Ginger bread house pre-made kit vs make your own

[hegsag]

Has anyone made their own gingerbread houses? If so, which mold and/or cutter do you recommend? I am planning on having a ginger bread house decorating party for my kids and their friends. I think it may be cheaper for me to make my own rather than buy 15 pre baked kits. Any suggestions greatly appreciated

 

[NHdisneylover]

The key is to bake the pieces at least a week ahead and let them get stale and hard before you assemble the houses.

You don't need to buy any mold or cutter. Just find a pattern you like online, print it out,cut the pieces out on a light cardboard (empty cereal boxes work great) and use those to cut around right on the dough (with any sharp knife).

If you google you will find tons of sites with easy templates. Here is one site with several easy to make ones:

http://tipnut.com/gingerbread-ideas/

 

[dakcp2001]

I have very fond memories of my home smelling like gingerbread as a child. I have always wanted to try to make my own! There is a recipe somewhere for the gingerbread that Disney uses to make the houses. I would love to try!

 

[pogo791]

Making 15 houses from scratch would be a lot of work, even if you keep to the basic four-walls-and-gable-roof model. I hope you have lots of enthusiastic help!

Having made gingerbread houses for some fifty-plus years now (and trucks, and dinosaurs, and trains - depends on the age of the kids and their interests), I'd agree with NHdisneylover. Just google a template, and use that. If you're going for fifteen houses, try to keep them reasonably small.

While NHdisneylover is right about assembly being easier when the pieces are hard (one day is enough for me), if you are going to cut out windows and doors, you should do this soon after you take the pieces out of the oven, when the dough is still relatively soft. Otherwise, you risk breaking the pieces, and having to start over from scratch. (You might wish to make some extra walls as reserve pieces.)

 

[Robbi]

I've made gingerbread houses both from a kit and as other posters have said from scratch using templates. If I am doing the project with kids, I use a kit. Our Junior League did a Breakfast with Santa one year and I was in charge of decorations. We made the houses from scratch and even made stained glass windows from sugar syrup. I agree with letting the gingerbread sit for a few days to harden. I can't remember the exact recipe for the "glass" but I found one that looks familiar.

Disney recipe
Gingerbread Dough

Ingredients:
6 cups Flour, all purpose
1 teaspoon Baking soda
.5 teaspoons Baking powder
1 cup Unsalted butter
1 cup Dark brown sugar
4 teaspoons Ginger, ground
4 teaspoons Cinnamon, ground
1.5 teaspoons Cloves, ground
1 teaspoon Black pepper,
1.5 teaspoon Salt
2 each Eggs, large, whole
1.5 cups Molasses

Instructions:
1. Pre-heat oven to 350 degrees.
2. Sift together flour, baking soda and baking powder in a large mixing bowl
and set aside.
3. Add butter and brown sugar to an electric mixer and cream until fluffy.
4. Mix in spices and salt. Beat the eggs and molasses.
5. Add flour to mixture. Mix on low speed until thoroughly combined.
6. Divide the dough into thirds and wrap in plastic. Place in the refrigerator
and cool for at least one hour.
7. Sprinkle flour on a flat surface. Roll out the dough until it is about
one-eighth-inch thick.
8. Cut the dough into festive holiday shapes and place on a non-greased
baking sheet.
9. Place the sheet pans in the refrigerator and cool for about 15 minutes.
10. Bake for 15 minutes or until the gingerbread is firm in the center.

Stained glass windows recipe (adapted from multiple sources for stained glass candy)

3 cups sugar
1 1/2 cups white corn syrup
1 cup water
Food coloring, as needed

*Combine sugar, syrup and water in a large saucepan with a candy thermometer. Cook over medium high heat until the temperature reaches at least 260 degrees. The mixture will come to a boil quickly, but then it'll need to simmer for a while in order to get hot enough. The temperature is critical because the hotter the sugar gets, the harder the candy will set up later. Don't over cook it too much or you'll end up with discolored syrup that won't take color as well.

*Remove the syrup from the stove and add food coloring (we divided the syrup into 4 containers and added 6 drops of food coloring to each).

