Gingerbread house recipes step by step recipe. Ginger house: recipe with photos
Section “TABLE SERVING, DISH DECORATION, ETIQUETTE”
This section helps you decorate a variety of dishes with minimal effort.
Chapter
3rd page of the chapter
GINGERBREAD HOUSES – gingerbread house
DIY gingerbread houses, step by step photos
Part 3
BUILDING A GINGERBREAD HOUSE, CASTLE or PALACE
Recipes with step-by-step photos
And:
Cookie and waffle houses
Gingerbread trees
Painted New Year's gingerbread cookies and gingerbread valentines
If the rolling pin is wooden, soak it several times at intervals of 1-2 hours with a generous amount of sunflower oil(it will be absorbed into the wood), then let it “dry” for 5-7 days (sunflower oil polymerizes, hardens in air, unlike olive oil).
After impregnation and drying, a wooden rolling pin (or a wooden cutting board) will become “eternal”, non-hygroscopic and easy to clean.
A very useful technique when rolling out dough:
The process of making gingerbread houses is the same and necessarily includes rolling out the gingerbread dough into a layer of the required thickness for subsequent cutting out parts from it.
When rolling the dough into a layer with a rolling pin, it is convenient to use slats of the required thickness laid on the sides, as shown in the photo.
This allows you to make the layer perfectly even in thickness and with straight side edges (which significantly reduces the number of trims when cutting out the house parts).
The details of the gingerbread structures are glued together:
– or white or dark chocolate heated in a water bath (this is the most convenient to work with, quite strong and quickly hardening compound),
- or thickly boiled (caramel) hot sugar syrup or sugar fondant (see) with the addition of citric acid (a drop of such syrup hardens on a saucer; citric acid prevents the crystallization of sugar and is added until a pleasant sweet and sour taste of the syrup is obtained),
– or – sugar-protein rice mixture.
As supports that hold the parts in the desired position when the gluing hardens, it is convenient to use glass jars of suitable sizes, partially filled with water for their stability.
Various patterns are drawn with white and tinted in different colors and imitations of snow are made.
You can also use a pastry shop for drawing and snow.
Snow sprinkles are represented by powdered sugar (it is carefully sprinkled through a strainer) or coconut flakes, or a mixture of both.
Decorative multi-colored figurines for decorating compositions with houses can be sculpted from thickly diluted, from and from.
Gingerbread house windows:
– or before assembly they draw on the baked parts,
- or made in the form of unclosed slits, decorated along the edges or; This is done more often if they fill the house with sweets, which are beautifully visible through the cut openings;
– or cover the window slits from the inside with thin slices of marmalade, gluing them:
- or make candy windows (stained glass windows): for this, the finished baked parts with cut out windows are placed face up on lightly greased foil, the windows are covered with crushed candies and placed for 1-2 minutes in an oven preheated to 220-250 degrees. C, where the candy crumbs are fused into a thin monolithic layer.
The fusing process of the candy crumbs in the oven is very short and must be monitored visually to ensure the pieces are removed from the oven in time. Because soon after the candies melt, they will begin to burn quite quickly into a bitter brown sugar burnt, which should be avoided.
By filling different parts of the window with candies of different colors, you can get beautiful multi-colored stained glass windows, which will look especially impressive when illuminated from the inside.
Candy windows are also used to decorate “stained glass” cookies made from shortcrust pastry or “stained glass” gingerbread cookies.
For stained glass cookies, see the end of this page.
Assembling a gingerbread house from parts with shaped candy windows.
In this case, the parts are glued together
Smoke from the chimney more often depicted as cotton candy.
It is recommended to develop the design and drawings of your gingerbread house (castle, palace) yourself.
If you are not very strong in architectural drawing, glue the made cardboard (or paper from thick Whatman paper) patterns into a whole product and make sure that all the parts fit well together. Then separate the patterns and use them to cut out the gingerbread pieces.
On this page we will look at several examples of the construction of different gingerbread houses. We recommend reading them all.
Mastering the techniques used in their manufacture will allow you to build any house or an entire gingerbread palace to your liking.
USEFUL VIDEO INSTRUCTIONS:
Educational and training gingerbread house
for beginner gingerbread house builders
– simple and beautiful
Its production shows all the main stages of gingerbread house construction.
We recommend that all work, starting from design, be carried out together with children.
1. Designing a house and creating template drawings.
Let's draw on paper and cut out patterns (templates) for the details of the future gingerbread house:
2. Then we start preparing the dough.
For those who have never made products from gingerbread dough, first you should bake homemade gingerbreads from it several times to gain experience, and only then make the details of a gingerbread house from gingerbread dough.
Therefore, in this case we will not use, but the one with baking powder.
Also see recipes on page .
NOTE 1.
Without any experience, you can easily and simply use an ancient dough recipe for (perhaps this is the best gingerbread dough). If desired, you can add the following spices to it, as well as powdered dry berries.
NOTE 2.
This recipe requires liquid honey to prepare the dough. If the honey is candied, i.e. crystallized (good honey is candied no later than October 20 - see), it must first be melted while stirring in a hot water bath.
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Heat the butter, molasses and honey on a baking sheet, stir and cool slightly. |
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Place the house facade template on the dough sheet and cut out the windows and door, side walls and roof. |
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Beat the egg whites until stiff. |
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Using a thin nozzle, also decorate the roof elements: draw borders along the ridge, and a grid pattern on the roof slopes. |
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Re-beat the frosting. |
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Install the second side and front walls of the house in the same way. |
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When the roof slopes are installed, there will most likely be a small gap where they meet. |
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Using a knife, remove excess glaze that has formed at the joints of the house elements. |
The roof of the house is covered with tiles made of cookies, the chimney is lined with halves of peanuts, the shutters are made of waffles, and the porch with columns is made of candy canes.
Next to the house there are trees made of waffle ice cream cups and pebbles made of gingerbread cookies.
WE WILL NEED
CUT OUT PARTS
1. One square = 1 cm.
2. Redraw the pattern in full size in centimeters (it’s more convenient on checkered paper).
3. All parts are made in 2 pieces, the pipe - 3 pieces.
4. Parts “1” belong to the first large house, parts “2” belong to the second small house.
5. The walls are baked from ginger dough.
6. The roof is baked from white dough.
7. One end of the large house is baked half from white, half from ginger dough (see).
The second end of the large house is baked from ginger dough.
The ends of the small house are baked only from ginger dough.
8. The chimney is baked from white dough.
WHITE DOUGH
For this recipe, knead the dough once.
180-200 g butter
2 cups sugar
1/4 teaspoon baking soda, quenched with vinegar
1 egg
3 cups wheat flour
1. In a large bowl, beat butter with an electric mixer for 30 seconds or until fluffy.
2. Add baking soda and sugar, whisk until completely combined.
3. Add the egg and beat until completely combined.
4. Add flour and quickly knead the dough.
5. Cover the dough and refrigerate for approximately 2 hours.
6. After cooling, divide the dough in half (it’s easier to roll out) and roll it out with a rolling pin into a layer 5-6 mm thick. To prevent the dough from sticking to the table (board), be sure to sprinkle the table with flour.
