten egg and cut into thin slices.