Gingerbread (Pepperkake) Castle

For anyone who likes to have a Hansel and Gretel moment. This is guaranteed to mesmerise small children.  I made my first gingerbread house for Christmas a few years ago, and each year I like to raise the bar. So I upgraded from a gingerbread house to a castle, and last Christmas I added coloured windows. For Christmas 2012 I got more ambitious with my windows, and had to have gingerbread dinosaurs attacking the castle as instructed by my nephews.

This is a Norwegian recipe. Traditionally Norwegians are supposed to bake at least seven types of biscuits for Christmas. 

The advantage of making a castle is that when it gets nibbled it becomes a picturesque ruin.

Once prepared the gingerbread dough should sit in the fridge at least overnight. If you can't be bothered to make a gingerbread building, the dough makes very nice biscuits.

Step 1: Ingredients

For the dough;
400g syrup
200g granulated sugar
100g butter
4 eggs
2 teaspoons baking powder
1kg flour
4 teaspoons cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon ground cardamom
1/2 teaspoon ground pepper
1/2 teaspoon ground ginger
1/2 teaspoon aniseed
1/2 teaspoon ground cloves

If you have the unground versions of the spices, then they can be ground in a pestle and mortar (I like to do this because it makes me feel like a witch). If you don't have all the spices, the most important spices are the cinnamon, ginger, pepper and cardamom.

a cake board or similar to use as a base (I have also used a large breadboard covered with foil)

baking tray

rolling pin

ruler and protractor

cookie cutters

coloured boiled sweets for windows (optional)

icing sugar

small set of lights (optional)

sugar (for sticking castle together)

sweets for decorating

Comments

[11877]

This is great I tried making a gingerbread house last christmas but it all fell to pieces thanks for making this instructables