Guaranteed to succeed: This is how you bake a gingerbread house yourself

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With a gingerbread house, Christmas is not just about the stomach, but is also something for the eyes. The individually decorated houses can be used as Christmas decorations. The only catch: They are so delicious that unfortunately they don't brighten up the apartment for too long.

Because making it yourself is much more fun than buying it, we'll tell you here how you can bake your own gingerbread house. This tastes better and is a great activity for you and your children during Advent. The gingerbread dough is easy to prepare and can then be expanded into your own dream house as you wish.

In addition to the gingerbread house recipe, we have picked out creative ideas for gingerbread properties so that you can let off steam in architectural and culinary terms. We also reveal how the gingerbread stays juicy for longer.

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Successful gingerbread house recipe

The amount of dough in this recipe is enough for one gingerbread house or 30-50 cookies (depending on size). Cut-out gingerbread cookies make great tree decorations, place cards or tags for Christmas presents - just as a suggestion if you don't have the patience to bake a gingerbread house.

You need these ingredients:
For the dough

  • 500 g rye flour
  • 250 g blossom honey
  • 125g powdered sugar
  • 125 g Butter
  • 50 g walnuts, grated
  • 2 Owner, Gr. M
  • 15 g gingerbread spice
  • 10g cinnamon
  • 10 g Natron
  • 2 THE RUM

Besides that

  • Egg or milk for brushing
  • Half walnuts
  • Almonds
  • candied cherries etc. for topping

For the icing
Mix 1 tablespoon of egg white with a little powdered sugar (finely sifted) and a few drops of lemon juice until creamy. The mixture must not run out, otherwise add a little more powdered sugar.

Gingerbread houses take some time to make. But once they are finished, they are an eye-catcher on every festive table.Credit:Sonja Priller/Löwenzahn-Verlag

This is how the preparation works:
Put all the ingredients in a large bowl and knead into a smooth dough, cover and leave to rest in a cool place overnight.

The next day, knead the dough together a little and roll it out to 5 mm thick. Cut out any shapes. Brush with egg or milk and top with nuts or candied cherries if desired. Bake in a preheated oven at 180 °C for approx. 12-15 minutes until light.

After cooling, prepare the icing, pour a small amount into a piping bag and assemble or decorate the gingerbread cookies as desired. A few drops of food coloring can be used for coloring. Gingerbread can also be easily decorated with sprinkles or other sugar decorations.

Tricks to keep the gingerbread moist for longer

When baking, make sure that the gingerbread does not get too dark in the oven. It should be nice and light when it comes out so it won't dry out and hard so quickly.

Homemade gingerbread will keep for several weeks.It's best to store it in an airtight cookie jar and add a few apple pieces. The apple releases moisture into the cookies so that they stay juicy for longer. Check again and again that the apple is not going bad and replace it regularly with fresh apple slices.

Building a gingerbread house: tips and ideas

The recipe for the gingerbread house above is designed for dimensions of 10 x 15 cm. For a simply constructed house like the one in the picture for the recipe, cut out two triangles and two rectangles (length 10 cm, width 15 cm). The door measures 4 x 5 cm. Simply make templates out of cardboard beforehand and then trace the contours step by step in the rolled out dough with a knife.

Special shapes replace the paper template. In addition, you can work more accurately and quickly with the finished kits.You can find a gingerbread house cutter set here on Amazon.*

What is important when building a gingerbread house is thatAlways cut out pieces before baking. Afterwards the dough is too hard. Therefore, always cut out the doors and windows or hatch the roof tiles in advance. The same goes for gingerbread tags. These should also be pierced with a toothpick before baking so that they can be hung up later.

Also remember, one tooGingerbread dough base for the houseto bake. You can glue the walls to this with icing. In the gingerbread house, the cast serves as a kind of glue that holds everything together. You can also use it to decorate.

Tipp:Don't make the casting too liquid, otherwise your buildings will literally melt away. If the icing runs down the edges of your wall and roof pieces, add a little more powdered sugar to thicken it.

To decorate your gingerbread house, you can glue whatever colorful candy you want (with edible icing). Powdered sugar or coconut flakes are enough to conjure up a sugar-sweet snow landscape. If you're more ambitious, you can make shapes out of fondant or raw marzipan and use them to pimp your crispy house.

