Gingerbread House - History and Recipes

History of Gingerbread

Gingerbread has been baked in Europe since the eleventh century. In some places, it was a soft, delicately spiced cake; in others, a crisp, flat cookie, and in others, warm, thick, dark squares of "bread," sometimes served with a pitcher of lemon sauce or whipped cream. It was sometimes light, sometimes dark, sometimes sweet, sometimes spicy, but it was almost always cut into shapes such as men, women, stars or animals, and colorfully decorated or stamped with a mold and dusted with white sugar.

In Medieval England gingerbread meant simply "preserved ginger" and was an adaptation of the Old French gingebras, derived from the Latin name of the spice, Zingebar. It was only in the fifteenth century that the term came to be applied to a kind of cake made with treacle, an uncrystalized syrup drained from raw sugar during the refining process, and flavored with ginger. Ginger was also discovered to have a preservative effect when added to pastries and bread, and this probably led to the development of recipes for ginger cakes, cookies, and flavored breads.

From its very beginning gingerbread has been a fairground delicacy. Many fairs became known as "gingerbread fairs" and gingerbread items took on the alternative name in England of "fairings" which had the generic meaning of a gift given at, or brought from, a fair. Certain shapes were associated with different seasons: buttons and flowers were found at Easter fairs, and animals and birds were a feature in autumn. There is also more than one village tradition in England requiring unmarried women to eat gingerbread "husbands" at the fair if they are to stand a good chance of meeting a real husband.

Our 2008 Gingerbread House

Gingerbread Recipe for eating or building

Ingredients

1 kg flour
200 ml water
125 grams sugar
125 grams brown sugar
500 grams Honey
4 egg yolks
2 teaspoons allspice
20 grams baking soda

Mix the water, sugar and honey together in a bowl, then add egg yolks.
In a separate bowl combine flour and baking soda.
Slowly add to first bowl to create the dough. Note: Avoid folding the dough while mixing, creating air bubbles.
Let the dough sit about a half hour.

The finished mix should have the consistency of Play-Dough.