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For December's Daring Bakers' challenge we were asked to bake and decorate a gingerbread house. Anna of Very Small Anna and Y of Lemonpi gave us two recipes for gingerbread. Anna provided a recipe from Good Housekeeping magazine and Y's was from The Great Scandinavian Baking Book by Beatrice Ojakangas. I decided to make a half portion of Y's recipe. I didn't use the spices that the recipe called for since we did not plan to eat the gingerbread. I didn't want to waste any spices since they are expensive. But I did add just a bit of ground ginger and cinnamon to give a nice spicy holiday scent. The other requirement was that our entire house must edible. Nothing like cardboard or glue to help support the house was allowed.

This was definitely more like a construction and decorating challenge than a baking challenge. The dough came together easily and rolled nicely. I created a template for my roof and walls using a file folder and then cut out the pieces from the rolled dough before baking.



I made one large house and one tiny house. I cut simple triangles for my trees using the leftover dough.





Royal icing made with meringue powder was my glue and assorted candies were my decoration. A bed of finely shredded desiccated coconut provided the snowy landscape. I was amazed that the pieces of my house actually fit together since I'm not known for my assembly skills and I was equally amazed that the royal icing glue held it all together without drooping or sliding.

This was my first ever gingerbread house. Overall it was a fun challenge which brought out the child in me. :) Happy holidays to you and your family! See you in 2010.


Gromit's view from the sky


A perfect landing

The fine print:
The December 2009 Daring Bakers’ challenge was brought to you by Anna of Very Small Anna and Y of Lemonpi. They chose to challenge Daring Bakers’ everywhere to bake and assemble a gingerbread house from scratch. They chose recipes from Good Housekeeping and from The Great Scandinavian Baking Book as the challenge recipes.
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