Gingerbread

So it appears I have a misconception about Americans.  (Another misconception?!)  All this time I thought America was the land of homemade gingerbread - real gingerbread, as in gingerbread house gingerbread. A couple of years ago I made gingerbread houses with my class, using a recipe I found online.  The houses were a definite success, since you can't go wrong with large amounts of candy, but I wasn't hugely thrilled about the gingerbread itself; the dough was too dry and brittle, and I had to add milk before it would cloy together well.

This time, I decided to haunt Facebook for the annual Christmas-themed gingerbread house photos, and ask around for the best recipe people used this year.  And here's where the misconception comes in: I was wrong about Americans and homemade gingerbread.  Everybody used a kit!  Okay, well, "everybody" as in all my Facebook friends who happened to post pictures of their children decorating gingerbread houses.  If you don't come under that category, you're excused.  If you come under that category and you didn't use a kit, excuse me!

Anyway, I decided to play with a different gingerbread recipe and, if it worked out better, blog about it so that anyone who happens to drop in and who might also be interested in making homemade gingerbread can pick up some pointers.  That's fairly unlikely, so let's say I'm really just trying on a Julie Powell here.

Recipe: 
(This makes a gargantuan amount of gingerbread, so you might want to halve it if you're baking just for one child, or even two kids; we made enough for five small houses.)
1 cup softened butter
1 3/4 cup dark brown (muscovado) sugar
1 1/4 cup white sugar
2 Tblsps molasses
6 eggs
6 cups flour (and more for dusting)
2 tsps baking soda (bicarbonate of soda)
1 Tblsp ginger
2 tsps cinnamon

Cream butter and sugars, adding in molasses and eggs and beating till well combined.  Mix dry ingredients in a separate bowl, then stir into batter.  When mixed, empty onto floured surface and knead till smooth, adding more flour if necessary.  The dough should come together easily, feel soft under your hands and look like this:

Now wrap it in clingfilm / seramwrap and chill it for about an hour, or as long as you like really.  Take it out and roll in on a well-floured surface, making sure to flour your rolling pin also as the dough may be sticky.

When the dough is about 1/4 inch thick, cut out the walls and roof sections of your gingerbread house.  We drew paper patterns beforehand and cut around them with a knife.

Carefully lift your pieces onto a flat baking sheet and bake them in a preheated oven at 325F / 170C for about 10 minutes till dark golden.  They will rise rather alarmingly during the first five minutes of cooking, but will settle again by the time they are finished.

At this point it's important that each piece is laid flat, uncovered, to harden and cool.  Later, they can be stored in an airtight container, ready for the next stage: constructing the gingerbread house with icing glue.  That will be the subject of my next post!