Gingerbread House : The Art of Royal Icing Masonry

Here is the result of a good three-hour job consisting of building walls, cutting windows frames, doors, dormer windows, adding details such as a well, a ladder, a chimney, a fence, decorated Christmas trees, ... mortaring large spatulas of royal icing...

A lot of fun that reminds me of the time when I used to build models...

In details , the recipe for the structure (walls and roof). The complete procedure can be found here...

Ingredients for Gingerbread dough (20cm x 20cm x 30cm house)

• 18 cups all purpose flour
• 1 1/2 tsp baking powder
• Gingerbread spices
• 1 1/2 tsp salt
• 500 gr butter, softened
• 4 1/2 cups packed light brown sugar
• 6 large eggs
• 3 cups dark molasses
• 3 TBS water

Procedure

• Whisk together the dry ingredients in a large bowl, set aside.
• Using an electric mixer, beat on medium speed the butter and brown sugar until fluffy and well blended. Beat in the eggs, molasses and water until well combined.
• Beat half of the flour mixture into the molasses mixture until well blended and smooth. Stir in the remaining flour. Use the hook until well blended. If dough is too soft, add a little more flour.
• Wrap the dough in plastic wrap and refrigerate at least two hours.

The house pieces are baked at 350 F / 160 C for around 15mn.

Ingredients for royal icing

• 6 large egg whites
• 8 cups powdered sugar

Procedure

• Whisk together until smooth the egg whites and  first half of the powdered sugar.
• Add the remaining the other half of powdered sugar to the sugar egg mixture. Using an electric mixer, beat on high speed until the icing holds stiff peaks. If it doesn't form stiff peaks, add more powdered sugar.
• Place a dampened clean towel over the bowl of royal icing. Keep this towel over the icing to prevent it from drying out while you work with it.
• When you are ready to mortar or decorate, fill a pastry bag with the icing