How To Make a Gingerbread House

At Biscuiteers, we like to think of ourselves as the biscuit experts, and we certainly know a thing or two about building a gingerbread house - we weren't voted Best Gingerbread House Kit for grownups 2024 for nothing! Here we'll give you a step-by-step tutorial on how to build a gingerbread house, with all the tips and tricks you need to create your very own to rival Hansel and Gretel...

What you'll need
We recommend using Biscuiteers DIY Gingerbread House Kit, which has everything you will need, but if you'd like to make your gingerbread dough from scratch, you can use our easy gingerbread biscuit recipe here. If you're making your icing from scratch, use our very easy royal icing recipe here. You will need to make it with 500g of icing sugar. You'll also need sprinkles, decorations and piping bags.

Make your Icing
To make traditional hard-set icing, sift the entire packet of royal icing sugar into a mixing bowl.

Add 3-4 tbsp of water and mix the mixture with a spoon or a whisk, slowly adding water until the icing stands up in straight peaks. If you make the icing too runny, add more royal icing sugar to the mixture, and mix well. For best results mix using a hand whisk.
Top tip:
For your icing to glue the whole structure together (without breakages) the consistency needs to be like toothpaste.

Separate your icing into two bowls, you will need the other bowl later. Now you’re now ready to ice!
Prepare your Icing Bag
Fill your piping bags with the white line icing. Take your bag and push the icing down to the end to get rid of any air pockets, then tie a knot in the open end.

Snip the end of the bag (across the seam), keeping it as close to the bottom as possible, to give yourself a fine line. You can test the flow of icing by practising on parchment paper.
Take the second bowl of icing and stir in a couple more spoonfuls of water. This will make the icing thinner and will be used for our flood icing. If you want to do different colours, split your flood icing into separate bowls and add your food colouring!
Decorating Your Gingerbread House
Now for the fun part! Here’s where you can get creative with your gingerbread house ideas. It’s important to decorate your house before you start to assemble. This way the decorations can dry flat.

Take the two ends of the house and start decorating those first. You can choose any design you like, we chose heart shapes. Then take the two sides of the house - for those using our tin, they are the smaller of the two rectangles. Ice the detail onto one, then repeat on the other.

Now it's time for the roof panels. Take each panel and pipe on the details.

Then it's time to flood. Use your runnier icing to fill in any of the shapes you've created with your line icing. Once you've added your flood icing, this will need to dry before you can add more details. To do this, put the biscuits in the oven at 50 degrees celsius for around 30 minutes.
Once dry, it's time to move on to adding the details. Use your icing to add more detail to your biscuits in different styles and colours. We like to add swirls, dots, hearts and lines.
Top tip
Using line icing to create dots is a great way to add a variety of detail without making it too complicated

When sticking on your gingerbread house decorations, use the icing like glue. Pipe a little dot and stick the decoration on whilst the icing is still wet. You can use mini candy drops, red glimmer sugar and silver baubles to add some texture.

Leave your icing to dry for at least 30 minutes before starting to assemble your house. Make sure all panels have dried properly before you move on.

Remember
Be sure to save roughly half of the icing to build your house.

Assembling your Gingerbread House
Begin by choosing a sturdy base for your festive gingerbread house. Cake boards are ideal. We also recommend using something to keep the biscuits standing up, such as a bowl or cup. Cut a slightly larger hole in your piping bag, as you will need a generous amount of icing to stick all the panels together.

To start, pipe a thick line of icing along the side and bottom of both side pieces and one end piece. Bring the pieces together so that they stick to each other and your cake board. Hold in place for 15 minutes. Repeat the process with the remaining end piece so that your house has 4 walls.
Top tip
Use some icing on the inside of the structure to re-enforce the walls. Don't worry about it being too neat as no one will see this part once the roof has gone on!

Once completely dry, it's time to attach the roof. Pipe a thick line of icing along the top of the end pieces of the house. Take your roof pieces and hold firmly in place for 15 minutes. Listen to your favourite Christmas carols to pass the time! It's really worth holding these panels as long as you can, to ensure they don't slip off.
Once the roof pieces are dry, pipe a line of icing down the centre between where the two roof pieces meet - this will contribute to the snowy effect! You can then add some silver balls or mini candy drops to look like roof tiles. Then leave your house to dry.
Finishing Touches
Don't forget you can use up any left over icing decorating your cake board. Spreading the white icing to cover the board will make the house look like it's surrounded by snow! If you have any icing sugar or edible glimmer, you can sprinkle this on top for an added touch.
Enjoy!
And there you have it... the best gingerbread house ever! We hope you've had fun building your handmade gingerbread house, from learning new royal icing tips to designing your very own roof. Send us some snaps of your finished house and share them on Instagram @biscuiteersltd with the hashtag #BiscuiteersMagic

If you'd like, you can also follow our Gingerbread House tutorial on Youtube.