Have you ever dreamt of a snowy house with a wonderful smell of gingerbread during Christmas? The tradition of decorating gingerbread house started around early 1800s in Germany, after the fairytale of Hansel and Gretel. The story gained popularity and inspired many local bakers to create small decorated houses from lebkuchen, spiced honey biscuits. 

 

The origins of gingerbread is not confirmed. Some says the recipe was crafted in Greece long time ago, some mentioned about France and other mentioned about Germany and Sweden. We don't know where the recipe is orginally from. 

 

However we know for sure that the modern tradition of making gingerbread houses has become a widely famous family event during the Christmas month around the world. Let's create your own magic winter wonderland by following all the steps below. 

 

• Prep:2 hrs
• Cook:30 mins
• Decoration time : 2 hrs
   

Ingredients

• 150 g unsalted butter, softened.

• 150 g dark brown sugar

• 200 g unsulphured molasses

• 1 large egg, at room temperature

• 1 tsp vanilla extract

• 437 g all-purpose flour

• 1 tsp baking soda

• 1/2 tsp salt

• 1 tbsp ground ginger 

• 1 tbsp ground cinnamon

• 1/2 tsp ground allspice

• 1/2 tsp ground cloves
  
   

For decorations

• 2 egg whites
• 500g icing sugar
• a lot of different types of sweets of your choice
• Edible sweets
   

Instructions

1. Use a mixer to beat the butter for one minute until it becomes smooth and creamy. Add the brown sugar and molasses and then mix them on medium high speed until everything combined. Lastly beat the egg and the vanilla on high speed for 2 minutes. 

 

2. Mix all the dry ingredients baking soda, salt, ginger, cinnamon, allspice, and cloves together until combined. Add the wet ingredients until combined on low speed. Divide the dough into haft then wrap around these pieces with plastic wrap. Wrap each up tightly and pat down to create a disc shape. Then put in the fridge for 3 hours or up to 3 days. 

 

3. Prepare the gingerbread house template. Put the chilled dough on a baking paper and then roll the dough to the thickness of 2 cm. Cut the gingerbread house according to the template until you have two side walls, a front and a back wall and two rooftops. You can use any leftover dough to cut into other figures for example gingerbread man or gingerbread tree. 

 

4. In a large bowl, put the egg whites together with the icing sugar, then stir to make a smooth icing. Put the icing in a piping bag with a medium nozzle. Put all the walls together then pipe at the edge in order to glue them together. Wait for 10 minutes for the walls to dry. Then put the two rooftops on the walls and glue them together. 

 

5. Use the icing pipe to decorate the windows and the door. Decorate the sweets according to your theme then dust the roof with icing sugar for a snowy effect. Finally you can put the tree and the gingerbread man around the house. 

 

Tada it is done! If you prefer to buy the gingerbread house kit then it will be much easier. You can check out Favorina Gingerbread House Kit in Lidl. Enjoy your gingerbread house!

Rose