7. Place the paper pattern of the corresponding part of the house on the rolled out layer and cut out the part from the dough along the contours.
8. Carefully transfer the part to a baking sheet (you can cover the baking sheet with foil). Place the paper pattern on the piece again and, if the edges of the piece were deformed during transfer, correct them.
9. Bake at t° 150 - 170°C for 5-7 minutes. When the part is slightly browned, it is ready.
10. Quickly remove the piece from the oven, transfer it to the board and, placing the pattern on it, align the edges (since the dough contains soda, the dough moves a little during baking).
11. Cool the part.
12. Do the same with all the parts that are baked from white dough. From the remaining dough you need to form and bake small cookies - “pebbles”, from which you will then make a “stone fence” near the house.
13. SPECIAL DETAIL - END OF A BIG HOUSE
(white roof and ginger end wall are baked together):
13.1. Make a paper pattern for the end of a large house in two copies.
13.2. Cut one copy of the pattern along the dotted line of the roof and cut out this part - the roof - from white dough (do not bake yet!).
13.3. Cut out the lower part of the part - the wall of the end of the house - from ginger dough (on the paper pattern the part ends with a solid line located just above the dotted line, parallel to it).
13.4. Place the ginger pastry on the white roof along the border as on the paper pattern. Lubricate the application area with a little water for gluing and press gently.
13.5. Cut strips from the ginger dough (according to the size of the pattern) and glue them onto the white dough roof using water.
13.6. Carefully transfer the part to a baking sheet (can be covered with foil). Place a whole paper pattern on the part and correct the edges that were deformed when the part was transferred.
13.7. Bake at t° 150-170°C, 5-7 minutes. When the part is slightly browned, it is ready.
13.8. Quickly remove the piece from the oven, transfer it to the board and, placing the whole pattern on it, align the edges.
13.9. Cool the part.
GINGER DOUGH
For this recipe, knead the dough twice, each knead separately.
80-100 g butter
one and a half cups of sugar
one and a half teaspoons of ginger
one and a half teaspoons of cloves
1 teaspoon baking soda, quenched with vinegar
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 egg
2 cups honey
2 tablespoons lemon juice
2 cups wheat flour
1 cup bran or 3 cups wheat flour
1. In a large bowl, beat butter with an electric mixer for 30 seconds until fluffy. Add sugar, ginger, cloves, baking soda and salt, whisk until completely combined.
2. Add the egg, molasses and lemon juice and beat until thoroughly combined.
3. Add flour and knead the dough.
4. Wrap the dough in plastic and keep in a cool place for 3 hours.
Christmas trees
Our Christmas trees will be waffle ice cream cones. If there are no cones, then we will make the Christmas trees ourselves - bake them from white dough.
1. From the rolled out dough, cut out circles of different diameters - from the largest (bottom of the tree) to the smallest (top). Use a knife to make teeth on the edges of each circle. This way we get jagged circles.
2. Bake the circles and stack them in a pyramid from the largest circle to the smaller one, coating them with glaze. To make the Christmas tree taller, you can place small round cookies, also baked from white dough, between the large parts.
3. In the same way, we collect several more Christmas trees.
4. We decorate the finished Christmas trees: place the icing, tinted green, in a bag and squeeze it out, tracing the jagged edges; Sprinkle the Christmas trees with multi-colored sprinkles, dust the top with powdered sugar from a strainer - “snowball”.
HOUSE FOUNDATION
Bake a large base crust on which to easily assemble the house. The area of the base should be larger than the area of the house (you can bake the base in parts and glue it with icing).
GLAZE
The glaze is used immediately, so do it after the house parts are ready for assembly. Don't double the recipe right away; make a second batch of frosting only when needed.
3 egg whites
750 grams sifted powdered sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla
food colorings
1. In a deep bowl, beat the egg white, add sugar and vanilla.
2. Beat with an electric mixer on high speed for 7 to 10 minutes or until very stiff. The glaze should not be liquid. To prevent the glaze from drying out, cover the bowl with a damp towel.
3. It is convenient to apply the glaze for gluing parts using a small bag (from an A4 file you get 2 small bags). Roll up the bag and fasten it with a stapler along the entire length so that it does not unwind. Fill the bag with glaze and, turning the top, fasten with a stapler (so that the glaze does not come out). To prevent glaze from seeping out of the holes from the staples and getting your hands dirty, wrap the bag filled with glaze in sticky thin plastic wrap, twisting it at the top. Cut off the sharp corner of the bag straight or diagonally, just a little bit.
4. If the glaze does not stick well to the part, moisten the gluing areas with water using a brush. Glaze can be applied to both gluing areas.
5. Color the glaze of a different color (for finishing windows, Christmas trees) with dry dye.
The more accurately you make the parts of the house, the easier it will be to fit them together.
DECORATION
Baked and cooled parts can be decorated before assembly, carefully checking that the level of the windows matches in height on all parts of the walls. And you can decorate after assembly.
If decorating before assembly, you must be EXTREMELY CAREFUL during assembly so as not to damage the painted windows and decorations.
1. WALLS
2. PORCH
Cut another square cookie crosswise into two identical rectangles and glue them to the first triangle in the shape of the letter " /\ " ().
ASSEMBLY
JOIN ALL THE PARTS WITHOUT GLUEING THEM AND TRIM, ADJUST IF SOMETHING DOESN’T FIT (UNTIL NOTHING IS LUBRICATE WITH CREAM OR GLAZE, THIS IS MORE CONVENIENT TO DO).
House.
Prepare the "foundation of the house." Combine the parts according to the picture. Glue the parts to the base of the house and glue them together with glaze. Wait until all joints are firmly secured. For reliability, as the house is assembled, the wall joints can be coated with additional glaze on the inside of the house.
Roof.
When the ends and walls are securely dry, you can glue the roof parts. Hold them until the icing dries.
Chimney.
Glue three parts of the chimney together and glue them to the end of the small house. Spread with glaze and top with toasted and shelled peanut halves.
Roof tiles.
Apply glaze evenly to the surface of the roof and place the cookie pillows in a checkerboard pattern. The glaze must be thick, otherwise the pads will crawl down and you will have to hold them for a long time. Liquid glaze can be mixed with powdered sugar again. Disguise the uneven edges of the “tile roof” by edging it with glaze. Use a strainer to powder the roof with powdered sugar - “snowball”.
FINAL TOUCHES
Icicles.
Using a bag with glaze, make an imitation of icing: touch the tip to the edge of the roof, gently squeezing the bag - the glaze will flow down, forming an icicle. Repeat along all edges of the roof and along the canopy over the front door.
Courtyard.
Gluing the “pebbles” with glaze, make a “fence”. Install Christmas trees in the yard. You can make “drifts” - grease the “pebbles” with glaze and sprinkle with powdered sugar. Imagine!
