Blogmas #10 Baking Gingerbread Men


While perusing Pinterest for a festive themed baking recipe to try, I decided these simple yet very cute little gingerbread fitted the bill perfectly. Gingerbread is nice and festive for Christmas and the base recipe is easy to do- plus they're fun to decorate! I found the mini cutter on eBay for around £1 but I've also seen them in Hobbycraft, Waitrose, Wilkos and Dunelm. You can even use the same cutter to make gingerbread reindeer like this if you want to do something different, just by decorating them the other way round!

For The Gingerbread                                                       To Decorate
350g plain flour                                                                  icing pens or writing icing
1 tsp bicarbonate of soda                                                    edible decorations
175g brown sugar                                                               cookie cutter (I used this)
125g butter
1 egg
4 tbsp golden syrup
3 tsp ginger
1 tsp cinnamon

Method
  1. Preheat the oven to 180C and line two baking trays with greaseproof paper
  2. Sieve the flour, brown sugar, bicarbonate of soda and spices into a bowl 
  3. Add your softened butter until incorporated, then the egg and golden syrup
  4. Mix until it all comes together and forms clumps. It will look quite dry here, but keep mixing!
  5. Begin to knead until your dough becomes a smooth ball, then put in the fridge for 15 minutes
  6. Roll out to 5mm on a lightly floured surface and press out your shapes using a cookie cutter.
  7. Place them on a baking tray (leaving a gap between them) and bake for around 15 minutes
  8. Once they're golden brown, leave to cool completely before decorating
One pointer I have is make sure you stick to the 5mm thickness when you're rolling out the dough, as they do puff up slightly when they cook. Decoration wise I went for a classic gingerbread man design as well as santas, but there are loads of ideas online so you could get really creative with it. The best thing about stuff like this is that you can make it as simple or as complicated as you want. They would make a great a homemade gift, or just to enjoy yourself with a cup of tea or hot chocolate as a festive treat!

Have you ever baked gingerbread?
Labels:
loading..