Make You Own Gingerbread House - Fun for the whole family
Edible gingerbread houses are a holiday favorite. They can be made in all shapes and sizes and decorated with pretty much anything you have in the pantry. They can be homemade with fresh gingerbread or assembled right out of a kit. They are enjoyed by kids and seniors... women and men... there are designs that will please anyone. This lens contains everything you need to create a gingerbread house at home. There are also a few tips and great pictures along the way.
Beautiful Gingerbread Houses
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Easy Gingerbread Recipe
Basic Gingerbread House Ingredients
These are the ingredients to make the basic shell of your edible gingerbread house. The real fun then comes in decorating it ...1/2 cup (1 stick) butter, at room temperature
1/2 cup dark brown sugar
1/4 cup light molasses or dark corn syrup
1 tablespoon cinnamon
1 tablespoon ground ginger
1 1/2 teaspoons ground cloves
1 teaspoon baking soda
2 cups all-purpose flour
2 tablespoons water
This is enough gingerbread to make a basic 3X5 inch gingerbread house. You will need more to make a bigger house.
This recipe and the remaining instructions can be found at FoodNetwork.com.
Do you have food allergies? Try this Gluten-Free Gingerbread recipe.
Making Great Gingerbread Houses
Delicious Designs from Cabins to Castles, from Lighthouses to Tree Houses
Making Great Gingerbread Houses: Delicious Designs from Cabins to Castles, from Lighthouses to Tree Houses
Amazon Price: $10.17 (as of 12/08/2009)
This is part pastry art and part architecture modelling, but making gingerbread houses is all winter-holiday and Christmas-time fun! These forty scrumptious-looking projects are perfect for anyone of any age with an urge to bake & decorate. Complete easy-to-follow instructions from an experienced pastry chef, illustrated step-by-photographic-step in full colour. Amazon product description
Avg. Customer Rating: 
Amazon Customer Review (luv2crop)
"We learned a lot and got lots of great ideas. It will be a part of our Christmas traditions. I loved this book and recommend this book for any gingerbread nuts on your list."
How to Make Royal Icing
To decorate your house you will need icing of various colors. Here is how to make it. There are more tips on the separate icing pages if you need themIngredients♨ 1 pound (3-3/4 cups) confectionery sugar
♨ 4 teaspoons packaged egg whites
♨ ¼ cup of water
♨ 1 -2 teaspons lemon or vanilla juice
♨ Coloring if required
Method➀Mix egg whites, sugar and water together using an electric hand mixer
➁When smooth, add lemon/vanilla juice to taste.
➂Add coloring if required.
➃Mix until smooth. If too thick add more water; add more sugar if too runny.
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How to Make Royal Icing
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If you are making a Christmas cake, a special party cake (like these for a Twilight Birthday Party) or decorating a beautiful gingerbread house, you'll need royal icing. Royal icing is the thick, solid icing that is often seen on wedding cakes a...
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Black Cake Icing
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Black Icing Techniques If you want to make a Twilight party cake or a cake for Halloween, you will probably need black cake icing. There are several alternatives. These tips will help you decide which method is best for your cake. Image: Laura Pasti...
Quick Tip
Keep your icing covered. It will dry out quickly. Store in a metal or glass container.
Easy Gingerbread Houses
A Video Tutorial
Free Gingerbread House Templates
- One Room House
- Victorian House
- Chapel
- Country Store
- Log Cabin
- Dormer and Chimney
- Cottage
- Carousel
- There are also templates for row houses, clock towers, castles, and more that you can buy here for as little as $9.95.
Quick Tip
Shredded wheat cereal makes a great roof.
Gingerbread is yummy!
Decorating the house
A few more tips to get you started
Making Gingerbread
A few supplies you may need
Kitchen Supply Gingerbread House Mold
This template will make cutting out gingerbread walls much easier.
Amazon Price: $23.12 (as of 12/08/2009)
Wholesome Sweeteners Fair Trade Organic Molasses, 32-Ounce Bottles (Pack of 3)
You can't make gingerbread without molasses. This bottle is organic!
Amazon Price: $18.42 (as of 12/08/2009)
Royal Icing Mix
You need royal icing to hold everything together. Using a pre-made mix will make the process go much more smoothly.
Amazon Price: $2.69 (as of 12/08/2009)
Red Vines Red Original Licorice Twists, 64 Ounce Tub
Licorice makes great window trimmings, gates, and siding and it adds a pop of color.
Amazon Price: $10.66 (as of 12/08/2009)
This picture courtesy of uriel on Creative Commons.
Quick Tip
Pour corn syrup on your base and cover with a mix of shredded coconut and sugar to make realistic looking snow.
Gingerbread House Blogs
On Google
- How To Enter the Gingerbread House Slideshow Contest
- Gingerbread houses are awesome! They combine craft, cooking, and scale-model construction in one delicious, sugary proj...
- Gingerbread house - Craft
- Gingerbread house - My cousin Jill, the one I made the one-and-only wedding quilt for, has a gingerbread house party every year the Saturday after Thanksgiving. Some years, I get to attend. Other ...
- Modern Gingerbread House – otto
- Hometta has provided free downloadable plans for a modernist gingerbread house. This DIY house is a small-scale version of the Draft House by HouMinn. This pdf, a crafty holiday spirit and a Wholefoods gingerbread house kit is all you ...
