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Follow the Ruels

Gingerbread Village Cake

December 8, 2017

 Every year around Christmas time I convince myself that I should make a gingerbread house. From scratch. But I never actually go through with it. I think I have been burned by gingerbread houses in the past. The pieces never fit together well, so they end up just awkwardly stuck together. Or the house ends up collapsing under the weight of all the candy and decorations (maybe I am a little heavy handed with the candy and decorations). 

So this year, instead of kidding myself I decided to make a gingerbread village cake! It was the best of all worlds because I could still bake the gingerbread from scratch and decorate them to my heart’s content, but I didn’t actually have to build a whole house! Except for the two little ones on top. But those were so cute, I couldn’t resist (I used this cookie cutter)

I took inspiration for my little gingerbread village cake from the canal houses in Amsterdam. I am not sure why. I certainly have never been to Amsterdam or seen a canal house in person, but that is that came to mind. 

I made the houses from my gingerbread cookie recipe and iced them with royal icing. I just cut them by hand into various shapes and sizes. Some tall and skinny, some short and fat. Some with flat tops, other with pointed tops. There wasn’t really any rhyme or reason to it, other than I wanted some variety.

Then I went to decorating. I used images from Google to help me figure out the windows, roof, doors, etc. 



For the cake itself, I adapted this recipe for a gingerbread latte cake. Talk about scrumptious! Oh my word, this cake was good! The best part, though, was the cream cheese frosting on top.


After the layers of cake were baked then chilled, I leveled them with a serrated knife. I topped the first layer with a huge dollop of cream cheese frosting and spread it evenly around the surface with an offset spatula. Then set the next layer on top of that and repeated with another huge dollop of icing.

This time, I spread the icing all the way down the sides to cover most of the cake. I didn’t do a huge layer of icing, I just wanted to catch all the crumbs first so they didn’t end up in the outer layer of icing.


After a quick chill in the fridge, just long enough for the icing to set up, I finished icing the whole cake and set it on my cake stand. The beauty of this cake is that you don’t have to be an expert icer because you are just going to cover it with the gingerbread houses.

The little houses just stick right onto the cream cheese frosting. Almost a little too well. I wanted to move one of the houses and it just lifted the icing right along with it. 


To attach the little gingerbread men, I put a dot of the frosting on the back an stuck them right on top of the house.

I did finish off a couple of the houses with a few other decorations. I had these cute holly sprinkles that I stuck right on using a bit of left over royal icing. And I added some candy canes and left over Christmas tree cookies. 

While this cake may have been a bit more work than a gingerbread house, I think I like it even more. For one, when you are done you can eat the cake along with the gingerbread cookies. It’s the best of all worlds! If you also want some candy in there, throw a few more candy decorations on top. That way there is a little something for everyone!

[yumprint-recipe id=’148′] 

 

 

/ Filed In: Cakes and Cupcakes, Cakes New, Eat
Tagged: cake, Christmas, cream cheese frosting, gingerbead house, gingerbread, gingerbread latte, holidays

Glazed Gingerbread Donuts

November 28, 2016

Glazed Gingerbread Donuts

Before we left to visit family in Texas for Thanksgiving, I decided I needed to put up my Christmas tree and get our house ready for the holidays. I pulled out all of the Christmas decorations that we had acquired over the years and unpacked it all (to see what I had to work with). It was like Christmas had thrown up in our living room. Which for me, was lots of fun. Not so much for my husband.

To fuel my Christmas decorating bender, I thought it would be appropriate to have a Christmas-themed breakfast. There are lots of things that remind me of Christmas, but maybe none more than gingerbread! My first thought was gingerbread pancakes (been there, done that). Then I thought: Gingerbread Donuts!

The gingerbread baking in the oven filled our kitchen with so many wonderful holiday scents – brown sugar, cinnamon, ginger, and clove. It smelled heavenly!


To make the gingerbread batter, I mixed together flour, brown sugar, baking powder, salt, and spices. Separately, I whisked together the milk, butter, molasses, and egg. Then I mixed the two together to make a light and fluffy batter.

 


I use a big zip-top bag to pipe the batter into the donut tin. I tend to overfill my donut tin, forgetting that the donuts will puff up and rise in the oven. Next time I will remind myself to only fill up the tin three-quarters of the way. 


They don’t take very long to bake, but I used that down time to whip up the vanilla glaze. The glaze is pretty simple to make: whisk together milk, confectioners’ sugar, and vanilla. I added just enough milk until the glaze was the right consistency.

gingerbread-donuts-10

I kept my glaze rather thick, mainly for the photos. But when I make these again, I will make my glaze thinner. I want the gingerbread to be the star of the show. If you make these at home, you could even skip the glaze completely and dust the donuts with confectioners’ sugar.

Any way this gingerbread donut is dressed (I tried the donuts plain, with confectioners’ sugar, and glaze….it’s a tough job, folks), it’s delicious. Light, yet moist and oh so flavorful. It is the perfect compliment to a cup of holiday spice coffee. Also the perfect start to a day of holiday decorating!

Gingerbread Donut

[amd-yrecipe-recipe:100]

/ Filed In: Breakfast, Eat, Other Sweets New
Tagged: breakfast, donut, gingerbread, glaze, muffin, Winter

National Pancake Day

September 26, 2014

I think children are like pancakes. You sort of ruin the first one, and you get better at it the second time around.
– Kelly Ripa
Happy National Pancake Day! I wanted to share some of my favorite pancake recipes with y’all since they are definitely my favorite breakfast food. I will be celebrating the day after National Pancake Day with a nice tall stack of my own.
 
Chocolate Hazelnut Pancakes
Biscuits Be Crazy - Chocolate Pancakes1
Peach Ricotta Pancakes
Peach-Ricotta-Pancakes5
 
Sugar Free, Gluten Free Pancakes with Strawberry Syrup
BBC Strawberry Pancakes3
 Protein Power PancakesDSC03410
 
Gingerbread Pancakes
Gingerbread-Pancakes
Pumpkin Pancakes
Pumpkin-Pancakes
And even though this is National Pancake Day, there is no sense in discriminating against international pancakes.
 
Dutch Baby (Pancake) with Berry Compote
Berry-Dutch-Pancake3
Whole Wheat Crepes
Whole-Wheat-Crepes
What is your favorite type of pancake?

/ Filed In: Eat
Tagged: breakfast, chocolate, gingerbread, hazelnut, pancakes, peach, pumpkin, whole wheat

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Hey There!

Hey there, I'm Lindsey. I'm a number cruncher by day and a home cook and baker by night. While I love to eat healthy and find fresh and healthy alternatives for my favorite foods, I will never turn down dessert! Life is all about moderation, right?

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