Gingerbread Men

If you bought one of Christmas Countdown colouring books then you might recognise this image from today's page!

Gingerbread men were a must when I was deciding what to include in the colouring book pages, as they've become a firm favourite for me and Jamie at Christmas time (I'll be making some this weekend!)

So I thought I'd use the opportunity today to share the recipe I use!

A couple of years ago I scoured the internet for a simple gingerbread man recipe and ended up altering a few that I'd found in order to make it work with the ingredients I had available at the time.

(I can't remember exactly how many this makes but it was enough for Jamie to take into work and share around the office!)

Ingredients:

12 ounces Plain White Flour

1tsp Bicarbonate of Soda / Baking Soda

1-2tsp Ground Ginger (You can adjust this depending on how strong you want them to be!)

4 ounces butter

6 ounces Soft Brown Sugar

4tbsp Golden Syrup

1 Large Egg

Method:

1. Sift the flour, baking soda and ginger together into a large mixing bowl.

2. Rub the butter into the flour mixture.

3. Stir in the sugar.

4. Whisk together the golden syrup and egg.

5. Stir all the ingredients together.

6. Form the dough into a ball, and roll out on a lightly floured surface.

7. Use biscuit cutters to cut as many biscuits from the dough as you can (you can use any shape, it doesn't have to be a gingerbread man, gingerbread hearts, trees and stars all taste just as good!)

8. Place on an oven tray lined with baking paper (You will either need to use a couple of large trays, or cook these in a couple of batches as it makes quite a few!)

9. Bake for 10-12 minutes (possibly a little longer depending on your oven) at 190 degrees celsius.

10. Once they're baked, transfer to a cooling rack until they're ready to decorate.

11. Decorate however you wish! Last time I went for a black writing icing face, and white icing and chocolate chips for the buttons. But this time I think I might use red and white writing icing to draw some festive jumpers on them!

And thats it! Now its time to enjoy them :)