How to Make a Gingerbread House out of Graham Crackers

Making gingerbread houses is a holiday tradition that my family looks forward to every year. However, instead of using gingerbread, we use graham crackers.

Difficulty: Easy

Instructions

Things You'll Need:

• Royal Icing
• Sturdy board or plate
• Graham Crackers
• Icing bag and tip
• Candy
• Sharp knife

1. 

   First, prepare plenty of royal icing using your favorite recipe. If you are going to eat it, use a recipe that doesn’t require raw eggs. Spoon the icing into an icing bag and add the tip. A medium star or round tip works well. Remember to keep the bowl of icing covered with a damp cloth and wrap the tip of the bag in a damp washcloth when you are not using it.

2. Cut a piece of cardboard and cover it with aluminum foil or just use a sturdy paper plate. You can layer several plates together to make a nice sturdy base for your gingerbread, uh graham cracker house.

3. 

   Make a basic house shape by cutting two graham crackers so that they have a point at one end like the peak of a roof. Work slowly so that the cracker doesn’t break. Sometimes it helps to draw a line with the knife, cutting partially through the cracker first. Then run the knife along the line again to cut the rest of the way through. Take three more graham crackers and break them in half so that you have 6 squares. If your cracker breaks, don’t worry! Put icing along the broken edge and “glue” the piece back together.

4. 

   Pipe a line of icing along the bottom and two sides of one pointed graham cracker. Pipe along the bottom edge of a square graham cracker. Place the pointed graham cracker and square cracker onto the plate so that they form two sides of a square. Add the second pointed cracker and another square cracker to complete the square, adding icing along the edges to hold the crackers together. Make sure that the pointed crackers are attached to the inside of the square crackers or they will be too far apart to hold the roof up. Pipe along the top edge of the house and add the roof.

5. 

   Add candy by piping icing onto the house and placing the candy into the icing. You can also draw doors, windows, shingles or other decorations with the icing. Don’t forget to decorate the “yard”! Have fun and be creative. Once you have mastered the basic gingerbread house, you can try something bigger. The possibilities are only limited by your imagination and the amount of graham crackers you have on hand!

Resources

• More articles by ~Analana~

[healthymomof5]

on 1/21/2009 These are really fun to make! Great article!

[miasavc]

on 12/13/2008 This is interesting to make. I'll give it a shot & see if it looks as good as your gingerbread house in the picture! :-D

[HowTo09]

on 12/13/2008 Never thought of using graham crackers. What a good idea. Thanks for sharing.

[ibooks]

on 12/10/2008 Great article and sounds very fun.

[dlcass]

on 12/10/2008 Excellent article. Gingerbread houses can be made of so many more things than just gingerbread. I saw a pretzle log cabin once. This sounds so easy, I just might try it. Thanks.