Daring Bakers: Gingerbread House

December 27, 2009

Daring Bakers: Gingerbread House

The December 2009 Daring Bakers’ challenge was brought to you by Anna of Very Small Anna and Y of Lemonpi. They chose to challenge Daring Bakers’ everywhere to bake and assemble a gingerbread house from scratch. They chose recipes from Good Housekeeping and from The Great Scandinavian Baking Book as the challenge recipes.

I can't remember how many years I make the mistake of saying aloud, always in the company of either cynical DG or others, "I'm making a gingerbread house this year". I mean it when I say it . To me it seems something just for me, since I won't be giving it away as gifts or likely sharing it for its edible nature. Its a chance to play, have fun, put on some holiday movies or music, have the Christmas tree lit and perhaps even a glass of eggnog nearby. Whenever I think about it it sounds just perfect. After all I'm one of those people who loves Christmas. I love the ritualistic visit to the Christmas lot looking for just the right tree and the smell of it inside. I take out a lifetime of ornaments, recalling old friends, people no longer with us, or a special ornament I made when I was a child. I love the smell of mulled apple cider and fresh grated nutmeg in a glass of magically aged eggnog and I'm a sucker for Bing and Burl and Christmas choir music. Throw in White Christmas or Holiday Inn on the DVD player and I am in HEA VEN.

I'm also someone who easily goes overboard with the food part of things at this time of year. As usual the days leading up to Christmas Day were a whirlwind of sugar, butter and spices as I madly baked the many old and new things I like to have around and give at this time of year. A wedding and a visit from family a few days before Christmas, however, threw my baking schedule off track this year.

These are just a handful of things that I took a breath to take photos of. Most things never saw the camera lens.

With all my grand plans, Christmas eve found me with a few partially iced walls of a colonial gingerbread house and not much more energy beyond that. But this year's gingerbread house plans were a little different because this was to be a Daring Bakers Challenge. When I found out December's challenge early in the month I vowed that this would be the year I made one. Luckily posting between December 23 and 27 was allowed for this busy time of year. So around 6:00pm Christmas eve I abandoned my gingerbread house in favour of Christmas eve with DG and decided this gingerbread house would be completed on Boxing Day. After all why must Christmas be only 1 day.

I'm fairly happy with the results although there were a few technical issues, which have been covered up pretty well. I chose to make an iced version inspired by the decorated cookies I make often. The colours of the house are what I would like my house to be if I had one. I have always dreamed of a house with a curved top red door. The favourite parts are the roof tiles and the charming wreath I crafted with royal icing and tree shaped cookie/cake decorations.