Gingerbread Dough and Royal Icing

well, it is time to do a Gingerbread house and cookies; at least it was a few weeks ago, and now after much procrastination, here are the results ;-)

first the cookies; (not many left to photograph I am NOT sorry to say ;-)

it is the same batter / dough as for the house so we will dispense with a repeat post:

First you will want to get the ingredients out; 

1/2 cup Shortening, 1 Egg and 1/2 cup Molasses at room temperature, leave out over night if you keep it in the fridge; 2/3 cup white sugar (I use 1/3 white and 1/3 DARK brown) 

    now here they suggest that you creme' the sugar and the shortening together and add the other ingredients one at a time; I have just plopped the lot in a bowl and with a spoon mixed it up; it still worked out well, your choice;

but my advice, the molasses and the shortening MUST be room temperature if you are using a hand mixer, as this is really tough on the motor; but if at room temp, it is also easy to mix by hand and save electricity ;-) if you are taking the molasses and shortening out of the fridge and using cold, then my advice is to use a pastry cutter or sharp knife to cut into small pea size pieces before using the hand mixer; just a bit of experience of the past 3 weeks making 5 batches ;-) 

    hmmmmmmm at this point it calls for 1/4 cup of hot water to be blended in; perhaps it pays to read the recipe ;( ok, next time; but you use it; it might help out a bit LOL ;-) 

     it says to gradually stir in the dry ingredients; ok, that would be the 2 1/2 cups of cake and pastry flour (ummmmmm, I used All Purpose in the first two batches, just removed a Tbsp for each batch, and sifted 2 times) 1/2 tsp of salt, 1/2 tsp nutmeg ground, 1 1/2 tsp of ginger ground; stir it up or sift it once; would be a good idea to do this before doing the wet ingredients, then it is ready when needed; combine with the molasses mixture and beat the h... (ooooops keeping it PG ;-) batter well until it is mixed; 

if your really getting into it, and you find that you want a darker batch, you can add another 1/4 to 1/3 cup of molasses and hand mix; it is an experience LOL as you can see; 

This is half a batch, on the cutting board, lightly floured, otherwise it sticks to the board and to hands; I used my hands to press it out, flipping the batter twice, and re-coating my hands once; then cutting the first cookies, and placing on the greased cookie sheet; then refresh the flour on the board and press out again, flipping only once, and then cutting the rest of the cookies; the remainder I shaped by hand and put on the pan; 

for the log cabin, I cut the "logs" from the pressed dough and put on the pan for baking;

rolling does not retain the round shape in the oven, as the dough flattens on the bottom; 

did a batch of rounds, hoping to make snow men, but they would have made better bushes ;-) filled with a nugat or almond past they would have made an interesting cookie, coated with a white icing ;-) just a suggestion LOL or a reminder to myself, as I just thought of it hahaha; 

    cut the squared logs off at the ends to make a neat end, otherwise they will need to be cut immediately after bringing out of the oven; same goes for the cookies, as they can be rather hard, though keeping in an airtight container will soften them; 

these are rounds that I cut with a 2 inch spice bottle lid; they baked to 2 3/4 inch width ;-) I was going to use them for an advent calendar, but they got eaten first ;-) it has been that sort of season; 

    Bake at 350 F on the top shelf for about 10 to 12 minutes, best to keep an eye on them unless you are sure you haven't got a "hot" oven like mine ;-) the first batch I left for the 12 minutes and the bottoms were caramelized ;-( not bad for me, but not what I would serve to others ;-) 

     as this is a method that does not utilize cooking on a stove, it is great for a quick last minute house or batch of cookies ;-) below is the Icing recipe; 

Royal Icing for the Gingerbread either cookies or houses

I took out the ingredients for the Royal Icing, and am a bit shocked, 1 lb of icing sugar and 3 egg whites 1/2 tsp of cream of tarter; have a feeling after beating for the 10 minutes, it is going to be quite the bowl of snowy white ;-) going to have to figure a way of either keeping it moist afterwards or cut it down ;-) of course I could mix in some cocoa, mint flavouring and coconut, flatten in a pan, make cut marks, and leave to harden and see how it turns out; think I can count on it being verrrrrrrrrrrrrry sweet - maybe add raisins and nuts to thin out the sugar ;-)