This entry was posted on Thursday, December 13th, 2007 at 8:23 pm and is filed under Food. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
Last week we made 180 gluten-free, dairy-free, egg-free gingerbread house pieces -enough for 30 houses. As we rolled, cut and baked I wasn’t terribly confident that these houses would stand. I had memories of Christmas’ past of sliding roofs, crumbled walls, candies popping off…and these were gingerbread houses made of gluten and eggs. So how would cookies made with inherently structureless ingredients fare (besides a pinch of xanthan gum)? Surprise, surprise, shockingly well!! The cookie icing made with rice milk and powdered sugar held the walls and roof in place. I have to say that ironically this was my best gingerbread house effort to date. The roof stayed in place, the candies didn’t move…it was meant to be. I thus highly recommend our gingerbread cookie dough (we sell it by the pound) for gingerbread people and houses. Oh and by the way it is delicious too.
I took the 180 pieces down to the California Integrative Hyperbaric Center in Irvine for a gingerbread house assembly and baking class for parents with children on a gluten-free/ casein-free diet. Their enthusiastic response from the parents was inspiring. My worries about the gingerbread houses standing are insignificant compared to these parents’ delight in finding treats their children can actually eat. I think my days of “regular” gingerbread houses are over as The Sensitive Baker now has a house that everyone can build…and eat.
