Christmas Gingerbread House - Assembly

I have posted the instructions on how to make this gingerbread house in three parts because that is really how the whole process occurs, in three stages. The making of the Gingerbread, the cutting and baking of the house parts and the building of the house. Which is what I will show you now.

1. First you need to start with a good icing glue mix. This is often called Royal icing. It is made using egg white and icing sugar.

Slowly add the icing sugar to an egg white until the icing mixture is smooth,thick and able to stand in firm peaks. This will help it to dry quickly which means less time for you to have to hold the pieces in place.

2. Cover your cake board with silver foil or baking paper. Then place a good dob of royal icing in the centre of where you will place the base of your house. Press the base firmly down on the board.

3. on top of two edges of the base place the royal icing and also on one edge of a side piece. Place the side piece and end piece on the base and press edges together firmly. You will need to hold in place for a couple of minutes until it stays in place.

4. Then add the other side piece using the same method and so on. Take a look at the photos to get some guidance.

5. Cover all the top edges with the royal icing and taking one side of the roof cover the top edge with icing as shown in photo. Place both sides of the roof at the same time on the top of the 4 sides, holding together firmly until they stick and do not move, as they are heavy they will tend to slide a bit until the icing sticks and hardens.

6. Using the icing, glue on the front door and window shutters. You will need to hold them in place for a couple of minutes until they hold firm to house.

7. Next assemble the chimney in the same way you assembled the house. you can either assemble it separately from the house or on the roof. See photo for a guide as how to assemble.

8. Now time to decorate with whichever sweets you choose. Make up some royal icing and use this to stick your sweets to the house individually. Depending on what you have chosen to place on the roof you can cover the roof with the icing and place the sweets on this way if you like. Or you can put icing on each individual sweet and place it on the house one at a time.

9. When you have finished decorating the house with the sweets, place the royal icing sugar in a piping bag and pipe the icing around all the edges and if you feel game and artistic you might be able to pipe some icicles coming off the edges of the roof.

10. When completed sprinkle the house with sifted icing sugar powder for a snow effect!