Connoisseur Jon's Gluten-Free Gingerbread House

I had wanted to make a gingerbread house at Christmas for a long time, but do to excuses galore, I never had time enough to devote to the process.  This year, however, I was determined to finally do it.  Liz found a gluten-free recipe for me online at onlysometimesclever.wordpress.com, and we altered it slightly to match up with our flour pantry. 

Here is the original recipe we used:

GFCF Gingerbread Cookies

Makes about 8 dozen medium-sized cutout cookies

1 cup amaranth flour

2 cups potato starch

3 cups sweet rice flour

3 cups brown rice flour

2 Tbsp xanthan gum

3 Tbsp baking powder

3 Tbsp potato flour (optional)

2 Tbsp ground ginger (or more, if you like ‘em really gingery)

1 Tbsp ground allspice

1 Tbsp ground cinnamon

1 1/2 tsp ground cloves

3 cups powdered sugar

2 cups dark brown sugar

2 cups shortening

1 cup eggs (depending on size, 4-5 eggs.  Measure into a glass measuring cup.)

1/2 cup + 2 Tbsp dark molasses (OR 1/3 cup blackstrap molasses)

1 Tbsp salt

We substituted soy flour, all-purpose GF flour, garbanzo flour, and buckwheat four the other flours, as we weren’t planning on eating the house, but just looking at it.  We have tried a lot of flour combinations, and these were leftover flours that we didn’t really like.  However, we were in for a surprise.  We came out with firm dough that was pliable and sturdy, but once it cooked up at 350 degrees for 16-19 minutes, turned out to hide the flavors of the flours and tasted really good!  The cookies were not crumbly at all, a usual flaw of GF cooking, but were solid and snappy, with a slight bit of chew.  It was the perfect gingerbread!  Anyway, before we cooked the gingerbread, we rolled it out and cut out the shapes we needed.  We got the pattern from bobvila.com, but I decided to add an extension to the house, so it was half Bob Vila’s design, and half my own twist.

We let the cookies and house parts cool (for about 3 weeks, because I ran out of time) and then began the build.  Royal Icing was used to cement the house together, and we used dried egg white rather than regular egg whites to make the house food-safe. 

First, we attached the stained glass windows (made of melted lifesavers), and then we build the house, using extra icing at crucial joints for reinforcement.  Once the house was together, we shingled it with Necco wafers and decorated it with Dots and more royal icing.  The house made a beautiful and delicious centerpiece that wowed our guests, and it was a lot of fun to make.