Gingerbread House Decorating Tips

Cookbook author Helen DeFrance shares ideas on how to create the gingerbread house of your dreams!

Prepare a cake board:
Using a spatula, ice the cake board and sides of the board with royal icing to at least ¼-inch depth.

"Attach" the gingerbread house in place with royal icing, then apply more icing to create "snow piles" around the house.

How to make:

Snow: Sprinkle shredded coconut on top of the icing before it dries and sprinkle white sanding sugar on top of the coconut for sparkly snow.

Bushes: Make bushes out of green gum drops or green jelly spearmint leaves. Drip royal icing over the bushes for a "snow capped" look.

Christmas trees: Use a pointed ice cream cone. Tint a portion of the royal icing green. Put in a piping bag with a leaf pastry tip.

Hold the cone by the tip and start at the bottom, icing from bottom to top. Make one row around the open edge in a wave-like motion, continuing up the cone to the top. You may also apply with a small spreader and hold the cone with one hand by placing two fingers inside the cone. Ice the tip last when the cone is in place to dry.

Sprinkle green sanding or sparkling sugar crystals on the wet icing before "gluing" into place on the board. Decorate with your choice of sprinkles and red hots for your ornaments.

Slate walkway: Select black, brown and purple Necco wafers only. Break them apart into varying shapes and sizes. Set the broken Necco wafers into the icing, working the pieces together as you would a jigsaw puzzle.

Shoveled walkway: Frost the board to a depth of around 1/4 inch. To shovel the walk, push the icing to each side to make small mounds. Sprinkle white sanding sugar over the snow, leaving the walkway clear. Sprinkle chocolate sprinkles over the walkway if desired.

Wreaths: Attach a wreath to the front door or on each window with royal icing. Green wreath gumdrops, green jelly rings or round shortbread cookies (with a hole in the middle) with green royal icing work well as a wreath.

Dot half of the wreath with royal icing to hold the decorations. Use tweezers to add cherries, red hots, pearls, etc. to decorate your wreath, then continue with the other half of the wreath. Allow the wreath to dry completely, then pipe a tiny red royal icing bow to complete it.

Roofing: Suggested roofing materials: Necco wafers, Black Jack gum, Big Red, Golden Grahams cereal, bite-size shredded wheat, peppermint candies and mini marshmallows. (Note: Be careful of making the roof too heavy.)

When applying shingles to the roof, always begin at the bottom edge of the roof. Run a line of royal icing (using a pastry tip and bag or small spreader) along the eaves 1/4 inch from the edge. Using your desired roofing material, attach shingles in a straight line to make the first row.

For the second row, cut or break one shingle in half vertically. Begin with this shingle, and continue as before. This will offset the rows. Completely cover the roof. You can dump royal icing "snow" on top of the roof if you desire.

Peppermint candies - People sometimes use these for the roof, but be careful as they can be too heavy.

Snowman: Using a white fondant, roll the fondant into three balls of decreasing size. Set the largest one on the bottom, the middle-sized one on top of that and the smallest one on top. Insert a toothpick through all three snowballs for stability. You may also use the royal icing to attach them.

Use the chocolate sprinkles, mini M&M’s or peppercorns as coal for the eyes, mouth and buttons. For the top hat, dye the white fondant black, for the nose you should dye orange to simulate a carrot and for the scarf dye red.

*For the hat:
Roll the black fondant into a ½-inch tube. Cut off a ½-inch piece, and shape with fingers into a tight, ½ inch by ½ inch cylinder. Take another small piece of black fondant, and flatten it into a 1/8-inch thick disk, 1-inch diameter. Push a toothpick through the snowman’s head, leaving ½ inch sticking out of the snowman’s head. Place the hat on the toothpick, skewering the base and the top of the hat together.

*For the nose:
Form a tiny snake with orange fondant. Bring one end to a point, and tap the other end on the counter to flatten. Make several indentations with a butter knife to make it look like a carrot; attach to the snowman with royal icing or a toothpick.

*For the scarf:
Roll the red fondant into a snake, then flatten the ends and wrap it around the snowman’s neck as a scarf. Clip the ends of the scarf to make fringe.

(Note: Fondant is a thick, creamy white sugar mass used in different forms for decorating cakes, candies, pastries and cookies.)

A few other ideas:

• Cinnamon sticks, tootsie rolls or pretzel sticks for wood piles, firewood, sticks, railings and fence posts.
• Licorice Twizzlers – red and black: Use as a support strip for porch roof, window awnings, window boxes or anything jutting out from the house, fences or accent trim.
• Candy canes for support posts for porch roofs, corner gap fillers and lamp posts. You can crush candy canes for roofing and foot paths and general accents.