What should ultimately happen - see the title. Design options:
:
For the test:
– honey – 1 glass,
– wheat flour – 2-2.5 cups,
– rye flour – 1 cup,
– egg yolks – 2 pcs.,
– butter – 50 g,
– soda – 0.5 teaspoons,
– ground cinnamon – 1 teaspoon,
– ground ginger – 1 teaspoon,
– ground cardamom – 1/4 teaspoon,
Glaze for gluing:
– egg white – 1 pc.,
– powdered sugar – 1 cup,
– lemon juice – 8-10 drops.
1. Heat honey and oil over low heat until liquid.
2. Mix a glass of wheat flour with ginger and cinnamon, pour into the honey-butter mixture, stir thoroughly so that there are no lumps. Cool slightly.
3. Mix rye flour with the remaining wheat flour and soda. Beat the egg yolks. Pour the yolks into the honey mixture that has cooled to a warm state, grind, then add the flour.
4. Quickly knead the dough. The dough should be non-sticky, plastic, dense. Divide the dough into 2-3 parts.
5. Roll out the dough on a floured table to a thickness of 0.5-0.7 cm, cut out blanks for the gingerbread house according to the template. Transfer the pieces to a baking sheet and place them at a distance of at least 2 cm from each other.
6. Bake the gingerbread pieces at +220°C for about 8 minutes; Be careful not to burn.
7. Cool the baked parts of the gingerbread house. They can be stored for several days in a closed cardboard box at room temperature before assembling the house.
Assembly and decoration of the house.
8. Caramel windows. Place parts with windows on a baking sheet lined with foil. Grind the hard candy caramel in a coffee grinder and pour it into the windows at the same level as the thickness of the parts. Place the baking sheet in the preheated oven for 2-4 minutes until the caramel melts. Remove from oven, cool until caramel hardens, remove foil.
9. Glaze for gluing. Beat the egg white until the volume increases 3-4 times. When beating the egg whites, gradually add powdered sugar in small portions and then add lemon juice. The glaze is ground until white and fluffy. If desired, the glaze is tinted to the desired color with cocoa powder, burnt sugar, beetroot or cranberry juice, turmeric, and food coloring. Prepare the glaze in small portions, as it hardens quickly. If you don't have a special pastry bag, you can apply thin strips of icing from a 10-20 ml medical syringe with the needle removed.
10. To decorate the gingerbread house, use icing, nuts, multi-colored dragee candies, confectionery sprinkles, coconut flakes, marmalade, chocolate, and candied fruits. The decoration elements are attached to the gingerbread base with icing and allowed to dry.
11. The house is assembled on a gingerbread base sheet. The parts are glued together with glaze gradually, pressing them well together and fixing them for 8-15 minutes. At the assembly stage, you can put gifts inside the house - gingerbread cookies, sweets.
12. The finished house is sprinkled with “snow” - powdered sugar or coconut shavings.
In such a beautiful palace it will be cozy and like a toy...
and to the real princesses:
In this photo, the children are not too surprised by the sight of the wonderful gingerbread palace,
because took an active part in its construction.
And each of them contributed their own creative idea for decorations.
Therefore, their views are not so much enthusiastic as they are carefully assessing the created work.
After taking photographs near the palace, they will begin to happily destroy it, starting from the roof.
Of course, as you eat, you will have to add additional dolls so that there is enough for everyone.
View of the gingerbread palace from the back side:
NOTE. Curved gingerbread products (for example, the elements of the walls of the round castle towers in the photo) are baked on round heat-resistant objects (for example, empty metal tin cans) covered with cooking paper, lightly greased with oil. Cut dough pieces 6-8 mm thick are laid out on top in 1/4 turn, but not more than 1/3 turn. At 1/2 turn, the gingerbread dough will drip during baking.
How to glue baked gingerbread elements into an intricate structure - see above.
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For the test:
– 1 cup softened butter
- 1 cup of sugar
– 2 tsp. baking powder
– 2 tsp. ground ginger
– 1 tsp. soda
– 1 tsp. ground cinnamon
– 1 tsp. dry ground garlic
– 1 cup sugar syrup (recipe below)
- 2 eggs
– 2 tsp. vinegar
– about 5 cups of flour (until you get a thick dough)
Ingredients for sugar syrup:
– 200 g sugar
– 200 g honey
– 70 g butter
– 1/3 cup boiling water
Ingredients for glaze:
– 1 egg white
– about 1 cup of powdered sugar (until a thick mixture is obtained)
– a little lemon juice or citric acid
Ingredients for caramel glue:
– 100 g sugar
– 2 tbsp. spoons of water (and boil everything until thick)
1. Prepare sugar syrup. Melt 3 tbsp in a metal saucepan. sugar until brown. Remove from heat and cool slightly, stirring. Pour in 1/3 cup boiling water, stir well, add the rest of the sugar, and put on fire. Bring to a boil and until the sugar is completely dissolved.
2. In a very large saucepan, beat the margarine with a mixer. Add sugar, baking powder, ginger, baking soda, cinnamon and garlic. Continue whisking well.
3. Gradually pour in the sugar syrup, continuing to beat, beat in the eggs and vinegar. Beat until smooth. Start adding flour, continuing to beat with the mixer until the mixer can turn the dough. Flour your work surface, place the dough on it and continue kneading with your hands. The dough should be very thick. Divide into three parts, cover and refrigerate for 3 hours.
4. Now divide each piece of dough in half again (you will get six pieces). Spread baking paper on a baking sheet, place a piece of dough on it, and first knead it with your hands. Then cover the dough with a second sheet of paper and roll it out with a rolling pin into a layer 3 millimeters thick. Remove the top sheet, place the house pattern on top and cut it to shape. The scraps can then be used for small decorations, figurines, gingerbread men, etc.
5. Bake in a preheated oven at 180 degrees. Bake in the oven for 7-9 minutes until the edges are lightly browned. Cool. Repeat with remaining pieces of dough and pattern sheets.
6. While the dough is cooling, prepare the icing and caramel glue. Separate the white from the yolk very carefully. Beat with a fork until light foam forms. Continue beating, gradually adding powdered sugar until the volume increases and the consistency of thick sour cream is obtained.
7. When the dough has cooled well, remove it from the baking sheet. We will paint each separate wall with glaze. On the roof, before the glaze has hardened, you can stick waffles or candies to imitate tiles.
8. Now prepare the caramel glue. Caramel glue is actually the same sugar syrup (which we prepared above), but more concentrated and without honey and butter.
9. While the caramel glue has not hardened (it can be kept on a pan of steaming water), dip the edges of the walls of the house into it, which we need to glue together. When the walls are glued and the house is already on the table, in order to glue the roof, we grease the upper cut of the walls with caramel glue and put on the roof. Cover the seams with glaze.
NOTE. Round pieces of gingerbread construction (for example, for the walls of a round tower) are baked with a size of no more than 1/3 of a turn, placed during baking on round heat-resistant molds of the required diameter.
When the workpiece size is more than 1/3 of a turn, gingerbread dough inevitably runs off during baking and distorts its given shape.
