Beyond Gingerbread Houses -- Tips for Making Gingerbread Cities

Gingerbread houses get the most attention during the holiday season, but if you want to build an impressive holiday decoration for next year, you’ll have to start planning months in advance.  

1. Design Your Structure Long Before You Bake

As with any project, you need to have a clear-cut plan on what you want to create. Bakers need to appreciate that a rectangular building, such as Chicago’s Sears Tower (also known as the Willis Tower) is going to be a bit easier than Rome’s Coliseum. But neither are impossible. You may even want to even look at a local real estate site such as Taylor Morrison Chicago for ideas that look like your dream house. 

New York City - Want to try to rebuild King Kong’s fave haunt, the Empire State Building? Start thinking about not only the shape of the building, but also how you’ll create the windows. Will you use frosting or even blue-tinted white chocolate? Perhaps the spires can also be fabricated with Pocky sticks. Artistic bakers may be able to sculpt the art deco details of the Chrysler Building, but you may want to start with a Brooklyn brownstone. 

2. Make Good Dough

Many families have a favorite gingerbread recipe. But good cookie dough doesn’t always make a great load bearing wall. Muller makes soft cookies, but bakes them at a low temperature so they’re crisp on the edges. She also creates an internal structure to support the cookie walls.

3. Get the Right Tools

Depending on how detailed you want your gingerbread house to bed you may need to get new tools. The tools need for building an impressive gingerbread building can be similar to making a real house. If you’re serious about making buildings that look real, you may want to consider getting a utility knife, Dremel, sandpaper, pastry bag with tips for delicate piping and other tools.

4. Decorate Smart

You’ll probably want to start decorating the gingerbread before you assemble the building. Why? If details like iced windows are added and allowed to dry while the building wall is lying flat, fewer drips will occur.