Kids Xmas Gingerbread House Tutorial

So every year, at this time of year, we make a Gingerbread House. Being a Swede – half – I love a bit of Flat Pack action. So, with some great Gingerbread House Flat Packs out there to buy – you can make something look pretty impressive – jealousmaking for sure, that is actually easy to do.

You will need:

• Flat Pack Gingerbread House – now I bought 2 and I used bits of both – trust me, it’s a good back-up plan just in case! I bought mine from Tiger – in-store £2 each.
• Icing Sugar (must be white not natural coloured) £1.70 Tesco you may also want optional shaker £1.99 Ocado
• Sweets and chocolates to decorate
• Snow AKA desiccated coconut Tesco £1
• Father Xmas figurine (optional) £6 Skandium
• Edible Glitter in white (optional) I wish I had it but did not! £1.79 Ocado
• Ready made soft icing pouch with different nozzles in white (optional) £2 Ocado
• A foil covered cutting board or a tray
• Two willing helpers – ideally who don’t eat the decorations before using them like mine did…
• Patience

Do this:

Sift about 1 cup of icing sugar into a bowl and slowly add water. Mix. The consistency needs to be like toothpaste. Don’t panic if you overdo the water – just sift in more icing sugar until you get the right consistency. This is your glue.

Lay out the pieces of the Flat pack Gingerbread House.

Using a small spatula stroke the icing glue down the sides of the walls you want to connect. Connect them one at a time and hold them in place so they dry enough to stand on their own.

Once you have a corner, add the glue along the seam of the join inside the house – the walls need to be very secure otherwise you will create more of a Gingerbread Heap than House.

Get all the four walls up – they are far more sturdy when you do.

Once these have started to solidify and become strong (5 mins) attach the roof – again using the spatula the stroke the icing glue around the edges so it attaches.

Form the chimney much like the house – using the icing glue. Leave it to dry for 5-10 mins.

Attach the chimney to the roof. Don’t panic if the cut out parts don’t quite fit – you can fill the gaps on with icing.

Leave the whole thing to dry solid for a few hours.

Now to decorate!

I started by pasting white chocolate buttons across the roof. To do this, add a dot of the icing glue to the back of each button and lightly press down to attach it.

Fill in gaps using small sweets/chocolates – we used Jelly Tots and Smarties.

Don’t worry if there are gaps at this point – the icing sugar we dust over the roof at the end hides a multitude of sins!

We then lined the join of the roof with a line of Jelly Tots.

The door, window frames and the chimney were covered with Match Makers – we have two sizes small and large – they can be broken to fit spaces better. To attach these spread the icing glue onto the surface and stick the Matchmakers on – it works better.

I added a Red Smartie knocker to the door once the Match Makers had dried into place.

I stuffed the chimney with two marshmallows (smoke!) and then lined the rim of the chimney with tiny little Jazzies – you could equally use Jelly Tots.

Decorate the rest of your house to your hearts content.

I then scattered desiccated coconut around the house for snow. If you have edible glitter – you could sprinkle that on the snow – would look amazing.

I broke a Flake bar into 3 pieces and piled them like wood logs by the house and I also added some wrapped chocolate presents from M&S and a wooly Scandi Father Xmas.

Now, the finishing touch – either use your Icing sugar shaker or add some icing sugar to a small sieve and gently dust the roof of the house and surrounding area with icing sugar snow.

Sit back and fancy yourself silly because boy oh boy – you are a clever mummy! We wish all our lovely readers and their families a very happy Xmas and new year. We are off now for a few weeks. Back with some great stuff in Jan. Mmmmmmmwah x