- gingerbread house - detail. on Flickr - Photo Sharing!
- Vegan gingerbread house made from scratch. Probably my favorite part about Christmas.
Picture courtesy of yumiang on Creative Commons.
Quick Poll
Wilton Ultimate Gingerbread House
Wilton Ultimate Gingerbread House
Amazon Price: $45.00 (as of 12/08/2009)
This house includes pre-baked house pieces and trees, 3 packages of icing mix, decorating bags, 2 tips, icing decorations, candy, and complete instructions.
Gingerbread Cottage
National Gingerbread House Competition
(Almost) too good to eat!
The ambitious might be tempted to enter the National Gingerbread House Competition. The competition is held annualy at the Grove Park Inn Resort and Spa in Ashville North Carolina. There are separate categories for adults, teens, youths and children so something for all the family to enjoy. The competition usually attracts over 300 amazing entries. Apart from the base, all of the gingerbread house must be edible. The inset photo shows the 2007 grand prize winning gingerbread house, an amazing gingerbread castle by Patricia Howard of Winter Springs, Florida. (Photo credit, © Grove Park Inn Resort and Spa)For more photos of beaufiul gingerbread houses, check out these photos of gingerbread houses which have won prizes in the National Gingerbread House Competition. If you are not feeling that ambitious, there are local competions as well.
Photo of gingerbread cottage by photojc123 via Flickr under a creative commons licence.
People love gingerbread!
See who's tweeting about it.
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- smokey_frankie
- @BuzzGirls Lips worthy of being Under the Mistletoe: Philosophy lip gloss gingerbread spicy pear +cranberry! http://tiny.cc/HQPNn #buzzgirls
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- Sally_G
- @AlexKaris It is distracting receiving informative tweets from a Gingerbread Man. Thanks for all your info - so helpful!
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- Mytaege
- Just looked up Starbucks Nutritional information My Gingerbread Latte Had 330 Calories CRAP!!!!!!
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- WestPalmParks
- Gingerbread Holiday Gift Shoppe at South Olive Community Center. 'Tis the season for shopping! Elementary through... http://bit.ly/8EIXlf
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- TheFadingPoint
- loves Christmas lights, gingerbread houses, singing Christmas carols, giving presents, drinking hot chocolate... http://bit.ly/83EwkB
This picture courtesy of sociotard on Creative Commons.
I hope you were inspired to make your own gingerbread house
Leave your comments, tips, and suggestions below.
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Reply
- jgelien jgelien Dec 8, 2009 @ 9:57 am
- My girls are all grown but we still get together every year to do a gingerbread house.
It's a very special part of our holiday. I love your lens
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Reply
- whitemoss whitemoss Dec 7, 2009 @ 10:40 am
- Wow- if I only had the time and patience I'd love to make one of these!
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Reply
- Themiscorkscrew Themiscorkscrew Dec 4, 2009 @ 7:28 pm
- I love the gingerbread cottage. 5 stars!
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Reply
- aj2008 aj2008 Dec 2, 2009 @ 5:26 am
- oooo these are magical. Beautiful lens and SquidAngel Blessings for you!
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Reply
- machinist machinist Dec 1, 2009 @ 7:49 am
- I think I might have difficulty eating one of these artworks should make one. I'd probably keep it till it went mouldy. Lovely to see though
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Reply
- ElizabethJeanAllen ElizabethJeanAllen Nov 29, 2009 @ 5:03 am
- We tried making a gingerbread house one year. We ended up with a sticky mess but it was fun. Thanks for the memories.
Lizzy
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- lasertek lasertek Nov 22, 2009 @ 7:24 pm
- Last year, we had an edible gingerbread house. The kids loved it. We'll be making another one this holidays. Might as well choose amongst the gingerbread houses you've posted.
Hope you could visit my lenses as well.
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Reply
- pkmcr pkmcr Nov 22, 2009 @ 2:39 pm
- Beautiful lens and they sound delicious! Blessed by a Squid Angel :-)
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Reply
- louiswery louiswery Nov 22, 2009 @ 8:19 am
- Thank you for this beautiful lens. I added its as a featured lens on my Holidays on St Armands Circle lens. Hope that's okay!
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- thesuccess thesuccess Nov 21, 2009 @ 3:05 pm
- This lens is just as well constructed as your Ginger Houses. I would like to try building from a kit!
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About this lensmaster
Lensmaster Kate-Phizackerley has been a member since October 5 2008, has rated 551 lenses, favorited 29, and has created 156 lenses from scratch. Kate Phizackerley donates their royalties to Save the Children. This member's top-ranked page is "Beautiful Gingerbread Houses". See all my lenses
My Bio
I am a middle-aged woman with a wide range of interests from Ancient Egypt, backgammon, cookery ... to ... Zimbabwe which I visited 20 years ago and loved.
As a young girl, my father taught me an appreciation of art and the countryside. Like both my parents, I am an accomplished trout fly fisher, but find litte opportunity at present. My mother taught her how to bake and dress making and I have designed some dresses for myself. I would also love to learn jewelry making which my mother also studied at college.
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Save the Children is the leading independent organization creating lasting change in the lives of children in need in the United States and around the world. Recognized for our commitment to accountability, innovation and collaboration, our work takes us
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I am a middle-aged woman with a wide range of interests from Ancient Egypt, backgammon, cookery ... to ... Zimbabwe which I... (more)
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