Back in highschool my sister and I started doing gingerbread houses. Nothing extravagant - just classic houses for fun! Over the years I've gone through a lot of gingerbread recipes, interesting patterns (which resulted in the use of a glue gun on multiple years), and various icing recipes. (Side Note: muffin pans work great for holding all the various kinds of candy.)
Last year I was fed up with trying to get the shape just right so that it would hold together - when it bakes it inevitably spreads! - and purchased this gingerbread house mold.
This works great although a little time consuming. One side creates a brick house (see below) and the other creates a log one (see bottom). I bake the dough directly in the pan, lightly greased, to maintain shape. No question of bad fits and pretty easy. This is actually my brother and sister-in-laws' house. (Mine is at the bottom.) They tend to take a lot of time decorating theirs...
Here's the recipe I used this year. I added 1 tsp cinnamon, some cloves and nutmeg and used a little less flour. It wasn't great tasting but I wanted to do a recipe with shortening rather than butter because most people tend to eat the candy, if anything, and not the house. Why waste the butter!?
This year I tried out a Fluffy Meringue Icing from the Wilton recipe that's included in the can. This worked great! It doesn't dry rock hard like royal icing, has a great sheen and is pure white. Just a tad sticky to work with! (Make sure to keep plastic wrap over the bowl while you're going along.)