It is optimal to bake rounded parts in 1/4 turn - in this case, the layer of gingerbread dough placed on it will not run off the cylindrical mold during baking.
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For the test:
– 350 g flour
– 130 g butter
– 2 yolks
– 2 tsp. cinnamon
– 2 tsp. ginger
– 0.5 tsp. soda
– 100 g sugar
– 4 tbsp. honey
- salt
For the sugar glaze:
– 250 g powdered sugar
– 1 tsp. lemon juice
– 1 protein
The most important thing is to make the correct template (drawing) of the house according to your imagination.
It’s better to make it out of cardboard and then assemble it to fit it exactly.
When you have a template ready, transfer all the patterns onto baking paper.
Now prepare the dough: mix flour with spices, salt and soda. Then add soft butter and grind into crumbs.
Beat the yolks with a fork and pour into the dough, immediately add sugar and honey.
Knead into a tight dough, wrap in cling film and refrigerate for an hour. Then we roll out part of the dough into a layer (I got 4) and bake until golden brown and while the cake is soft, we cut out the details of our house according to the templates and one cake for the stand (our composition will stand on it), and you can cut out cookies from the leftovers.
YOU NEED TO DO IT QUICKLY, BECAUSE THE CAKE, AS IT COOLS, BECOMES HARD AND MAY CRUMBLE.
When all the parts are ready and cooled, we combine them with icing sugar, i.e. we are building a house. Then we decorate as we like.
The dough in the recipe is enough for a small house and 10 cookies.
If you increase the proportions of the dough, making it larger, you can build a large house, and put a cake inside, a small one on a stand can be used to decorate the cake or let the children eat it.
The peculiarity of this dough, unlike honey for houses, is that it does not go stale for a long time.
TIP: DO NOT ROLL OUT THE DOUGH TOO THIN, THE IDEAL THICKNESS IS 0.5 CM!
For sugar glaze Grind everything thoroughly with a wooden spoon until a thick, homogeneous mass is obtained.
Paint each baked part, dry the glaze well and only then glue it together.
After gluing and hardening the joints, do the finishing: masking the seams, applying “icicles”, imitation snow, etc.
Like gingerbread houses, sleighs are glued together with sugar-protein drawing mass (icing) or hot thickly boiled sugar glaze, or solid chocolate (black or white) melted in a water bath.
Painted gingerbread figures for decorating gingerbread compositions or for serving with tea. Such figures are cut out of a layer of dough with a knife using a cardboard template, then baked and decorated with icing.
Children's creativity - gingerbread decoration for the Christmas tree:
Sleigh design options:
In some countries, various sets of ready-made parts are sold for self-assembly of gingerbread compositions. This house is assembled from the following set:
FINNISH GINGERBREAD HOUSE WALL PATTERN
FINNISH GINGERBREAD HOUSE ROOF PATTERN
Gingerbread Christmas tree template
GINGERBREAD MAN TEMPLATE
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For the gingerbread dough:
– 140 g unsalted butter, cut into cubes
– 100 g sugar
– 1 egg
– 1 tsp. soda
– 100 ml light molasses (golden syrup) or, even better, fructose syrup
– 1 tsp. ground cardamom seeds (you need to grind the seeds from two pods in a mortar)
– 1 tsp. ground cloves
– 1 tsp. ground cinnamon
– 1 tsp. grated orange zest
– 450 g plain flour
NOTE. Instead of all the spices, you can add ginger - then you get a gingerbread house.
For the glaze:
– 400 g icing sugar, sifted
– 2 egg whites
– 2 tsp. lemon juice
For decoration:
– 4-5 orange or yellow icicle candies, crushed with a rolling pin
– 3 packs of Smarties (multi-colored chocolates)
– 400 g marshmallows or marshmallows
And:
– you will need a board on which you will build a house,
– four baking trays
- and several clean cans or bottles that can be used to prop up the still wet adhesive walls of the house and other structural elements so that they do not fall apart.
– Cookie cutters in the shape of trees and men will also be useful for baking shaped products from gingerbread dough that decorate the composition.
NOTES.
– To cut out parts, be sure to use pre-prepared templates, otherwise the walls of the house will not fit together.
– Choose the design of the house and decorate the house the way you want - you can make a multi-colored range, using only white glaze, like snow.
The house can be stored in a cool, dry place for up to 2 weeks.
PRELIMINARY, ACCORDING TO YOUR IMAGINATION, DESIGN AND CUT TEMPLATES FOR A GINGERBREAD HOUSE.
In the wall templates, provide openings for windows and doors, which we will then fill with crushed candies and melt them in the oven.
Step 1. First make Finnish gingerbread dough. Place the butter and 50g sugar in a bowl and beat with an electric mixer.
Step 2. Beat the egg with the remaining 50g sugar until it resembles lightly whipped cream.
Add soda and molasses to the oil. Then add the egg mixture.
Add the spices, orange zest and flour and mix until you have an elastic, soft dough.
Form it into a ball, wrap it in film and put it in the refrigerator for at least 30 minutes.
Step 3. While the dough is chilling, cut out patterns from parchment or baking paper based on your templates.
Preheat the oven to 220 gr. WITH.
Step 4. Line four baking sheets with parchment.
Tear off a piece the size of an orange from the dough. Roll it out on a floured table to the thickness of a coin and cut out the wall.
Roll out the scraps and gradually roll out and cut out the remaining parts of the house.
Using a spatula, transfer them to a baking sheet.
You will need to cut two side walls, a front and back wall, two roof pieces and four pieces for the chimney (the bottom walls of the chimney should be in the shape of a triangle so that the pointy part fits into the hole in the roof).
Cut out trees and people from the dough.
Step 5. Roll out the remaining dough and scraps directly onto the parchment and cut into an oval approximately 25 cm in size. This is the “garden” on which the house will stand.
Place on parchment paper on a baking sheet.
Step 6. Cut a door in one of the walls, then cut out windows wherever you want.
Cover window and door openings with an even layer of crushed candy canes.
Bake the cookies in batches for 6 to 8 minutes (the garden takes a few minutes longer) until the edges of the cookies are brown and the candy melts have melted.
For perfectly shaped cookies, apply templates to the cookies and trim off any areas where the cookies have spread.
Let cool for 5 minutes, then transfer to a wire rack.
Step 7 While the cookies are cooling, make the glaze by mixing powdered sugar, egg white and lemon juice.
This is the “glue” with which we will connect the walls and decorate the house.
Step 8 Now take out the board for the house and place the jars on which you can support the glued walls.
Transfer the frosting to a piping bag fitted with a very small tip or place in a plastic bag and snip off a small tip in the corner.
Starting at the small side, pipe a thin strip of icing along the bottom edge and adhere it to the "ground".
Press it firmly against the board for a few minutes and then prop it up with a jar until the glaze hardens.
Step 9 Brush the glaze on the bottom of the long wall, place it on the bottom of the house and press firmly until it hardens.
Then put up the other two walls.
