Gingerbread House~2015

I don't always make a gingerbread house every year but here I am with another one this year.  I made one last year and all the instructions for making the cookie dough and icing are given here.  This year I still had lots of left-over candies languishing in the cupboard waiting to be used up so this year's gingerbread house is vaguely familiar to last year's.  

I use the same dough each year but if you want to make your own from your favourite gingerbread man recipe, it will work just as well.  Just make sure you bake the house parts until they are dry.  You may have to lower the temperature and let the pieces bake a little longer.  

So here is my new house.  I'm not giving the recipe again as you can find it here with all the instructions.  I'm just including a few pictures of how I made the windows this year and of course pictures of the finished house.

I racked my brain trying to figure out how to make nice neat windows for my house.  Then I spied the spice/herb can. It was the perfect size to imprint  the window patterns on the dough.

Once the pattern was imprinted, it was easy enough to cut around with a pointed knife.

Last year I used a hammer to crush the butterscotch candy into small pieces.  That ruined one of my dish towels so this year I thought I'd give the candies a whirl in the blender.  This turned the hard butterscotch candies into sugar which worked really well and I didn't "do in" another dish towel.  Spoon the crushed or pulverized candy into the baked window holes and place in a low oven until melted.

I had a few spots that needed patching so I rebaked with fresh pulverized butterscotch candy filling in the cracks.  

Ice cream cones are great for making evergreen trees.  This year I tried a different approach by stacking several cone tops onto a single cone.  I used one of the cut off cones to make a smaller tree.  You can see both trees in the picture below.

If you look at the back of the gingerbread house on the left, you can see two small battery operated tea candles. These go inside the back of the house and provide a lovely flickering light in the dark of the night. All the white snow on the ground and roof is royal icing. The lamp post is made from a rolled wafr with a gumball stuck down the middle.  A few foil covered chocolate balls form a decoration around the base. 

Bubble gum "lights" trim the roof.  Spearmint candy leaves are ornamental bushes around the house.

If you look carefully, you can see the back door is not stuck to the house.  I leave it leaning against the house so I can insert the battery operated candles.

The back deck of the house is made from graham wafers.  The step is coloured licorice sticks. 

The poor, little snowman is made from two sizes of gumballs covered in a thin layer of royal icing and dusted with icing sugar.  His hat is a Hershey kiss stuck on a chocolate baking wafer.  His eyes and nose are little pieces of gumdrops and his scarf is a piece of strawberry licorice string.  

The logs and firewood are made from rolled wafers. 

The chimney is made from gingerbread cookie covered with rock candy.  The "mortar" is grey coloured royal icing.

Last year I found brick shaped candies.  This year I had a few left so I sliced them and used them to pave the walk-way in front of the house. 

The trees made from ice cream cones covered in green royal icing and cake decorations.

Merry Christmas from my house to yours!