My sister likes to bake cookies and cakes and whatnot with my daughter. So a few weeks ago they made gingerbread cookies. The recipe they used turned out more dough than they could use at the time, so I took the rest home and stored it for future use. Project Partners: my sister and my daughter who made the dough.
My father likes to collect useful objects (this does not do justice to his "hobby," and what he has collected and how he's collected it would fill a book in itself). He can make and/or fix just about anything. (Case in point: my daughter went through a spell where she watched the old movie Bed Knobs and Broomsticks over and over. She wanted a "bed knob" like that of the movie. So Daddy went to his basement and produced a spherical wooden bed knob and a can of gold spray paint.) Recently, a good friend of his went through a divorce and was getting rid of much of the contents of his home. Daddy, not being able to bear wasting anything that might possibly, remotely, sometime-in-the-future, hopefully be used, brought back a number of items. In fact, this has now become a by-word at our house. ("Where did you get it?" "Daddy brought it back from--." "Ahhh. I see," with a knowing nod.) One of the items was a cast iron gingerbread house mold. I have no idea where it had been made, but it looked rather unused and is heavy enough to use as a battering ram. Project Partners: Daddy who gave us the mold and his friend who gave it to him.
So I proceeded to pull the dough out of the freezer and thaw it for making a house. I didn't have the first idea how to make the proper icing to hold it together (the box kits have it pre-made), so where did I go? The Internet of course! I found, wonder of wonders, a recipe specifically for gingerbread houses, and it worked really well, drying nice and hard. My daughter and I (well, mostly I) rolled the dough, put it in the mold, and baked it. It baked up nice and hard, and thus good for construction. However, if we try to eat it, we'll probably break our teeth. The pieces were a little lopsided and not as smooth as the box kits, and I had a little trouble getting the walls to stay up. To that end, I affixed one end firmly to inside of a box lined in parchment paper. I can't draw a straight line with a ruler, so you'll see our windows, and anything else that requires a line, are a bit crooked. My daughter did the decorating of the house, the gingerbread boys and girls, and the gingerbread trees. She has a liking for green and red sugar sprinkles so those went everywhere. Project Partners: my daughter and me (unless you count my two-year old son who ate one of the peppermint-chocolate squares we used for the walkway while watching and trying to grab everything in sight).
It's not worthy of Better Homes and Gardens, but we had fun doing it. And I learned a good deal (such as making my pieces as smooth as possible so they stay upright better and that the icing recipe is way to much for one small house-I have at least half left), so I'll be better prepared for next year.
Writer's Note: After the drafting of this piece and after the picture was taken, I mistakenly left the box with the house down in reach of my two-year old son. In my defense, I have basically run out of places that he cannot reach. This morning he pulled it off, and it fell to the floor. Though the mess was big (lots of powdered sugar), the house itself stayed intact. In fact, all that broke was one of the peppermint bark walkway pieces and the icing along the walkway. That speaks well for the gingerbread and icing construction materials.
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