We used this recipe for gingerbread,
and this recipe for the icing "glue." (I did beat it nearly 10 minutes to get it nice and stiff. You want it as thick as possible for the assembly process.)
I didn't use the gingerbread recipe at the second link because it called for whipping cream which I didn't have. (This site had blueprints for a variety of houses such as a log cabin, etc., but I didn't check them out.)We ended up needing two batches of both the gingerbread and the cement to complete these three structures:
This mat worked really well for rolling and transferring straight to the pan. The recipe suggested using foil.
Geoff designed the pattern for the two smaller houses. Here are the baked pieces for one of them. 
Little G wanted a bigger house, so he designed his own. This is one of the end pieces ready to cut out:
And in the oven, nearly done:
Assembling them was the most difficult part. It required both adults and several pairs of patient hands to hold pieces together till they set up enough to stand on their own. Geoff used graham crackers (and saltines after we ran out of those) for supports on the insides of two of them:
Once we got them assembled, we propped them up and let them sit overnight to dry and stabilize!
Then the best part...decorating!!!
Glad to see Geoff still using his engineering degree to its fullest! :)
ReplyDeleteWow that looks intense. When I was younger one of our relatives would always send us a gingerbread house kit with the cookie panels and icing mix. Even that was a huge project, I can't imagine doing it all from scratch! Great job!
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