I think it's almost Christmas!

It's that time of year again and the madness of cooking lots of Christmas goodies begins.

I was racking my brain as to what to give some family and friends as part of their presents - so I just made some little Gingerbread Christmas Tree's ..

This is a little time consuming but well worth the end result.
I started making the dough at around 8 in the morning - finished the baking process by 2 pm  - went to work and got home around 9.30 pm - looked at them and thought I would finish them tomorrow ... Got up around 2 am to grab a drink and thought 'Bugger it - I will do the rest now!" finished them at 5 am!! lol

But they are done, ready to be wrapped in some pretty cellophane with ribbon .. =D

So if you have some patience then give this a go ..


INGREDIENTS

• 3 1/2 cups Plain flour - 
• 1 Tsp Baking Powder
• 1 Tsp Bicarbonate Soda
• 3 Tsps Ground Ginger
• 1/2 Tsp Ground Cardamom 
• 150g Soft Butter
• 1 Cup Honey or Golden syrup
• 1 Egg
• 1 Eggwhite
• 1 1/2 Cups sifted icing sugar
• 1/2 Tsp Lemon Juice

METHOD

Sift flour, baking soda, bicarb soda, ginger and cardamom together.
Beat butter and sugar with an electric mixer until fluffy.
Add Honey / Golden Syrup and egg - Beat until well combined.
On a low speed, beat in sifted ingredients until well combined and turns into a dough.
Divide the dough in half and wrap in cling wrap and put in the fridge for 30 minutes.

Note; If Dough is too dry (crumbles) add a tablespoon of milk.

Roll out dough halves between baking paper, around 4mm thick.
Get a large, medium and small star cookie cutter and cut out 27 large stars.
If any dough is left over, start cutting out 45 medium stars, you will start using the other half of the dough by now. With the remaining dough cut out 9 small stars.

With the large stars bake in the oven at 180 C for 7 - 8 minutes. Put on a rack to cool
With the medium stars, bake for about 5-7 minutes. Put on a rack to cool
With the small stars, bake for about 5 minutes. Put on a rack to cool

Once you have all your stars, it's time to make some royal icing.

In an electric mixer, add the egg white and beat until glossy, add the lemon juice and continue to beat.
Little by little add the sifted icing sugar and keep beating until you have a nice smooth glossy icing.

Divide the royal icing in two
Put a bit of green food colouring in one half of the royal icing.

Get two piping bags with a small nozzle

Fill one up with the green royal icing and the other with the white royal icing.

Start with a large star and blob a bit of green icing on each point. Then blob a bit of white icing in the middle of the star. (The white icing is the glue that holds it together)

Start stacking 3 large stars at offset angles, then continue with 5 medium stars and finish with one small star.

Keep continuing until you have 9 little trees.

I then sifted some icing sugar over the trees to make it look a bit snowy ..

Ok I know I suck at tying bows lol