house

A sturdy, construction quality gingerbread cookie house recipe, ideal for making your own gingerbread house for Christmas.

High Altitude Gingerbread House Recipe

sugar

molasses

ginger

allspice

cinnamon

cloves

tsp baking soda

unsalted butter

eggs, (lightly beaten)

cocoa powder, sifted free of lumps ((or replace with flour))

tbsp meringue powder

tsp vanilla extract

water

Preheat the oven to 325 F, and position a rack in the center of the oven.  Line several baking sheets with parchment paper.

In a saucepan, combine the sugar, molasses, ginger, allspice, cinnamon and cloves.  Over medium heat while stirring frequently with a silicone spatula, bring the mixture to a boil.  Remove from the heat.

Stir in the baking soda; the mixture will foam up and become paler and fluffier.  Then stir in the butter until completely melted.

Stir in the beaten eggs, then the flour and cocoa powder, until the dough starts to come together.

Dump the dough out onto a clean work surface, and knead for several minutes until it smooths out.  If it seems too damp or sticky, add a bit more flour.  If it seems too dry or crumbly, add a little warm water.

Cut the dough into 4ths, and wrap each portion in plastic wrap, working with just one portion at a time.  This recipe makes enough dough for a fairly large house (like the one pictured), or 3-4 mini gingerbread houses.

Make the Gingerbread Dough

Lightly flour the counter, and roll out the dough to just under 1/4 inch thick.  You shouldn&#39;t need to use too much extra flour, but if it sticks to the rolling pin, dust the dough lightly with flour.

Cut your dough, using any type of template or cutter, then place the cut pieces on the parchment lined baking sheets.  For larger pieces, you&#39;ll need to use a very large spatula or cake lifter to transfer the dough to the baking sheet, so that you don&#39;t tear or stretch the dough out of shape while transferring it.

If cutting out windows or doors, be sure to do that before baking the dough.  You can also emboss the dough with various impressions.  I used a spoon to emboss the roof pieces with a scalloped pattern, and the blunt side of a butter knife to emboss the chimney pieces with a brick pattern.

Roll and Cut the Dough

Bake the gingerbread pieces for about 15 minutes, or up to 20 minutes for very large pieces, until completely baked and hard.

Let cool on the baking sheet completely.

Bake the Gingerbread

For the royal icing, combine the powdered sugar and meringue powder.  Using a whisk, stir in the vanilla and water, starting with just 5 1/2 tbsp water, then adding more as needed.

For a stiff consistency to glue the house together, you should only add around 5 1/2 - 6 tbsp water.  For a medium/stiff consistency for the icing &quot;snow&quot; to decorate the house, add around 6 1/2 - 7 tbsp water.

You can start with a stiff consistency for construction, then add a small amount of water to slowly thin it out for decorating the assembled gingerbread house.

Fit a piping bag with a coupler and a small round tip, and fill half full of icing.  Secure the top of the bag with a rubber band or clip, since royal icing has a tendency to creep up and out the top of unsecured piping bags.

Note:  Another edible alternative to royal icing is to use liquid caramelized sugar to glue the house together.  A non-edible option is to use hot glue - this is perhaps the easiest option, since the hot glue dries and sets very quickly, and makes a strong seal to hold the house together.  If you don&#39;t intend your gingerbread house to be eaten and it&#39;s purely for decoration, there&#39;s no shame in using hot glue.

Royal Icing

I used clear gelatin sheets for the windows on my house, simply cutting them to fit and then gluing them onto the back of the pieces before assembling the house.

Another popular option for gingerbread house windows is to use isomalt.  This is a type of sugar substitute that you can sometimes buy in craft stores.

Windows

Check your gingerbread pieces to make sure that they all fit together, and the edges are straight.  If the edges are slightly curved or bowed, they won&#39;t make good contact with the icing or glue, and your construction won&#39;t be as solid.  If needed, you can use a microplane zester to gently shave any bowed or uneven edges to make them perfectly straight.

Start by assembling the sides and ends of the house.  You have to give the glue or royal icing enough time to dry and set before you move the pieces or add the roof.  Most gingerbread house disasters are the result of not allowing enough time for the icing to harden.

Once the base of the house is secure with the sides, ends, and any other parts (like the front door vestibule I added to mine), you can attach the roof, and then the chimney.

Assembly

To decorate my house, I chose not to pipe any intricate details that are typical of gingerbread houses.  Instead, I simply decorated mine with lots and lots of swirly royal icing snow drifts.

Using tip #6 on my piping bag, I piped snow drifts along the roof lines and edges, on top of the chimney, above the window sills, and around the base and corners of the house.  This also helped to cover up any evidence of my having used hot glue to secure the house pieces together.

If you&#39;re decorating your house with candy, you have to add the candy quickly before the icing hardens and sets.

Lastly, dust with a little powdered sugar, if desired.  Allow the icing to fully harden and cure for about 24 hours, before attempting to move your house.

Decorating

I love this house.   How did you do the trees?

I think it's best to trace them onto thin cardboard, like I did, which is much sturdier than paper.  I used empty cereal boxes.  It was very easy to place them on the dough and cut around them.

The prettiest sweet house ever!! I have been trying to make one for a few weeks now and have a terrible time finding templates that are big enough I have been looking everywhere for beautiful large gingerbread house cutters to no avail do you have any insight 🩷🩷 the templates you down load are very hard to use when they are paper

This gingerbread house recipe turned out fantastic! I subbed flour instead of the cocoa powder, and the color was still great. It had fine structural integrity, and the taste wasn't bad at all. The kids had fun building houses and munching on scraps. Thank you for another win!

Source: Epicurious 
You will need a Bundt pan (or something similar) if you feel like making an ice ring.

Philadelphia Fish House Punch

lemon juice (6 to 8 lemons), strained

Jamaican amber rum

Cognac (1 1/2 cups)

oz (1/4 cup) peach brandy* or 1/4 cup Cognac, which is how I always make it now

lemon

To make ice block, fill bundt pan with water and freeze until solid, about 8 hours.

Stir together sugar and 3 1/2 cups water in a large bowl or pot until sugar is dissolved. Add lemon juice, rum, Cognac, and brandy and chill, covered, at least 3 hours.

Put ice block in a punch bowl. Top with lemon slices. Pour punch over top.

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High Altitude Gingerbread House Rec...

Philadelphia Fish House Punch

The most viewed house recipes by Recipe Cart users, saved from over 6,000 sites. Or, go to our Recipe Search Engine