Step 10 Attach the roof. Apply glaze to the corners of one part of the roof and the top edges of the walls, place the lid against the walls and press firmly.
Place the can so that it supports the roof.
Repeat with the second part of the roof.
Connect all the pieces for the pipe and attach it to the glaze on the roof.
Step 11 Spread the glaze over the surface of the roof and chimney, dripping glaze onto the walls to create a snowy effect. Then place smarties on top. Spread "garden" icing and draw facial features. Attach white marshmallows to the icing around the entire perimeter of the garden to create a fence.
Place people and trees everywhere.
Sprinkle with powdered sugar.
Step 12 Place the finished gingerbread house in a prominent place and admire it for a long time, show it to all your friends and acquaintances.
:
– 1 cup flour (flour should always be sifted before kneading any dough)
– 1/3 cup sugar
– 1/2 teaspoon of soda
– 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
– 1/2 teaspoon of grated ginger root (our gingerbread will be piquant and spicy, you can use less ginger to taste)
– 2 tablespoons softened butter
– 1 tablespoon liquid honey
– 1 tablespoon milk
1. PREPARATION OF THE DOUGH.
Mix all ingredients.
Knead the dough thoroughly with your hands for about 10 minutes until it becomes elastic - this is the main thing in preparing any gingerbread dough.
Roll into a ball and leave to rest for 10-15 minutes, but no more.
2. TEMPLATES FOR MINI-HOUSE.
The house will require 6 templates:
– 2 for the roof,
– 2 for front and rear facades,
– 2 for end walls.
Draw templates on thick paper and cut them out with scissors.
If you want to make houses with windows (with empty holes or filled with candy, marmalade), provide them on the templates.
3. CUTTING OUT THE PARTS.
Roll out the dough into a layer 5 mm thick and trace along the contour with a sharp knife or, which is much more convenient when cutting the dough, use roller pizza cutter.
To facilitate subsequent assembly (so that the roof does not move when gluing), you can make two small holes for threads in both parts of the roof before baking.
When assembling, simply tie the baked parts of the roof with thread.
After the gluing glaze has hardened, remove the threads and cover these technological holes in the roof with glaze.
BAKING DETAILS.
Bake the house parts in a preheated oven at a temperature of 170 degrees. From about 7 min.
Then let cool completely under a folded towel.
A screwdriver can be used to cut through dough in tight spaces.
Having seen enough beautiful photos on the Internet, many sweet tooths and those who like to create in the kitchen are wondering how to bake a gingerbread house. For Christmas, a child's birthday or another family celebration, this miracle creation made from dough and sugar with the addition of a wide variety of goodies will bring many vivid impressions, indescribable delight and memories for a lifetime.
In fact, baking it is not difficult, as it might seem at first glance. You just need to make an action plan, think about what the end result will look like, and start acting.
Step by step steps for baking a gingerbread house
Before you bake a gingerbread house at home, you need to create a step-by-step plan to make preparing this dessert comfortable, organized, and hassle-free. Here's a rough sketch:
- Prepare products for dough and glaze.
- Think about how the house will be decorated and prepare these details.
- Choose a template according to which the gingerbread house will be baked.
- Bake as directed in the recipe and glue the main parts together.
- After fixing the base, decorate the product as desired.
Dough recipe
In order to bake a gingerbread house, as a rule, gingerbread dough is used, from which almost every housewife bakes gingerbread men or roes (a Slavic version of gingerbread with painting) for Christmas. To prepare the dough you will need the following ingredients:
- 350 grams of butter.
- 3 eggs, of which only the yolks are used for the dough, and the whites are placed in a sealed container and sent to the refrigerator - they will be needed when making sugar icing for painting a gingerbread house.
- An incomplete glass of honey.
- 100 grams of granulated sugar.
- 0.5 tsp. ground ginger, nutmeg, cardamom or anise. You can also add the grated zest of one lemon or a teaspoon of cinnamon.
- 1 tsp. soda quenched with vinegar.
- 900 grams of flour. The amount of this component is usually given as an approximate amount, as it depends on the amount of gluten in the grain.
- 2 -3 tbsp. l. cocoa powder. This is not necessary, but this product will make the walls of the house dark brown, they will look in contrast with the snow-white glaze - the effect will be more impressive.
How to knead gingerbread dough?
Mix honey, sugar, butter in a small saucepan and place it in a water bath, stirring constantly, making sure that the sugar crystals melt - after this, remove the dishes from the heat. In a separate bowl, mix cocoa, soda and spices, crushed in a mortar or coffee grinder. Try not to buy already ground ones. After all, only crushed spices are much more aromatic than those that have been lying around for who knows how long.
Add half a portion of sifted flour to the spicy mixture, mix and pour in small parts into the sweet honey mass, stirring so that no lumps form. The resulting lump of dough, similar to plasticine, is wrapped in plastic and sent to a cold place for at least 6 hours, but preferably overnight. It should sit until the spices begin to release their aroma and the honey begins to interact with the flour.
Just before baking the gingerbread house, take out the dough and mix in the rest of the flour. It should be elastic, but quite dense. Therefore, formation is most often done on parchment paper.
Cutting out the details
It’s difficult to bake a gingerbread house from scratch at home, like in the pictures. Therefore, it is better to start with a simple template so as not to be disappointed if you fail. Indeed, in this matter, as in others, gradually developed skills are important.
Roll out the dough on parchment paper to a thickness of about 5 mm and, dividing it into pieces, apply a template. We cut out the details of the house and related decorations, if they are needed according to the plan: Christmas trees, house doors, little people at the entrance, a fence, a snowman, etc.
If the dough sticks too much to the rolling pin, you can cover it with another sheet of paper and roll it out. Then the formation process will be more calm. Also, before baking a gingerbread house with your own hands, the master will definitely think about what he will build the entire exhibition on, so it’s worth baking a large circle for the “yard”. But you can use a ready-made base, for example for honey cake or pizza. But you shouldn’t use waffle cakes - they are too soft and don’t hold their shape at all.
Carefully, together with the parchment, move the cut out parts onto a baking sheet and bake in the oven at a temperature of 180-200 C for about 15 minutes. Let the parts cool and then carefully remove the paper. If the house is planned to have windows, then you can make them from melted caramel. We pour it into the recesses on the gingerbread parts immediately after removing the baking sheet from the oven. If you don’t want to cook caramel, you can simply melt a few candies.
Preparing glaze for painting
After all the effort and worry, when I finally managed to bake the gingerbread house according to the recipe, it was time to start assembling and decorating it. For this, the same glaze is usually used - icing. To prepare it, take the remaining whites from the refrigerator, lightly beat with a fork (not with a mixer) and gradually, in small portions, add 500 grams of powdered sugar, kneading with a fork and under no circumstances beating with a blender. This is not a protein cream, and there should be no air bubbles in the mass.
At the end of mixing, add a teaspoon of lemon juice. Ideally, it is better to divide the quantity of components into two parts and prepare half at once - for painting the walls of the house. After all, the patterns must completely harden and become stronger before connecting the parts into one structure.
