Any Home Bakers Here?

[Xiao Casa]

Brothers!

I managed to get back at him nicely... I had him try to use the decorating canister. He made a nice little pile of frosting, underneath which there was supposedly a cookie.

 

[N F C]

I guess that's a guy that likes his sweets!

 

[sunflour]

My (Mis)Adventures in Gingerbread Cookie Baking

Have to say one more time, the cookie recipe was very good and I would use it again. Instead of the royal icing, I wanted to try a cookie glaze, which is amazing stuff. My cutters are 5" and I got 19 cookies from the recipe. Fine, there are only 2 of us, so 19 is plenty. Things kind of went downhill from there:

Casualty #1: Oops, a gingerbread man lost his head coming off the baking sheet. No biggie, 18 is enough for us.

Casualty #2: Ugh, can't open the canister part of the new decorating kit I just got for the cookies. It's ok, DH got it for me.

Casualty #3: The plunger knob on the decorating handle kept popping off. Fine, toss it aside and just push down with my finger.

Casualty #4: The stick and disc inside the decorating canister came apart so no frosting can be pushed out because now the disc is floating freely inside the tube. Forget it, just use a knife to put the cookie glaze on.

Casualty #5: Glaze is semi-hard and has to be re-worked.

Casualty #6: The knife proved too large to work with. Ok, reduced to decorating with coffee stir sticks. Find out decorating cookies with a little wooden coffee stirrer stinks.

So there you have it! The whole process was time-consuming and frustrating (although DH thought it was all hilarious) but I learned a few things:
1. That's a tasty gingerbread recipe and the sulfated molasses worked well
2. Buy better equipment, that decorating kit is now trash
3. The cookie glaze was good. It dries shiny and kind of semi-hard coating, like what you get on a bakery cookie. Recipe courtesy of KAF: http://www.kingarthurflour.com/recipes/simple-cookie-glaze-recipe
4. Maybe round up a few daycare kids to help?

Anyway, here a few of them in all their funky glory, LOL:

My 1st one while the decorating kit was all in 1 piece:



This is what happens when your decorating kit breaks, the knife
is too large and you have to use stir sticks to frost:
(And her head fell off moving to a serving plate this a.m.,
so I ate her for breakfast)


We dubbed this one "New Year's Eve Baby With Binkie":

I think they are precious! Anything homemade is better than the picture perfect bought stuff.

 

[sandesnow]

Glad the recipe worked out. It really is a surprisingly tasty one, considering I am not a huge fan of gingerbread cookies, I figure if I liked it, others might. I think all the gingerbread people turned out fabulous!

Don't think of them as disasters when it doesn't go the way you feel it should, just think of them having character. Not another in the world is the same. But honestly, they all look fab!!

 

[N F C]

Glad the recipe worked out. It really is a surprisingly tasty one, considering I am not a huge fan of gingerbread cookies, I figure if I liked it, others might. I think all the gingerbread people turned out fabulous!

Don't think of them as disasters when it doesn't go the way you feel it should, just think of them having character. Not another in the world is the same. But honestly, they all look fab!!

Thank you for the recipe! Both DH and I really liked it and we had fun decorating them. I'll definitely make the recipe again. DH is already talking about trying a house next year, lol.

 

[sunflour]

Started my gingerbread house today:



And tomorrow put it together!

 

[N F C]

Started my gingerbread house today:



And tomorrow put it together!

Cool! Can't wait to see what it looks like all put together.

 

[sunflour]

Cool! Can't wait to see what it looks like all put together.

Will post pics when done. Didn't get it finished til way after dark…poor pics is all I could do.

I bought a blackstrap molasses that tastes better than what I used in the past. Had to eat some of the dough, 'cause it smelled so good baking..

This one would be edible, but would send me to the dentist with broken teeth?

 

[Alice28]

Started my gingerbread house today: And tomorrow put it together!

Oh my gosh! Where did you get the gingerbread house mold?

 

[N F C]

Talk about gingerbread! Take a look at this entire town re-created in it:
https://www.flickr.com/photos/bjorgolfur/4196364180/in/gallery-7158635@N05-72157625420700838/

1,960 structures...impressive!