Tree Decoration Biscuits

3 1/2 cups Edmonds Standard Grade Flour (525g)
1/2 Tbsp Edmonds Baking Powder
2 tsp ground ginger
1 tsp mixed spice
1/4 tsp ground cardamom
125g Tararua Butter
1 cup Chelsea White Sugar (225g)
1/2 cup Chelsea Golden Syrup (180g)
1/2 Tbsp lemon juice
1 egg, whisked with a fork
TO DECORATE
1 egg white
2 1/2 - 3 cups Chelsea Icing Sugar or Chelsea Pure Decorating Icing Sugar (375g - 450g)
1- 2 Tbsp lemon juice
White icing colour (optional)
Mixed lollies or sprinkles, for decoration
Print out the Gingerbread House Template and cut out. It is best to transfer the template to baking paper as normal paper can stick to the dough.
Preheat oven to 170°C bake.
Sift Edmonds Standard Grade Flour, Edmonds Baking Powder, ginger, mixed spice and cardamom into a large bowl.
In a large saucepan, stir Tararua Butter, Chelsea White Sugar and Chelsea Golden Syrup over a medium heat until sugar has dissolved. Remove from heat and leave to cool for 15 minutes.
Mix in lemon juice and egg. Pour liquid mixture into dry ingredients and work into a soft pliable dough (add a few tablespoons of warm water if needed).
Divide mixture into four or five pieces and roll out each piece of dough between 2 sheets of baking paper to a thickness of 2-3mm. Remove the top layer of paper. Using the template provided, cut out 2 sides, 2 ends, 1 chimney side, 2 roof panels and 1 base. For the ends, you will need to separate the chimney and the door. You can either do this after cutting out the whole end piece, or cut these out of the template and trace out separate pieces.
When cutting out the gingerbread, the dough will retain its shape better if you remove the surrounding excess dough and leave the cut out template piece on the baking paper, then transfer directly to a baking tray.
Bake pieces for 10-12 minutes, or until golden and set. Allow to cool and harden.
Use any extra dough to cut out gingerbread men or other fun Christmas shapes.
DECORATE
Make icing by whisking egg white in a bowl with a fork until frothy. Add Chelsea Icing Sugar and lemon juice and mix to a thick white paste, adjusting quantities of icing sugar and lemon juice as required. For a bright white icing, add a little white icing colour. Transfer to a large piping bag fitted with a small round piping tip.
Use the icing to pipe decorations on the sides, doors and chimney (we find it easier to decorate the roof after assembling). Add any sprinkles as you go (save heavier lollies to attach later).
Assemble the house on the base using icing to attach the sides and ends. Hold each piece for a few minutes until dry and set in place.
For extra structural support, pipe a thick layer of icing along the inside of each roof piece, where the roof will rest on the sides of the house. These act as ledges, to help hold the roof up. Allow the 'ledges' to dry completely, then attach the roof with extra icing.
Decorate the roof, then use icing to glue the chimney pieces on. Now that the house is nice and stable, attach any heavier lollies. Cover any joins in the house with icing, to look like snow. Dust with Chelsea Icing Sugar and marvel at your beautiful creation!
CLICK BELOW FOR PRINTABLE TEMPLATE:
Gingerbread House Template
(Recipe updated and improved December 2021)
If you prefer not to use raw egg whites in the icing, swap for 2 Tbsp pasteurised egg whites (available at most large supermarkets).
White icing colour is available at most craft stores or cake supply shops.
We used this recipe with our own house cutters. I only made 1/2 batch and still had heaps left over for gingerbread men. I doubled the ginger and mixed spice. We found it needed 15 minutes to bake through. Makes a lovely crisp biscuit that held its shape fairly well.
Although I stuffed up a few times due to not quite reading the recipe properly and ended up throwing quite the kitchen tantrum - haha - but I overcame and honestly this recipe is DELICIOUS! The look on my kids faces at the end was totally worth it and they really enjoyed helping decorate. If I'd done it right from the start it wouldn't have been quite such a mission!
Great recipe ,the icing dries like concrete ,holds together very well ,made two of them with my kids but made them larger .
Pretty tasteless dough, and with the high temperature this turned out quite puffy so a bit floppy for a house.
Excellent recipe. The extra spices and lemon zest are something special. I've made this recipe 3 times now and it's worked every time. I do find if you rest the dough for 15 minutes or so prior to rolling it sticks to the baking paper less and less. For one house I did 1/4 of the recipe and it was enough.
Good flavour I also added in some cinnamon as well which gave it a nice taste but the assembling was very hard please make it a bit easier thanks.
Really good recipe! I halved it and it was just enough for the house. Definitely a recipe I'll be using again
My go to gingerbread house recipe has disappeared from the internet so thought I'd give this a go. Disappointed. This recipe was very crumbly.
It was really good and I really enjoyed making it. I thought that it was a fun and challenging task - very tasty as well!
A good dough that stayed mouldable, never crumbly, throughout the three hours of rolling and cutting and rolling and cutting it took to use it all up. Gets firmer as it cools, so got harder and harder to roll.
I think next time I'll do half quantity.
You can also probably leave the oven off until you're actually mixing the dry and wet ingredients together.
The best gingerbread house mixture I have ever used - and I mix one every year! Beautiful to work with!
Great recipe, although you definitely need more ginger! I made double the mixture and made 1 full sized, 6 half sized, and a couple of dozen biscuits!!
The mixture was great, really held its shape when cooking and had a great texture.
Awesome Gingerbread. House is a good size and so much fun to put together. I used a packet of Royal icing Powder to stick together as sets fast and firm .
A great recipe. Very nice tasting and good consistency gingerbread. Popular with the kids on Christmas day!
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