The Gingerbread Project

In between Chirstmas and New Years we built a gingerbread house from scratch. I am not exactly sure why or how we got onto this project. And if we had known what we were getting into it may not have happened at all. After 30 hours of planning, baking, building and decorating we ended up with this. It is an accurate representation of a Victorian Farmhouuse with a wrap around porch.

The top lessons learned

1. Have your architect make templates.
2. Hard crack sugar syrup is better than Royal icing to stick gingerbread together
3. 26 different pieces of gingerbread takes a long time to bake
4. The children will eat important pieces of the house if they are left alone too long.
5. Gingerbread is an ephemeral form that should be “eaten” by New Years Eve.
6. Once you start to wire the house for lighting you have crossed the line.
7. Graham Crackers and burnt sugar syrup can make replacement walls in a pinch.
8. Rice Krispie treats with food coloring can be made into trees, bushes or a number of other plants.
9. If you make your roof out of caramel it will slide off the house overtime or really overnight.

We are now in the process of planning next year’s house. It will be bigger and better in a yet-to-be-decided architecturally accurate style. Feel free to let me know what style that should be.