Total Time: 50 minutes

Prep: 30 minutes

Cook: 20 minutes

Yield: 2 houses

 

While edible, this gingerbread house dough recipe is “structural”.  It has no leaveners that would make it puff up and distort the shapes and it’s firm so it can support LOTS OF DECORATIONS!

 

Ingredients

2 cups light corn syrup (or dark corn syrup for a darker house)

1 ½ cups light-brown sugar (or dark-brown sugar for a darker house), firmly packed

1 1/3 cups margarine

9 cups all -purpose flour

½ teaspoon salt

1 tablespoon ground cinnamon

1 tablespoon ground ginger

2 teaspoons ground cloves

 

Steps to Make It

1. Gather the ingredients

2. Before you begin the actual recipe, print out a pattern.  Cut it out and transfer to light cardboard and cut again.

3. In a medium microwave-safe bowl, heat corn syrup, brown sugar and margarine until the margarine has melted and sugar has dissolved completely.  Stir until smooth.

4. Meanwhile, in a large bowl, whisk together the flour, salt, cinnamon, ginger and cloves

5. Add the syrup-sugar-margarine mixture, making sure it is cool enough for the kids to squish the dough until it is smooth and comes away from the sides of the bowl.

6. Wrap the dough in plastic and let it rest at least 30 minutes at room temperature.  This is a good time to wash up the dishes and get your baking pans, rolling pin and pattern pieces ready.

7. If the dough is too hard/too unmanageable, you can microwave it for 20 to 30 seconds

8. Heat the oven to 350 degrees

9. Roll out the dough ¼” thick onto a sheet of parchment cut to fit your baking pan. Edgeless pans or those with only one edge are the best.

10. Lightly flour the cardboard patterns and place them, floured-side down, on the rolled out dough leaving a 1-inch space between pieces

11. Try to fit as many as you can without crowding.

12. For clean edges, cut with a pizza wheel

13. Remove and reserve excess dough

14. Grab the opposite edges of the parchment paper and transfer to the baking sheet

15. Bake 12 to 15 minute or until pieces are firm and lightly browned around the edges.  Cool completely before removing from pans.

16. Reroll dough scraps for the remainder of the pieces.

17. Assemble and decorate your gingerbread house as you see fit.

18. ENJOY!