As I mentioned below, American gingerbread is informed by at least two major gingerbread archetypes: shortbread-like English/Scottish gingerbread and crispy, cookie-like German gingerbread. Although judging from the sheer variety of gingerbread I’ve come across over the years, we’ve probably inherited several others too. This page from The Boston Cook Book demonstrates just how varied gingerbread […]
READ ONUnknown. However food historians do have a fairly good idea of where and when the gingerbread house became popular: in Germany in the early 1800’s, not long after the Grimm Brothers published their collection of fairy tales. The particular tale that made those houses so popular was of course Hansel and Gretel. Apparently, in the […]
READ ONFinding someone else to blame for my own stupid behavior is a consuming pass time of mine. Only this time there’s no way to deny that the reason the site was down this morning is because I forgot to pay my URL registration fees. Which means that any of you who tried to get onto […]
READ ONRoyal icing is a go-to building material for cake decorators, as it’s indispensable for detail-y bits like beadwork on wedding cakes. It pipes extremely well and sets up quickly into very firm and stable structures. That virtue is also royal icing’s curse, at least when it’s applied to something like a cupcake, since it dries […]
READ ONReader Arzu in Paris asks: Could you explain how you can pasteurize your egg whites or can you buy them like that? That’s an excellent question, Arzu, for indeed more and more people are having concerns about egg safety these days. Just this past summer there was a huge recall of salmonella-infected eggs here in […]
READ ONAny finesse I may bring to mixing other types of doughs and batters goes right out the window when I mix gingerbread. I just dump all the ingredients in the mixing bowl and stir. You can see in the below picture that I even ignored my own instruction to lightly beat the eggs. I just […]
READ ONSince the evolution of gingerbread is linked inextricably to the history of ginger in Europe, let’s start there. Ginger was probably the most important spice in Medieval Europe after pepper. It was known to the Greeks, who discovered it over the course of their escapades in Persia. The Romans knew about it as well, and […]
READ ONTwo egg whites plus three cups of powdered sugar plus a squeeze of lemon juice. That’s the standard formula that I learned years ago, though these days, because of concern over the use of raw eggs, more and more people are using meringue powder to make royal icing. I’d need to consult with an expert […]
READ ONHere’s a good sturdy gingerbread that’s excellent for either gingerbread cookies or gingerbread houses. It’s not half bad for eating, either! Yes, it contains vegetable shortening, but that’s a better choice when you’re fashioning a house or making a cookie that’s destined to become a tree ornament. Why? Because shortening won’t go rancid. If you […]
READ ONI know there are at least three readers who’ve been anxious for me to get to these, even though Christmas is six weeks away. But what they hey — Thanksgiving weekend is coming up, and it’s always a good idea to have a decorating project around for the kids. I’ll try to channel my inner […]
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