Examples of gingerbread house decorations:

  • Nuts and almonds
  • Raisins
  • Pretzel sticks and pretzels
  • Marshmallows
  • Butterkekse
  • Sugar writing
  • Gummy bears
  • Rubber cords (or rolled up licorice snails)
  • Smarties or other chocolate chips
  • Toffifees
  • Jelly Beans
  • Print
  • The Zimtsters
  • Sugar pearls
  • Candy

Have you run out of inspiration? Don't worry, here are seven great gingerbread house ideas to imitate.

1. Gingerbread house idea: decoration with cinnamon and star anise

It doesn't have to be a gingerbread house with candy overload. You can also decorate your house beautifully with Christmas spices such as star-shaped anise. Cinnamon sticks become logs that lie in the attached shed in front of the crispy house.

Kellogg's Toppas were used for the roof - brilliant because the whole grain cereal has the right shape and look of roof shingles. If you want to let smoke rise from your fireplace, you can use white cotton candy and drape it over the fireplace as a cloud of smoke. Alternatively, you can use normal cotton wool, but unfortunately it is not edible.

Tipp:Instead of decorative Christmas trees, you can also glue small sprigs of rosemary or thyme onto your building base with icing.

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2. Gingerbread house idea: forest hut with pretzel sticks

If you like it rustic, you can convert your gingerbread house into a wooden house. To do this, prime the walls with melted chocolate and glue the trimmed pretzel sticks to them.

You can also make a garden fence out of small pretzels or attach a ladder out of pretzel sticks so that your gingerbread men can repair the chimney if necessary when Santa Claus arrives.

3. Gingerbread house idea: villa with balcony

Think big – if you live in a one-room apartment, you can make your dream home come true by baking a gingerbread house. For a gingerbread villa, you obviously need several wall parts that you “glue” together with chocolate icing or icing.

A multi-story gingerbread house is also possible. But it's best to wait until the lower floors have solidified before you go any further.

Tipp:The larger the individual parts of the house are, the heavier they become. To prevent everything from collapsing before the casting has dried, we recommend stabilizing the side walls from the outside with glasses.

4. Gingerbread house idea: Gingerbread village with church

A house is not enough for you? Then make a whole gingerbread village including a village church. The crunchy village can be a little smaller than the large gingerbread villa.

A village like this is great to create with children. Each child can bake their own gingerbread house. In the end you put everything together into a cute housing development. By the way, also a great idea for a children's birthday party.

Tipp:Illuminated with a mini LED string of lights inside the gingerbread houses, the decoration also comes into its own in the evening. Spread across the middle of the table, you can beautifully stage your banquet.

5. Gingerbread house idea: chocolate everywhere

Chocoholics simply cover their gingerbread house with chocolate. Literally. Because chocolate pieces serve as paving stones for the wall and the door can be designed like Kitkats with chocolate bars. To stick it on, you use chocolate that you melted in a water bath.

Tipp:You create decorative patterns with different types of chocolate. In addition to milk chocolate as well as dark and white chocolate, blonde caramel chocolate is also suitable for decorating. Wrapped in pink ruby ​​chocolate, your gingerbread house becomes a powder pink ranch.

6. Gingerbread house idea: castle with a turret

Hand on heart, who doesn't dream of having their own castle? To bake a gingerbread castle like this, you need plenty of dough for all the individual pieces. And a few building skills, because a gingerbread castle like this is not for beginners. However, good pre-planning on paper is half the battle.

For the pointed tower roofs, you use ice cream cones that you brush with colored icing. By the way, ice cream cones painted green make great edible Christmas trees. If you want it to look even more realistic, dip cornflakes in white chocolate and use it to cover the fir trees.

7. Gingerbread house idea: mini houses for the coffee cup

If the gingerbread is already served as a coffee orIf you want to serve it, you can immediately build a pin house for the cup. To do this, cut a recess in the bottom of your crispy house before baking. To ensure that the house sits well on the edge of the cup, it is best to measure the exact width beforehand.

More ideas for delicious Christmas cookies

The recipe for the easy-to-shape gingerbread dough above comes from the wonderful baking book “The Best Christmas Cookies” by Johanna Aust. Not only will you learn how to make buttery-soft shortcrust pastry and other dough classics, but you will also get more than enough ideas for filled donuts,andwith alternative flour.

>>You can order the cookie book from Amazon here.*

No matter whether with gingerbread or other cookies, cookies and biscuits - we wish you a nice Christmas time and bon appetit!

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