How to decorate the product?
This is the most crucial moment in cooking. After all, baking a gingerbread house is somehow easier than turning your decorating fantasies into reality. The first thing that is important is to decide what the roof of the house will look like:
- Roof tiles. Then the simplest options are to paint with glaze or cover the entire roof layer with icing and lay out nuts or small candies, imitating a tiled roof.
- The roof of the house will be completely “snowed” with glaze and large icicles hanging down the sides. Then we leave this point for later, when the house is already assembled.
- Cover the roof with a thin layer of glaze and lay out small cookies.
We also use icing to decorate window openings and doors. If you want, you can paint patterns on the walls or paint the house like a brick. To do this, place the icing sugar in a regular syringe of the largest volume or make an envelope from thick polyethylene and cut off the corner just a little. If you don’t have much imagination yet, then you can use the examples described in the article.
When all the painted parts have hardened, then you can assemble the entire structure together: on the base layer we mark the places where the house will be located, and where additional decorations are, if any. If the structure is small, then all its sides can be assembled together at once, gluing them with icing. If the size is over 30 centimeters, then it is better to assemble it in two opposite parts, immediately gluing the walls, and after hardening, the roof. It's important to take your time and give the icing time to fully harden so that the entire gingerbread house holds up firmly. When it is installed on the base, it is better to additionally support the walls with wooden toothpicks, and when the icing dries, carefully remove them. This is followed by the finishing touches on the design: imitation of icicles, snowdrifts near the house or snow on the Christmas tree or fence.
- small candies: lollipops, jelly beans or M&Ms;
- decorations made from chocolate: melt the chocolate and use a syringe to draw any shapes on parchment paper, from simple snowflakes and stars to ornate Christmas trees and birds.
- candied berries also work well as a garnish.
Video master class
If the description of the process of how to bake a gingerbread house is still not clear, a master class from a real professional may help more.
Follow the directions diligently and persistently try several times if suddenly it doesn’t work out the way you want. After all, as you know, Moscow was not built right away.
December is the time to bake gingerbread.
This master class is for those who have long dreamed of their own gingerbread house, but do not know how to approach it. It’s only scary at first, of course - on the forums they talk about the correct gingerbread dough, caramel windows, some unknown icing and other subtleties of the process.
Don’t listen to anyone, the most important ingredients in our business are not overseas spices, but patience and time. If you have enough of both, then everything will definitely work out!
It would be nice to find a volunteer who will meekly wash the mountains of soiled dishes and sweep the floor, because you won’t have time for a day or two.
All gingerbread dough recipes are more or less the same. I will give one of them, repeatedly tested on myself without any damage to health:
Of what:
250g honey,250g sugar (preferably brown, but not essential),
100g butter,
3 eggs,
0.5 teaspoon of soda,
7 glasses of flour,
Cocoa and spices (ginger, cinnamon, cloves, cardamom, nutmeg, black pepper, allspice, vanilla, etc.) to taste.
How:
Melt 3 tablespoons of sugar in a saucepan until light brown. Remove from heat and cool slightly while stirring (otherwise, when adding water to boiling sugar, severe splashing may occur).
Pour in 0.3 cups of boiling water, stir well, add the remaining sugar and put on fire.
Bring to a boil and stirring until the sugar is completely dissolved.
Place honey and butter in a large bowl. If the honey is candied, then it should first be melted in a water bath. Pour in boiling syrup. Stir. Honey and oil should completely dissolve. Add cocoa and spices. 
Cool until warm. Add eggs and beat lightly. 
Add 3-4 cups of flour, stir thoroughly. It is advisable to sift the flour through a sieve.
Pour the dough out of the bowl onto the table, gradually adding the remaining flour. Flour may not be completely used.
The finished dough should resemble plasticine, not stick to the table or hands, but at the same time roll out easily.
Place the dough in a bowl, cover with a napkin and put it in the refrigerator, then forget about it for an hour or two. 
Many people prefer to bake ready-made parts of the house; this does not seem very convenient to me. During transportation to the baking sheet and during the baking process, they can become quite deformed. I prefer to bake cakes, and only then “build” a house from them.
Roll out the dough into sheets 5-7mm thick and bake in the oven for 10 minutes at 180 degrees. We do the same with the remaining dough.
Use baking paper, it saves a lot of nerves.
While baking the cakes, do not forget to close the windows and doors tightly, otherwise the neighbors will come running to the smell and eat everything, but we have completely different plans.
Now the most important thing is to overcome the temptation to give up everything, cut the cakes into many, many gingerbread cookies and eat them.
It’s better to eat a cookie and start designing your future house. If drawing is difficult, then the Internet will help you, you can download from there even a church with a bell tower, even a deer with a sleigh, or even a royal palace.
I decided to draw the template myself. The house itself is more than standard, but I played with the roof a little, let it be beautiful.
So, the cakes are ready, there is a pattern. At this stage, it is already permissible to feel a little proud of yourself.
Make sure all pieces fit well on the cake layers. 
In addition to a couple of roof slopes, two side walls and two facades, depending on the design of the house, we may need auxiliary parts for “load-bearing partitions”. If you wish, you can make a base crust; I decided to do without it. In my case, there won’t be whole roof slopes either; the trim will go to the roof.
But the auxiliary parts will be: two transverse partitions, one I will cut out according to the facade template, the second - a rectangle with sides equal to the length and height of the house. They will support the roof and give the house additional strength.
Let's start cutting out the parts.
To make your task easier, scratch the outlines of future parts on the cakes with something sharp. Shiloh will do just fine. Then take a sharp knife. We make the side cuts of the walls at an angle of forty-five degrees to make it easier to join them during assembly. 
The time has come for the windows, if you don’t care about caramel anymore, then don’t cut them out, leave them like that, and then draw them.
If the excitement hasn’t disappeared and your eyes still sparkle with a fanatical sparkle, welcome to the ranks of the most persistent! 
We place the parts with cut out windows on the parchment, face up, and cook the caramel.
In a small container (an enamel pot is the best) put ten spoons of granulated sugar and squeeze out lemon juice so that the sugar is slightly damp, no more. Place on a hot stove. With constant stirring, you will get caramel in a couple of minutes. It makes the most sense to go with a light golden color. Lighter - it can become sugary, darker - it’s already burnt.
Fill the window openings with caramel; this must be done quickly, before the mass thickens.
The optimal thickness of the “glass” is about 5mm.
To make the parchment easily separate from the caramel, wait until it hardens completely.
For now you can start decorating.
So, icing... Nothing more than ordinary sugar glaze - egg white beaten with powdered sugar. Beat the egg white thoroughly for about five to ten minutes, then add powdered sugar a little at a time and continue whisking until you get a thick, homogeneous mass, you can add a couple of drops of lemon juice.
If desired, some of the glaze can be painted in different colors. I use food coloring for this. Cocoa, beet juice or spinach juice are also good.
Cover the resulting glaze with a damp cloth and place in the refrigerator for ten minutes.