*Pour into the window spaces of your baked gingerbread. Wearing gloves will help prevent burns, in case you drip some hot sugar on yourself. Re-heat gently if the mixture becomes too thick to pour easily.

Clean up: All you need is a lot of hot water and a little bit of time. First of all, if you have lots of leftover sugar syrup, go ahead and re-heat it and then pour it into a baking tray lined with aluminum foil. This reduces the amount of hard sugar you have to clean up. Put your dishes in the sink and run hot water all over the outside of everything to get any sugar off (be patient). Then you can fill the measuring cups with water and stick them in the microwave for a bit to melt any sugar remaining inside. The pot can be filled with water and heated on the stove.

Another Disney recipe:
Ingredients:

1/4 cup unsalted butter
1/2 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup dark molasses
3 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon ground cloves
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
3 teaspoons ground ginger
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon ground cardamom
1/2 cup water


Directions:

In a large mixing bowl, cream butter and brown sugar. Add dark molasses and mix until completely blended. Sift the dry ingredients together and add to butter mixture, 1/3 at a time, alternating with the the water. Blend well.

Wrap dough in plastic wrap and chill in refrigerator at least 1 hour.

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease cookie sheets (or line with parchment paper). Roll out dough on a lightly floured surface and cut into desired shapes. Bake at 350 degrees for 8-10 minutes. Cool on wire racks.

Decorate with Royal Icing (recipe follows) when completely cooled.



Royal Icing (for gingerbread Mickeys, men and houses)


Ingredients:

1/8 teaspoon cream of tartar
2 egg whites
3 1/2 cups powdered sugar


Directions:

Add cream of tartar to egg whites in a chilled mixing bowl. Beat with an electric mixer at high speed until white peaks form. Reduce speed and gradually add sifted powdered sugar. Continue to whip the frosting until a smooth, spreadable consistency is reached.

Separate frosting into small bowls and add food coloring (if desired). Spoon into cake decorating bags (or freezer bags with the corner tip cut off) and decorate cookies. The frosting will harden when dry.


*Tip: Make sure all utensils are free of grease and oil and egg whites do not have any yolk in them. The egg whites will not whip if any oil or yolk is present.

 

[wiigirl]

I usually back gingerbread but do a kit for the gingerbread house.

 

[soccerdad72]

We're a kit family. The boys love decorating them during the holidays, but we're as uncrafty of a family as they come, so the premade kits work well for us.

We save out baking time for cookies we plan to eat.

 

[Conservative Hippie]

I make gingerbread houses from scratch every year using a pampered chef mold and recipe. What's funny is when I take them places a lot of the time people will not want to eat it because they think it is a kit. Nope, my gingerbread is fresh and awesome!

This is the recipe I use (the photos are mine too!) --

http://www.food.com/recipe/pampered-chef-gingerbread-house-mold-recipe-344668

The icing is royal icing, recipe on the back of the Wilton meringue powder can!


Edit: we do a gingerbread party every year. I ask the moms to bring their own pre-assembled house (I pass out my recipe if they need it). Assembling the night before so it is "structurally sound" is essential. I provide the icing and decorations. I also have two giant gingerbread man pans that I use for the little kids -- it is easier for them to just pile frosting and candy on a giant cookie. I also make regular sizes cookies for eating during the party. I like to make my own "pretty" house to take to church or give to another charity.

Sent from me.

 

[etoiles]

I did gingerbread houses with my students before and to make it easier we didn't bake gingerbread but we made our houses using graham crackers. I definitely recommend as another poster mentioned that assembling the house and decorating is too much to do in one day. having it already assembled lets the frosting dry because the candies can weigh it down and cause it to collapse if the frosting cement is still wet.

 

[scrapquitler]

Has anyone made their own gingerbread houses? If so, which mold and/or cutter do you recommend? I am planning on having a ginger bread house decorating party for my kids and their friends. I think it may be cheaper for me to make my own rather than buy 15 pre baked kits. Any suggestions greatly appreciated

All of the kids "make your own gingerbread houses" events that I have been to around here don't use gingerbread at all, they use graham crackers. That would be a. easier and b. much less expensive. Every event has the graham cracker houses already assembled before the kids arrive at the event. Another bonus is that because they aren't so big, you don't need as many candies to decorate them and they don't take as long.

