Gingerbread People

These gingerbread people are cute, bright and fun to make. Creating them will make your house smell fantastic and inject you with holiday cheer.

I used my favorite gingerbread recipe and a 6-inch cutter to make them. After baking, I made a big batch of royal icing and just got creative and tried to give the gingerbread people a bit of personality. I hope you give these a try, it really is fun.

Here's my recipe for royal icing:

Royal Icing
2 1/2 cups powdered sugar
3 tablespoons meringue powder
6 tablespoons water
1 tablespoon lemon juice
Food coloring, optional

In a large bowl combine meringue powder, water and lemon juice and stir until meringue powder is dissolved. Add powdered sugar and with an electric mixer on low speed, beat until evenly moistened. Then beat on high speed until stiff, glossy peaks form. Divide and tint as desired and add water a few drops at a time to get desired consistency.

And, here's how I decorated the Gingerbread People:

I started off by using piping consistency royal icing to add hair to the people.

For the pants, I outlined the shape with piping consistency royal icing and added three dots for buttons. After letting the icing dry for about 5 minutes, I filled the pants in with flood consistency icing in the same color.

For the dress, I outlined the shape and stripe with piping consistency blue royal icing. After the icing dried for a bit I filled in the dress with flood consistency blue royal icing and then immediately dropped in the white dots and stripe using flood consistency white royal icing.

I added some red detail to the dress with piping consistency icing. I also outlined and flooded the feet with green royal icing and outlined and filled the face and hands with tan royal icing. Two drops of blue for the eyes and a red mouth finish her off.

For a raised effect like the little red button on this girl's pants, add the drop of red royal icing after the base coat has dried.

This guy's "v" neck sweater was made by outlining the shape of the sweater and the neck and arm stripes with piping consistency red royal icing and then immediately filling in the rest of the sweater with flood consistency green royal icing.