Picture this: The fire is crackling, rain patters lightly against the window, and the smell of gingerbread wafts through the house. The best part of Christmas is the traditions that add anticipation and pave the way for Dec. 25: Cookie-decorating, caroling, parties, and, of course, making gingerbread houses.
For many people, if decorating a gingerbread house is a winter tradition, it is through a box with stale gingerbread, dry frosting, and a couple of gumdrops. The final result is usually a poorly-constructed monstrosity that, with luck, will stay standing for five minutes. But it does not have to be this way. Making a beautiful, homemade gingerbread house from scratch is not as difficult as it seems.
The first step is finding a good gingerbread recipe. The gingerbread should be crisp and sturdy for the base of the house. If it is too soft, the finished product is likely to collapse.
Once the dough is made and rolled out, all the pieces must be cut evenly. A great trick is using paper templates to trace the same size for the corresponding front and back pieces of the house, the sides and the roof.
After baking and cooling the gingerbread, the fun part begins: decorating. Many people try assembling before decorating, when they should do the reverse order. It must be easier to pipe frosting designs when the pieces of the house and flat on the table. Decorating is where the creativity comes out, by adding things like stripes, polka dots, scalloped borders, designs in the windows, a wreath on the door, etc. Make sure to find a a good royal icing recipe with meringue powder, because this type of frosting dries hard and keeps the house together.
Once the frosting designs are set, it’s time to assemble. This is the most crucial step, and it is important to do it correctly so the house stays standing. Pipe thick lines of frosting along every side of the front, back, and side walls, then hold them together in position for five minutes. Then, wait half an hour before adding the roof.
Once the structure is finished, the final product is still far from done. There is designing that happens in the front yard. Decorating the roof, adding a chimney, creating upside-down ice cream cone trees, an ice skating rink, and adding gingerbread people in front of the house truly personalize it and make it a piece of art.
