Makes about 20
Preparation Time 1 hour 30 minutes plus chilling and drying time
Baking Time 8-10 minutes
Oven Temperature 160°C

• 720g (1 380ml) cake flour
• 12ml baking powder
• 10ml ground cinnamon
• 5ml ground ginger
• 5ml ground mixed spice
• 250g (175ml) golden syrup
• 400g (470ml) sugar
• 60g (65ml) butter
• 60ml lemon juice
• 1 large egg, lightly beaten

Royal Icing

• 1 large egg white
• 6ml lemon juice
• 150g (290ml) icing sugar, sifted
• 115-135g (225-255ml) icing sugar, sifted
• pens with edible ink, or silver balls

1 Sieve the flour, baking powder and spices together into a bowl. Melt the syrup, sugar and butter together. Remove from the heat and add the lemon juice then leave to cool slightly.

2 Stir one third of the flour mixture into the syrup mixture and add the egg. Add the remaining flour mixture and stir to form a dough. Knead the dough for a few minutes until it becomes elastic and less sticky. Cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate for 30 minutes to an hour.

3 Roll the dough out onto a lightly floured surface. Use tree or gift-shaped cookie cutters to cut shapes out of the dough. Place them onto a greased baking tray.

4 Bake in a preheated oven for 8-10 minutes or until the edges start to brown slightly. Remove from the oven and cool on wire racks.

5 Royal Icing Stir the egg white, lemon juice and 150g icing sugar together in a large bowl. Gradually stir in the remaining icing sugar and stir until smooth and glossy. Add a little water, if necessary, so that the icing has a firm consistency that you are able to pipe with ease.

6 Pipe a border of icing around the edge of each biscuit. Leave to dry for five minutes and then fill in the rest of the biscuit with icing. Set aside to harden overnight.

7 Once the icing is hard, the children can use edible ink pens to decorate the gingerbread trees and presents. If you don’t have pens, you can stick silver balls or other decorations onto the biscuits before the icing has hardened.

 The biscuits featured here are made by Love at First Sight.

Words and image: Ideas magazine