Pretzel Gingerbread House

Just as I was digging out my gingerbread house pattern and recipe, my husband came by with a bag of pretzels and said, “how about using these to make a log cabin?”  "What a great idea", I thought.  And "Oh, did I marry well!"--My heart goes pitter-pat when he comes up with nifty ideas like that. Since it meant that I wouldn’t have to roll out cookie dough, we gave it a try.

To hold everything together, you will need to make some icing that dries rock hard. I used to make it with egg whites and cream of tartar like my mother taught me, but now I just use Wilton Meringue Powder mixed with powdered sugar and water. You can find Meringue powder in craft stores—follow the recipe for Royal Icing included inside the can.

I constructed the walls and roof pieces separately and let them dry before building the house, instead of building the house Lincoln Log-style.  I also added pieces of Rye Crisp to the insides of the walls for extra structural support.

 
 
 
 
 
 
The roof is made of graham cracker pieces.  I added gingerbread cookies to the roof  for a nice German look.
 

 

I constructed the house on a foil-covered piece of cardboard.  My mother taught me to lay down a good-sized blob of icing in each corner before placing the walls, then put a generous amount of icing in the inside seams.

 

After attaching the roof, let the icing dry and have the kids decorate the house with candy, add some icicles, and top with a dusting of powdered sugar.