Gingerbread House

Tip for perfectly cut walls - 1. roll the dough 2. score the exact outline of the wall 3. Leave a small (2cm is fine) border around the scores edges 4. Bake and when ready, cut through the soft gingerbread along the scored lines with a sharp knife before it hardens. Don’t wait until the gingerbread is hard as it will crack easily. Doing this method is better than cutting the dough to the exact template as you will prevent the edges from spreading.

Yield: Half recipe-gingerbread dough (metrics removed) 1/2 pound unsalted butter (2sticks) 1 1/4 cups plus 1 1/2 tablespoons dark brown sugar 6 cups + 6 Tablespoons plus 1 tablespoon all-purpose flour, plus more for dusting 1 heaping tablespoon of each ground ginger and ground cinnamon 1\2 teaspoon + 1\4 teaspoon baking soda, level 1\4 teaspoon baking powder, level 1\4 teaspoon salt, level 2 eggs, at room temperature 1 cup molasses Zest of 1 lemon and 1 orange (optional, but I would add)

I am in the process of trying this for the first time. As I bake the sheets of gingerbread they are getting bubbles on the surface... can anyone tell me why and how to prevent it? I am baking at 175 degrees C in a convection oven.

I found it helpful to weigh the dough into 20 oz chunks, pat into squares, and wrap individually before refrigerating. That way, you can take out a square of cold dough and roll it out for each slab.

Added 1/4 tsp of cardamom, 1/2 tsp ground cloves & 1/2 tsp of ground nutmeg to each half batch - even fuller flavor! And add the zest of the orange & lemon because it really does knock it out of the proverbial park!

We made this last year and it was great!! I was so nervous that it would crumble or fall apart and it was sturdy and easy to work with. We left it out to dry for a week before proceeding with assembly. The kids and I had a great time. We are making it again this year as well.

Just got the first batch out of the oven and the gingerbread itself is delicious. Not sure how it will stand up house-wise, but warm-cookie-wise, it's fab. I wish that the ingredient list listed the amount of each ingredient used per half-batch. I kept getting confused along the way.

Made half the recipe and used 6.5” squares instead of 9”. Worked beautifully! Great size, and delicious!

I wish the ingredients were listed in amounts for half batch, since you can’t exactly measure out the full amount and then divide in half without remeasuring. I get that you’d have to make two batches to make a full house, but that can be an included note. Otherwise, really delicious recipe.

Agree with others - cut the gingerbread after it comes out of the oven, while it is still soft. I waited the 5 days the instructions suggest and my cuts were not clean, plus I had a corner crumble because the gingerbread was too hard by that point. It helps to use a small paring knife to trace out the template on the gingerbread after it's baked, then make clean cuts with a larger knife.

I made this and the dough was great! The problem I encountered had to do with the construction of the piece. The roof was too long and covered up the sides..at 9 inches..that is long, so trim them shorter. The royal icing was missing something and it was not the consistency that it needed to be to constuct the house. I would recommend another royal icing recipe than this one. I am a chef and, in my professional view, the template and the royal icing recipe need to be tweaked. A nice size house.

No. My Canadian Cookbook with same recipe does not call for drying the gingerbread slabs out at all. I found once baked, they were hard enough, that if you wanted to use them once cooled, you probably could.

I have a 6 qt mixer and ended up halving it still. It's a very thick dough so I think doing in two batches also guarantees proper mixing.

FYI, if your stand mixer has an 11 lbs or higher dough capacity (like the Ankarsrum which is what I used), it will be able to hold the whole recipe in a single batch. But it was at the limit, so an even slightly smaller mixer probably wouldn't work. I had a hard time portioning and rolling out the dough until it had been at room temperature for at least 15 minutes, at which point it became much easier. Haven't tasted the final product yet but the raw dough tastes amazing with the zest.

That's exactly what you do. The assembly instructions are linked at the bottom of the recipe, or you can go here (if I'm allowed to include links) : https://cooking.nytimes.com/guides/47-how-to-make-a-gingerbread-house