Build your own gingerbread house

We show the dough here without pictures. You can see it come together step by step, with photos, in the honey gingerbread recipe. The pictures in this guide start where the finished dough is rolled out.

Dissolve 5 g of Baking salt in 25 g of whole milk and, in a second Bowl, 5 g of Potash in the other 25 g of whole milk. Leave both to stand until you need them.

The two belong apart: Potash keeps the Gingerbread moist, the Baking salt makes it rise and gives it its colour.

Put 530 g of White flour with 8 g of Gingerbread spice onto the work surface and form a well. Pour in the cooled honey and sugar mixture, then 20 g of whole egg and, one after another, the two dissolved raising agents.

It works just as well in the stand mixer with a Dough hook.

Using the Rubber scraper, keep pulling a little flour into the honey mixture and knead everything together slowly. As soon as the flour has soaked up all the liquid and larger lumps form, carry on kneading firmly by hand for several minutes, until the dough is smooth.

Wrap the dough well in cling film and let it rest at room temperature: at least 24 hours, better still two to four days. During this time the spice works its way into the dough. Without it the Gingerbread tastes flat and is harder to roll out.

By the way: unworked Gingerbread dough keeps at room temperature for up to three months. Honey and sugar preserve it.

More about the dough, with baking times, thicknesses and storage if you also want to bake it as biscuits, is in the honey gingerbread recipe.

Take the rested dough and knead it briefly: by hand in portions or in the Dough mixer. This makes it soft again and lets you roll it out cleanly.

Lightly dust the work surface with flour and roll out the dough to 5 mm using the rolling guides. An even thickness matters more here than with biscuits: parts that differ in thickness will stand crooked later, and a crooked house tips over.

Expect some offcuts: quite a bit of dough is left between the hearts and around the base. It is not thrown away; the scraps become biscuits.

Using the heart Cake ring (Ø 14 cm), cut out three hearts. Two of them become the walls, the third later becomes the roof.

For the base, use the round Cake ring with Ø 22 cm. It is deliberately much wider than the heart: this way the little house stands securely and still has room all around for decoration. A rectangle works just as well, and if you like, cut the base out completely freehand with a small knife. The irregular shape looks rather pretty later on.

Now, while the dough is still raw, cut out the windows with a small ring from the ring set and cut out the door with the knife. Both go only into the two wall hearts, not into the third.

Be sure to do this before baking: baked Gingerbread breaks as soon as you try to cut it.

Cut the third heart exactly down the middle with the knife. The two halves become the two roof surfaces.

Place all the parts on a Baking tray lined with baking paper and brush them with a little whole milk. This gives them their shine during baking.

Bake the parts at 190 °C fan for 8 minutes. Keep an eye on them: if they bake too dark they will break when you assemble them.

Briefly bring 30 g of gum arabic to the boil with 100 g of water and brush the still warm parts with the silicone brush. This adds the final shine and protects them.

Let all the parts cool completely while lying flat. As long as they are warm they warp, and with warped walls the house will not stand.

Mix the Royal icing Mix according to the packet instructions, but for assembly make it noticeably firmer than for decorating. It should hold its shape in the cornet and not flow, otherwise the walls will slide while you are fitting the next parts.

Divide the Royal icing into several Bowls and colour it with the ProGel colours. A dab is enough for a strong colour. Fill each colour into its own cornet.

Place the two wall hearts on the base so that they touch at the top at the tip and stand slightly apart at the bottom, like a tent. Pipe a bead of Royal icing where the hearts touch the base and press it into place.

Hold the two walls together at the top until the icing grips: this takes about 30 to 60 seconds.

Pipe a bead of Royal icing onto each of the sloped edges of the walls and lay the two heart halves over them on the left and right. Press them lightly into place and hold them briefly until they stick.

Now the basic structure is standing. Let it dry for one to two hours, ideally overnight, before you start decorating. Whatever is still wobbly now will wobble even more later under the weight of the decoration.

Using the cornet, pipe a row of white drops along the roof edges, one next to the other, to create the typical snowy edge.

Trace the windows and the door with white, paint a little fir tree on the wall, place a heart above the door and scatter small stars and dots. Here you can do whatever you like, there is no wrong way.

Place the almonds like roof tiles along the roof and, to finish, stick a small Gingerbread heart on the peak. If you like, add some Sprinkle decor, Sugar pearls or sugar stars too.

Let everything dry through once more: Royal icing is firm after a good half hour, and fully set after four to six hours.