It’s more convenient to paint the walls in a disassembled state, so that’s what we’ll do. Anyone who has a pastry syringe is great, but an ordinary plastic bag with a corner cut off is no worse.
We apply the patterns and let them dry thoroughly. We don’t throw away the remaining glaze; we will need it for assembly. 
Assembly!
In the center of the two auxiliary parts we make counter vertical notches: 
We connect the parts crosswise. Coat the joints with glaze. 
We apply a good layer of glaze to the side sections of the walls and the supporting structure and connect them together in the required order.
To fix the walls while drying, I use a simple system of four glasses of water.
Let it dry for several hours, or better yet, a day.
The final touch is the roof.
We attach the roof to the base. The same icing is used as glue. Let it dry and decorate.
To decorate the roof, you can use nuts, dried fruits, coconut or chocolate chips, monpensiers, ... Anything.
I have a composite roof made from scraps. I will hide the ugly joints under the “tiles”. 
Almonds, chocolate chips or cornflakes are ideal to imitate it. You can bake it, but I didn’t bother, so I’ll stick with flakes, they’re healthy.
We “glue” the tiles onto the glaze, starting from the slopes and methodically, row by row, going up. 
Chocolate pillows also look good: 
All! We wipe our forehead with our sleeve and, despite the slippers sticking to the floor sticky with powdered sugar, we rush to get the camera. And we take pictures, take pictures, until some Hansel and Gretel come running, and they will come running, you can be sure. 
To enhance the effect, light the house from the inside. When the house is eaten and the delights of your family have subsided, upload the photo to social networks - you are guaranteed numerous “likes”!
It is quite simple for him, but the process itself is long and labor-intensive, so it is better to start it in advance: even if you come to your senses on the thirtieth of December, you will not have time to bake and assemble it. On the other hand, younger family members will most likely take an active part in both the architectural development of the project and the final design refinement.
The main thing a gingerbread house consists of is the dough. You can take any recipe suitable for gingerbread. The main thing is to comply with the condition: the dough should not be too soft so that it can withstand the shape of the intended structure.
Stages of the long journey
To simplify the whole process, it is better to divide it into several “approaches”. It is recommended to perform them on different days and always in a good mood, then you will definitely get a wonderful gingerbread house (recipe). The master class we conduct can be divided into the following “episodes”:
Secrets of preparatory work
Before you prepare the gingerbread house recipe for which you choose, you need to take care of some additional things. Suppose you have cut out a pattern plan for your architectural masterpiece. Since it is desirable that all parts be the same thickness, prepare two slats of the required height. They are placed on both sides of the rolling pin when rolling, and the workpieces will come out identical and with smooth edges. Believe me, you will appreciate it when you start assembling the house. By the way, if at the market you come across a rolling pin with a design carved on it, take it without hesitation: it is intended specifically for decorating the walls of a gingerbread house. A wooden rolling pin should be soaked in sunflower oil several times ahead of time with a break of two hours. After drying for a week, the instrument will not get wet, will be easy to clean and will not crack.
"Glue" for parts
When you make a gingerbread house with your own hands, you can also choose the recipe for the composition that will be used to join the individual pieces together. There are three options for gluing parts:
- Melt a black or white chocolate bar in a water bath. This material is very convenient to work with because it hardens quickly, but you must do it in one go so as not to melt new chocolate each time.
- Often, confectioners use caramel syrup or fudge with the addition of citric acid, which adds hardness.
- Icing, which is a protein-sugar material for drawing, looks quite aesthetically pleasing.
During the gluing process, individual parts are supported vertically (or at the desired angle if the walls are inclined) with cans of water.
Window decoration
The further design and the final appearance that the created gingerbread house with your own hands will take will directly depend on how you designate the windows. The recipe offers several ways:
Secrets of the test
Most chefs believe that if you want to get a real gingerbread house, the dough for which you have chosen the recipe must include honey, and not sugar or molasses. Moreover, chemical disintegrants will also be superfluous in this case. Instead, you can use rum, cognac or vodka (four spoons per kilogram of sifted flour). Whether to agree with this opinion is the choice of each individual housewife. It is also not recommended to replace butter in the dough with lean fat or margarine.
To give the dough different flavors, natural products should be used - dried berries, herbs or nuts, ground almost into dust. You can also add chalked or chopped quality dried fruits.
And the main secret: it is in gingerbread dough that low-grade flour is appropriate. What explains this is unknown, so the cooks simply follow the superstition.
Chouxed honey dough
It is from this that a gingerbread house is traditionally made. The step-by-step recipe will look like this:
- 3/4 cup of natural liquid honey with a quarter cup of water is placed in a saucepan, and the mixture is heated (without boiling) to 70 degrees.
- Add one and a half cups of spiced flour if you add them. The mass is quickly mixed, preferably with a wooden spatula.
- After cooling, beat in an egg, add half a glass of rich sour cream, another one and a half glasses of flour, two tablespoons of strong alcohol and a hundred gram piece of softened butter.
- The dough is kneaded vigorously - from a third of an hour or more, but so that it does not become too steep, otherwise it will not rise, and the gingerbread pieces will come out tough.
When the mass satisfies you with its plasticity and homogeneity, immediately make preparations so that the dough does not begin to settle. If you have decided to prepare a gingerbread house for your children for the New Year, the best recipe for it, in our opinion, is this one.
Honey-sugar dough
It is the second most popular place for this kind of baking. It makes a real Christmas gingerbread house. The recipe advises mixing wheat and rye flour to obtain a particularly delicious result. There are no exact proportions, so combine them as you like. First, a glass of sugar is fried in a dry frying pan until it turns a beautiful brown color. Carefully, so as not to get burned, pour a glass of boiling water with dissolved burnt sugar into it. After boiling for three minutes, the syrup is removed from the heat and after a short cooling, 450 g of honey and 160 g of butter are added. When they are completely dissolved, add a glass of sugar, beat until there are no lumps and leave to cool.
Separately, sift two types of flour into an incomplete glass, add a little salt, spices (if provided) and a spoon with the top of quicklime soda. If you want a darker house, add another spoonful of cocoa. When the mass has cooled sufficiently, three eggs are driven into it, after which the dry mixture is added. Now all that remains is to knead the dough to the desired plasticity. However, you won’t be able to bake your gingerbread house right away - the recipe requires putting the dough in the refrigerator for a day. You can work with it after about six hours, but it’s better to follow the recommendations: then the dough will come out more elastic.
Quick gingerbread dough
Cooking according to the classical method is quite difficult physically - you have to knead the dough for quite a long time. Therefore, to use the honey-sugar option you will have to wait. But you can make a lighter gingerbread house. The simple recipe calls for sugar rather than honey. To begin with, take 400 grams of richer sour cream, and stir soda in it, three-quarters of a teaspoon. When the surface begins to bubble, add two yolks and mix the mixture. Next, add a bag of vanillin with a glass of sugar, and after achieving homogeneity, add flour, gradually from two to three glasses. When you are satisfied with the degree of plasticity, take out the “pattern” and start making the future house.
