BakingWinter
Gingerbread house
A firm, easy-to-shape honey dough for a small house and about 20 figures – an Advent family activity you can keep as a decoration afterwards.
- Prep:
- 1 hr
- Baking/cooking:
- 1 hr
- Serves:
- 1 small house and about 20 figures
The honey we recommend for this recipe: Wildflower honey
It gives the dough a full flavour and a lovely colour, and works even when crystallised, because it melts as you warm it. You'll need about 300 g of honey.
For a different flavour: Chestnut honey – makes a darker, spicier, slightly bitter dough.
Ingredients
- 300 ghoney(Wildflower honey)
- 1 kgplain flour
- 250 gbrown sugar
- 200 gbutter
- 3eggs
- 2 tspbicarbonate of soda
- 1 sachetgingerbread spice mix
- 1orange, grated zest
- 2egg whites for decorating
- 400 gicing sugar for decorating
- 4 tsplemon juice
- 6 tbspgranulated sugar for sticking it together
Want to make one of your own sugar recipes with honey? Sugar-to-honey converter
Method
- 1
Warm the honey with the spice mix over a low heat, stir in the butter, and leave to cool until lukewarm.
- 2
Whisk the eggs with the brown sugar until frothy, add the honey mixture, then work in the flour mixed with the bicarbonate of soda, and the orange zest. Wrap in cling film and rest overnight in the fridge.
- 3
Cut the templates for the house out of paper: two side walls, two gable ends and two roof panels.
- 4
Roll the dough out to 3–4 mm thick, cut out the pieces around the templates, and use the rest for figures. Bake at 180 °C for 10–12 minutes, and let them cool flat on the tray so they don't warp.
- 5
Melt the granulated sugar into a light caramel, and use it to stick the walls together, then the roof. An adult should do this step: hot caramel can cause serious burns.
- 6
Mix the egg whites with the icing sugar and lemon juice until glossy, put it in a piping bag, and decorate the house and figures.
In our guides: Honey at a Hungarian Christmas: honey wafers, poppy seed guba and gingerbread
Oszd meg, ha tetszik
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