I've got lots of friends who have a difficult relationship with gluten (including myself) and the holiday period is particularly hard with all the meals out and goodies being brought into the office so this year I'm going to try my hand at a range of gluten free recipes so that all of these gorgeous girls can enjoy Christmas as much as everyone else!
The Recipe
Ingredients
Gingerbread
- 300g of Gluten free plain flour
- 1 teaspoon of baking powder
- 1 teaspoon of xanthan gum
- 2 heaped teaspoons of powdered ginger (or less if you only like a hint of ginger)
- 1 heaped teaspoon of powdered cinnamon
- 250g of honey
- 125g of shortening (brands such as Trex, Flora White or Cookeen in the UK)
- 1 tablespoon of treacle
Icing
- 1 sachet of powered egg white
- 250g of royal icing sugar
- 1 cap-full of vanilla extract
- water (I used 5 table spoons)
- sprinkling of desiccated coconut for the roofs
The Method
Step 1 - Make the Gingerbread
- Heat the shortening, honey and treacle in a pan until it starts to boil and then turn if off and leave until it is room temperature
- Put all the dry ingredients in a bowl and then mix in the liquid ones once they have cooled. You'll have to get your hands dirty of this one and don't worry about it being quite a soft/oily consistency)
- Wrap the dough in cling film and put it in the freezer for 1 hour (or in the fridge overnight if you are not in a rush). This stops the dough expanding when you put it in the oven
- After removing from the freezer, put whatever you are not using just now in the fridge to keep it cool
My dough looks dark in this picture because I put too much treacle in my first batch. Yours should look lighter than this.
Step 2 - Roll your dough
I put my dough in between 2 sheets of grease proof paper on a chopping board and rolled until it was about 1/2 a cm thick
Step 3 - Cut out your house
Print out my Gingerbread house template onto some card and cut out the shapes. before placing the template on the dough, sprinkle a little flour over the top so that the card doesn't stick to the dough.
Cut out two of each to make 1 house
Step 4 - Bake
Put them in the oven for 8/10 minutes at 180 degrees celsius. but keep an eye on it to make sure it doesn't burn. it will still be a little soft when you take it out the oven but will harden up as it cools.
Make sure none of the pieces are touching otherwise they will join together when baking
Step 5 - Leave to cool
Leave your pieces out to cool as they need to be cold to touch before you can put on the icing
Step 6 - Make the icing
- First beat the egg whites with 2 tablespoons of water until they are light and fluffy
- Add half the icing sugar and 1/2 more table spoons of water as needed
- Repeat with the rest of the icing sugar
Step 7 - Build your house
Pipe the icing on the house pieces to join them together. The small squares are for the sides of the house and the larger rectangles are for the roof.
Step 8 - Let it snow
Ice the roofs and then press some coconut of the top to make it look like snow. Then all that's left to do is serve them to your friends on mugs of your favourite hot drink, I recommend a chai latte!
I'll be back,
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