Gingerbread house
Cookies and other baked goods containing this ingredient are extremely popular in Western countries. Accordingly, a gingerbread house is very often baked at Christmas. Its recipe, considered one of the most successful, is also based on a combination of rye and wheat flour. First of all, combine one and a half glasses of honey, half a glass of brown sugar and half a pack (125 grams) of butter in a bowl. Over low heat, with continuous stirring, the ingredients combine into a single whole. In another bowl, mix both flours, a quarter kilogram each, and a spoonful of soda. Then the warm mixture is poured in, an egg is beaten in and spices are added: ginger, cinnamon, nutmeg, cloves (approximately a quarter of a teaspoon). The dough is kneaded until smooth and wrapped in plastic, hidden in the refrigerator - this time for only two hours.
Peppermint Gingerbread House
A very good solution for those who love aromatic pastries. You can use mint tincture or its essence - just a spoon of such liquid is enough. If you are a supporter of natural ingredients, you will need a tablespoon of dried herb, and it is better to bring it to a dust state in a coffee grinder - then you will get a more uniformly smelling gingerbread house. The recipe at the very beginning is similar to the other variations: this time the syrup is prepared only from sugar (a glass of sand for the same volume of boiling water). It is not advisable to use honey: the smell of mint will overwhelm its aroma. After boiling, the saucepan is removed from the stove almost immediately, mint is added to it or its tincture is poured in and a piece of butter is added. When it dissolves and the mass is no longer hot, it is poured into flour (2.5-3 cups) mixed with a spoonful of soda, and the dough is kneaded. It should be kept in the cold for no longer than a third of an hour, after which you can start baking the parts of the house.
Orange House
The dough is interesting because it completely lacks water (or sour cream). And how wonderful your gingerbread house will smell! The recipe insists on using only freshly squeezed juice; It will take half a glass - about two oranges. In addition, before loading citrus fruits into the juicer, you will need to zest them. First, combine the following ingredients: juice, soft but not melted butter (240 grams), two glasses of sugar, three eggs and two large spoons of honey. To obtain an even mass, it is more convenient to use a mixer or blender. Then the rest of the bulk ingredients are added: 6-7 cups of flour (decide when you need to stop), two spoons of cocoa, baking powder and cinnamon, one of ginger and zest. The dough is kneaded to the desired state, and it is immediately ready for further work.
Gingerbread on semolina
The Germans shared with us this way of preparing a festive Christmas delicacy. And at the same time you get a complete and tasty gingerbread house. The recipe is as follows: mix a glass of wheat flour and half of the sifted semolina, add two spoons of baking powder, a pinch of salt and, if desired, spices suitable for baking (cardamom, cloves, nutmeg, cinnamon). Using a blender or mixer, beat half a stick of butter, a third of a glass of sugar and half of honey. Little by little, with constant stirring, the first mixture is added to the second. When the dough has already reached the desired density and elasticity, it is left on the table under a napkin for a quarter of an hour. Next is the standard: roll out, cut according to the template - and into the oven.
Final actions
All that remains is to paint and assemble the gingerbread house (recipe). We have already conducted a master class on gluing, only a few details remain to be mentioned.
Firstly, gingerbread cookies bake quite quickly, and you shouldn’t overcook them in the oven, otherwise in the future they can replace your hammer.
Secondly, it is better to do the main drawings on planes before assembly: it is more convenient to do this on lying walls than on already fixed ones.
Thirdly, the roof can be covered with specially baked small “gingerbreads”, but such work is quite painstaking. It turns out quite tasty and beautiful if you use, for example, ready-made pillow cookies, halves of peanuts as tiles, or simply mark it with icing.
Fourthly. For design success, you will have to use your imagination to the fullest and use frozen berries, candied fruits, grated nuts, chocolate, powdered sugar, and so on. However, before drawing, it’s a good idea to practice your artistic skills on paper or at least think in advance about what and how you will paint.
Good luck with your New Year and Christmas experiments!
The tradition of making houses from ginger dough originated in Germany in 1812. Then the Brothers Grimm fairy tale “Hansel and Gretel” was published. Readers loved the delicious gingerbread house that lost children stumbled upon. Therefore, its analogues soon became an invariable attribute of Christmas and New Year fairs.
The beauty of this holiday treat is that, thanks to the spices, it can be stored for several weeks. And it is the spices that give it a special New Year’s aroma.
Ground ginger and cinnamon are required ingredients. But you can use other seasonings. For example, celebrity chef Jamie Oliver sometimes adds a little nutmeg and ground cloves to the dough.
Although the dough can be stored for a long time, over time the house will begin to get stale, so you shouldn’t delay tasting it too much. Moreover, it will be quite difficult to resist.
Ingredients
- 220 g butter;
- 250 g sugar;
- 2 large eggs;
- 400 g liquid honey;
- 700 g flour;
- 1 teaspoon of soda;
- ½ teaspoon baking powder;
- 4 teaspoons ground ginger;
- 4 teaspoons ground cinnamon;
- 1 ½ teaspoons salt.
Preparation
In one bowl, mix butter and sugar. Then add the eggs one at a time and beat until smooth. Pour in honey and mix well.
In another bowl, mix all the dry ingredients and place the mixture in the first bowl. Knead the dough, wrap it in cling film and put it in the refrigerator for a couple of hours.
Shutterfly.com
This amount of dough is enough for an average house 20 × 10 × 20 cm.
How to build a gingerbread house
This is the most difficult, but at the same time the most interesting part. It is best to build and decorate a house together with loved ones. This will give you a great opportunity to spend time together and develop your creativity.
First you need to make a house template. You can draw it yourself or choose from ready-made ones. For example, download , or .
Roll out the dough into a large layer 0.5–0.7 cm thick, place templates on it and cut out the necessary parts. It is best to roll out the dough between two sheets of parchment. So it definitely won’t stick to anything.
shutterfly.com At this stage, if desired, you can cut out additional windows and a door in the dough. And from the leftovers you can make Christmas trees that “grow” next to the house, build a chimney or bake.
Carefully transfer the parchment with the parts onto a baking sheet and place in an oven preheated to 180°C for 12–15 minutes. The dough is baked when it has hardened and turned dark brown around the edges. Allow the parts to cool before building the house.
At this time, prepare the protein glaze: it is needed to hold the walls and roof together and for decoration. Beat 3 egg whites with a mixer until foamy. Then, without stopping whisking, gradually add 500 g of powdered sugar to the whites. You should end up with a thick white glaze of uniform consistency.
Prepare a beautiful stand on which the gingerbread house will stand. Once glued, it can no longer be moved.
Then use icing to glue the pieces to the stand and to each other. The easiest way to do this is to place the icing in a pastry bag, a pastry syringe, or a regular plastic bag with a small hole in the corner. When building a house, the walls need to be supported with some available means so that they stand level.
The remaining glaze will be useful for decoration.
The pieces can be decorated before you put them together. Especially if you decide to build a large or non-standard house. But if you make it according to the templates presented above, you can decorate the finished product.
