Make these festive houses in the kitchen with the kids this Christmas

Gingerbread houses are a fun and easy way to get into the festive spirit. If you find yourself with an afternoon to spare, whip up a batch of gingerbread and busy little fingers with the task of assembling and decorating their own house ornaments. Trust us, the fun will last for hours!

If you’re not a fan of the houses hanging as ornaments like these ones, the same gingerbread recipe can be used to build a more traditional free-standing house. Simply switch the template of the pieces you’re cutting to one like this and you’re good to go!

Ingredients:

• 3 cups (450g) plain flour
• 1 ½ cups (330g) caster sugar
• 1 tablespoon ground ginger
• 2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 200g butter, melted
• 1 tablespoon golden syrup
• 1 egg, beaten lightly
• 300g white chocolate melts, melted, cooled
• Length of ribbon or cord, for hanging (optional), at Spotlight

Method:

1. Sift dry ingredients into a large bowl (A). Combine melted butter, golden syrup and egg in a small bowl.
2. Stir butter mixture into the dry ingredients until combined. Knead dough for 5 minutes or until smooth. Divide the dough into 2, press into a disc and wrap each in cling film. Refrigerate for 1 hour.
3. Roll each piece of dough between two sheets of baking paper to about 4mm thick. Place in freezer for 15 minutes. Using a 5cm square cutter or cardboard template, cut out 36 squares (B). Cut 12 of the squares in half to form two triangles.
4. Preheat oven to 180°C/160°C fan. Grease oven trays and line with baking paper.
5. Arrange squares on trays about 3cm apart. Place a triangle on top of each square slightly overlapping to form a house shape. Press gently over the join to seal (C). Using a skewer, make a small hole in the top of each house, not too close to the edge.
6. Bake cookies for 10 minutes or until golden. Stand cookies on trays for 10 minutes before transferring to wire racks to cool.
7. Fill a small piping bag (see tip) with melted chocolate, cut a small hole from the tip of the bag. Pipe chocolate onto biscuits using picture as a guide (D). Stand until set.
8. If using biscuits as decoration, thread ribbon through hole to hang biscuits. Undecorated cookies suitable to freeze.

Top tip: Cool trays between each batch. The shapes will feel soft when they’re cooked, but will crisp on cooling. If you prefer, you can use writing icing, available from the baking aisle in supermarkets.

We don’t all have the time (or inclination) to make Gingerbread houses from scratch. However, KitKat has released a Christmas Cabin set that contains everything you’ll need. It’s simply a matter of melting the white chocolate, using it to glue the walls and roof together, and then decorating. Depending on their ages and skill levels, this is one you could possibly set up and leave the kids to busy themselves with on their own. For only $35, you can pick up a kit today with no need to hunt and gather all of the ingredients during one of the busiest times of year.

We put our creative skills to the test in the office and had a go at building a cabin of our own. Pictured above is our final outcome… Can you do better?

Ingredients (All included in the kit):

• KitKat bars
• A KitKat Santa
• Allen’s Smarties
• Allen’s Ripe Rasperries
• Nestle Bakers White Chocolate Melts

A detailed method is included in the box, alongside templates for you to trace with melted chocolate, so all the heavy lifting has already been done for you. Happy building!