 

[glassslippergirl]

I am not a gingerbread maker but have a vivid memory of my elementary school art teacher trying to have every student in the class make a big gingerbread house. It was a big failure, and the houses never got finished. A mom had a bunch if us over to make small gingerbread houses-- big success. From this experience, my advice would be-- however you choose to go-- make the houses small. Less work for you, more manageable for the kids.

 

[sksjasams]

We always invite my mom mid-December. We used to bake cut out cookies, but DS lost interest in those a few years ago, so we switched to doing a gingerbread house instead.

The first year I bought a kit that needed assembly. I didn't know the tip about building the house the day before and it was a disaster. We could not get the house to stay standing.

Ever since then, I buy the kind that is already assembled. DS and his Nana still have a fun time decorating it. I have bought the Pillsbury Gingerbread roll of dough a few times too, to make some gingerbread men to decorate at the same time.

 

[zoemurr]

All of the kids "make your own gingerbread houses" events that I have been to around here don't use gingerbread at all, they use graham crackers. That would be a. easier and b. much less expensive. Every event has the graham cracker houses already assembled before the kids arrive at the event. Another bonus is that because they aren't so big, you don't need as many candies to decorate them and they don't take as long.

We did our parties this way too..much easier if you are making a lot, and the kids still love it. When they were very small we used cheerios, pretzels, etc. to decorate instead of candy since half of it was going in their mouths.

 

[Janepod]

I make my own, using the recipes and templates in Gingerbread Architect. The gingerbread is easy to build with and still tastes good.

 

[NHdisneylover]

Making 15 houses from scratch would be a lot of work, even if you keep to the basic four-walls-and-gable-roof model. I hope you have lots of enthusiastic help!

Having made gingerbread houses for some fifty-plus years now (and trucks, and dinosaurs, and trains - depends on the age of the kids and their interests), I'd agree with NHdisneylover. Just google a template, and use that. If you're going for fifteen houses, try to keep them reasonably small.

While NHdisneylover is right about assembly being easier when the pieces are hard (one day is enough for me), if you are going to cut out windows and doors, you should do this soon after you take the pieces out of the oven, when the dough is still relatively soft. Otherwise, you risk breaking the pieces, and having to start over from scratch. (You might wish to make some extra walls as reserve pieces.)

Of course you are totally the resident expert! I wasn't thinking of anything all that complicated with all those kids--just basics The few times I have done doors or windows, I have cut them before baking, but that probably would not give you crisp enough edges for what you do


It's probably because we bake at my house--but both of my kids came home from a "gingerbread house decorating workshop" we paid for when they were little, all upset that they just made tiny little "houses" with graham crackers. They never thought of Santa as a lie (see other thread ) but they sure were miffed about being misled into believing they would be making gingerbread houses and actually making "graham cracker shacks" (as DD, 6 at the time, phrased it-we still joke about graham cracker shacks).

 

[Conservative Hippie]

Of course you are totally the resident expert! I wasn't thinking of anything all that complicated with all those kids--just basics The few times I have done doors or windows, I have cut them before baking, but that probably would not give you crisp enough edges for what you do

It's probably because we bake at my house--but both of my kids came home from a "gingerbread house decorating workshop" we paid for when they were little, all upset that they just made tiny little "houses" with graham crackers. They never thought of Santa as a lie (see other thread ) but they sure were miffed about being misled into believing they would be making gingerbread houses and actually making "graham cracker shacks" (as DD, 6 at the time, phrase it-we still joke about graham cracker shacks).

I agree -- gingerbread houses are made out of gingerbread! Last year I invited a family to our gingerbread house party and I asked if she wanted my recipe or if she had one. She was surprised me made real gingerbread, the only "gingerbread houses" her kids had ever decorated were made out of cardboard!! Worse than graham cracker shacks!!!

Sent from me.