Blogmas 2017 - Day 13: Gingerbread House

I know I’ve mentioned it in the past but my baking skill level is “below average”, and I don’t think of myself as being particularly creative. However, I spotted a cheap Gingerbread House kit in Sainsbury’s so I thought we’d give it a try this year.

I have never baked a gingerbread house before, and the only gingerbread men I’ve ever made were well under par. A quick look on Wikipedia tells me that in the 17th Century only professional gingerbread bakers were permitted to bake gingerbread, apart from at Easter and Christmas when anyone was allowed to. Gosh, didn’t realise gingerbread was such serious business! Anyway, with me being about as inept as my two little helpers, I felt a kit was the best way to go. It included nearly everything we needed, we just had to add butter and golden syrup.


The making of the gingerbread pieces was easy. Melt butter and golden syrup, add to packet mix, set aside for 10minutes, knead, roll, cut out the shapes using the templates on the box, bake for 15minutes.



The tricky part was the assembly of the pieces. I’ve never piped icing in my life, so needed to work that out with minimal waste of the icing provided, whilst also sticking the sides together. We had a slightly gappy roof (“I hope it doesn’t rain in gingerbread land, mummy!”) but it was constructed and didn’t collapse. Hurrah. I have to admit, I did let CBeebies babysit whilst I did the construction part alone - with the help of a couple of jars of pesto. Thought it best in order to avoid any shouty moments!


Charlotte decorated the house herself whilst Benjamin had his nap, and I think she did a pretty good job. I’m not entirely sure why sprinkles were included in the set as they just rolled off any of the icing (even when wet) and went all over the floor. Charlotte was happy though, she just pretended it was the aforementioned rain going into the house.


We ended up with a bit of dough left over, and things went a bit rogue - Charlotte used it to sculpt a "gingerbread volcano"!


I eventually persuaded her to use some biscuit cutters to make some gingerbread shapes. Because of this, may I present the festive house of Peppa Pig’s teddy, and George Pig’s Dinosaur!




Far, far, far from perfect but not horrendous work for a 3 year old and an incompetent 30 year old! 



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