Gingerbread Cottage

Total Time: 42 mins Preparation Time: 30 mins Cook Time: 12 mins

Ingredients

• 650 g self-raising flour
• 3 teaspoons ginger
• 3 teaspoons cinnamon
• 175 g butter, cut into cubes
• 225 g dark brown sugar
• 175 g black treacle
• 2 eggs, beaten
• 2 (120 g) tubes ready to use icing
• chocolate, flake bars
• 400 g marshmallows, mini
• 200 g icing sugar, sifted
• 2 coloured lolly pops
• chocolate, buttons and
• candy cane, to decorate

Recipe

• 1 place flour, ginger, cinnamon and butter in a food processor and pulse until they resemble breadcrumbs( do this in 2 batches if the bowl is small).
• 2 combine treacle sugar and egg in a large mixing bowl. tip in the flour and stir, then bring the dough together with your hands.
• 3 turn onto a lightly floured surface and knead until smooth.
• 4 cover and chill for at least an hour.
• 5 pre heat oven to 180c and line 3 baking sheets with non stick baking paper.
• 6 divide the dough into 3 and roll out to the thickness of a £1 coin. using the templates cut out 2 of each for the roof the sides and the front.
• 7 re roll the scraps and make christmas trees and 1 gingerbread men.
• 8 bake for about 12 minutes or until just firm.leave to cool in pan for 5 minutes, then transfer to a wire rack to cool completely.
• 9 to assemble the house, pipe a door on the front and a window on the side using the icing.
• 10 pipe icing generously along the bottom edges of the pieces and attach to the board, then join all the sides.
• 11 use the flake bars to support the inside of the house by laying them behind the walls on the floor of the house.
• 12 fix the roof of the cottage and leave to set overnight befor decorating.
• 13 stick the marsmallows all over the roof, using the ready icing as glue. fix chocolate buttons around the door and a sweet as adoor knob and use more chocolate buttons to cover the corner joints. make icicles hanging from the roof by making a pea sized blob and pulling downwards to break off.
• 14 mix the icing sugar with drops of water to form a thick spreadable paste and spread on the board to make snow, then decorate with lolly pops ( fastened to sweets), sweets, chocolate buttons and gingerbread trees. place the gingerbread on the roof or outside the door.