Mini Gingerbread House

Use our printable template to make the perfect sized house for your little ones to decorate.

Molasses is a key ingredient when making Gingerbread Cookies. But with several different types available, how do you know which one to use?

The 4 main types of molasses are that are produced during the boiling/refining process; fancy, cooking, blackstrap, and light. Each with their own slightly different taste:

Fancy Molasses
This is the highest grade of molasses and is the pure juice of the sugar cane, which has been condensed, inverted and purified (and is also the sweetest). This molasses can be used ‘raw’ on poured on pancakes or spread on toast, to all your baked goods recipes.

Blackstrap Molasses
This is the final by-product of refining molasses. It has been highly-concentrated into a thick, dark mass with a slightly bitter taste, due to the majority of the sugar crystals being removed. Its bold flavor are great in recipes liked baked beans, or even gingerbread if you want a less sweet product.

Cooking Molasses
A blend of fancy molasses and blackstrap . It has the best of both worlds, with a thick, dark consistency, but less sweet straight fancy molasses. The addition of the blackstrap gives it a fuller-flavored taste. Use cooking molasses in all your cooking or baking needs.

Light Molasses
This a product made from fancy molasses with the addition of glucose-fructose and other ingredients. It is specially-formulated to be a calorie-reduced option.

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Just like building a real house, here is everything you need to get you started!

Blueprints

Download our free Mini Gingerbread House Template:

[button link=”http://gfcsite.s3.amazonaws.com/downloads/GFC_GingerbreadHouse_Download.pdf” style=”download” color=”silver” window=”yes”]Gingerbread House Template (.pdf)[/button] [button link=”http://gfcsite.s3.amazonaws.com/downloads/GFC_GingerbreadHouse_Download.zip” style=”download” color=”silver” window=”yes”]Gingerbread House Template (.zip)[/button]

Materials

Prepare the Gingerbread Cookie recipe, and roll out to 1/4″ thick on a lightly piece of floured parchment paper.   Cut out the template pieces then lay them onto the dough. Carefully cut around the template with a sharp knife, and place on a prepared baking sheet.

Bake as directed, allowing to cool completely before assembling.

How to Assemble

You can ‘glue’ house together using Royal Icing, however I found the best – and quickest setting and hardest ‘glue’ is candy syrup.

Have all your gingerbread pieces cut out and cooked, while you prepare a candy syrup.

Follow the instructions in this Almond Brittle recipe to make the candy syrup, and once the boiling sugar syrup reaches 275°F, CAREFULLY dip the edge of one side of the house into the boiling syrup (use tongs to be extra safe to avoid burning yourself).

Working on a silicon or parchment lined baking sheet, quickly press it together with its matching side, holding them together until set – a few seconds. Repeat until all pieces are ‘glued’ together.

Once completely cool and hardened, let the kids start to decorate with icing and gluten-free candies as desired.