Its What's for Dinner- Not really

Today's recipe is not one that you are going to eat. No, instead it is my favorite recipe for gingerbread for decorating Christmas houses. It is a little more involved, but holds up great and you can really fill it full of decorations.
Don't forget about the Holiday House contest coming up, so get started making those plans for your house.


Deni's Deluxe Dough
February 20 2008 at 9:39 PM
Loreta Wilson (Premier Login Gingerbread)
Forum Owner

Also known as oven-plywood - The recipe that follows makes excellent, stiff gingerbread dough. It is NOT your basic gingerbread dough. Please read the instructions thoroughly BEFORE starting - make you sure you really want to go to all this work! (It takes a bit more time and energy, however, I prefer to use this for my large houses, and I love it - Loreta)

NOTE: An electric mixer is NOT recommended. This dough is VERY stiff and could easily burn-up a mixer motor.

Equipment needed: 13 Qt. stainless steel mixing bowl (must be stainless steel - it will need to be placed on direct heat), 9 qt mixing bowl, smaller bowl, measuring cups and spoons, whip, large spatula.

6 cups All Purpose Flour
6 cups Rye Flour
Measure All Purpose Flour and Rye Flour into the 9 qt. bowl. Sift flours together to blend, set aside.

2 tsp. ground Ginger
2 tsp. ground Cinnamon
2 tsp. ground Cloves
1/2 tsp. ground Nutmeg
1 tsp. Salt
Remove about 1 cup of the blended flours and place in small bowl. Measure Ginger, Cinnamon, Cloves, Nutmeg and Salt into the small bowl. Blend this small amount of flour and spices together, then add to large bowl of flour. Sift (or stir well) to blend.

2/3 cups Lemon Juice
2 beaten Eggs
2 beaten Egg Yolks
Combine Lemon Juice, Beaten Eggs and Egg Yolks in another bowl. Set aside.

1/2 cups Margarine
1 1/3 cups Honey
3 1/3 cups Sugar

Combine Margarine, Honey and Sugar (in that order) in the 13 Qt. mixing bowl. Place over medium heat - do not leave unattended. Stir with large spoon while heating until Margarine and honey are melted and sugar can easily be stirred into them. (Sugar does not need to dissolve, just blend). Remove from heat.

Combining:
While Margarine/Honey/Sugar mixture is sill warm, add Lemon Juice/Egg mixture. Stir with a wire whip until well blended.

Begin adding Flour/Spices mixture to the Honey Mixture, stirring with the wire whip at first. As the dough gets stiffer, change to a large sturdy spoon. Stir in as much of the flour as you can, then begin kneading the remaining flour. Dough will be sticky at first, then becomes very stiff as you continue adding the flours.

Very useful: I put the 13 qt. bowl on the kitchen floor, get on my hands and knees and knead the dough directly in the bowl. It is much easier on the arms and a lot less mess.

Knead the dough until it makes a smooth ball. Keep it covered with plastic wrap.

Prepare another bowl of the flour mixture (variable amount) to be used to "dust" your rolling pin and surface.

Break off amount of dough to be used for house piece to be cut. Knead again to make smooth. The dough is very difficult to roll if it becomes cool/cold. You can keep the covered dough in the stainless steel bowl on top of stove while oven is on OR if the dough cools down, pull off a piece you intend to roll, wrap it in plastic wrap and microwave 15 - 30 seconds at a time. This re-heats the honey slightly and makes it easy to handle. (I use the microwave method - works great). Dust surface and rolling pin, roll to desired thickness.

Cut pieces and bake at 350 degrees for 15 min for 1/4" thick, 20 - 25 min for 3/8" thick. Check pieces - different sizes may need different settings.

Tips for Rolling, Cutting and Baking

Use a gauged rolling pin, that is, one that has interchangeable rings so your dough is the proper thickness (I don't use one, I like to just touch the dough to know it is the correct size....but it could be useful).

By the time you get the dough rolled the size you need, it is cool enough to actually pick the whole sheet up and drape and shape over a mold if desired.

Lightly wipe the counter with water then spread a sheet of aluminum foil down (the water keeps the foil from moving). Roll dough directly on foil. You can either cut pieces now or lift foil and place on baking sheet, then cut your pieces (prevents misshapen pieces).

For the straightest and cleanest edges, especially windows and doors, leave your scrap dough in place after cutting. Trim it, but leave 1/2" or so strip all the way around the piece. This prevents the edges from baking darker or spreading. (I tried this and it works great, but you really have to be quick when pieces come out of the oven and run a knife or pizza cutter across cuts again to make sure they separate well).

For the windows and doors, make your cuts but leave the piece in place. Don't bake it without those in place (I tried this, but I had a tough time removing baked pieces. I found it easier to remove extra dough before baking).

When the piece is baked and is still hot to very warm, you can pull those pieces away from the edges and out of the windows and doors. You can also press crumbs into place.

To make melted candy windows, allow the piece to cool completely. Brush crumbs from all cut edges, square the corners. Lay on sheet pan on top of a piece of foil. Spread cracked/crushed candies in window hole, brush any candy flakes off surface around window. Place back in the oven and heat only until candies melt and fill corners (Push it into the corners with a toothpick if necessary). If bubbles occur, use a straight pinto pop while the candies are still liquid. These windows won't fall out. If you use different colors in a window, you can swirl them while it's hot.

Larger structure/support pieces should be rolled 3/8". Pieces that are not support can be rolled 1/4" or thinner.

All pieces may be returned to the oven to bake more if necessary (if they didn't get brown or hard enough).

Dough rolled paper-thin must be watched closely while in the oven - maybe 5 min. Thin dough can be used for shingles. Use a small cutter. Then use a knife to score each in half (not all the way through). This allows you to snap them apart when cool.

Anytime BEFORE you apply any royal icing, if you feel a piece is not completely dry or you see that it is slowly bending out of shape at room temperature, PUT IT BACK IN THE OVEN at 250 - 300 degrees. Pieces that are draped over a mold may need to be set at 200 for about 45 min - 1 hr. They MUST be completely baked or they will cave-in. The low temp will dry, but not brown the surface further.



Notes

This gingerbread is NOT conventional. Most recipes instruct you to refrigerate the dough. DO NOT REFRIGERATE THIS DOUGH. It is tough and dense so must be warm to knead and roll. Your hands and arms will be better off. It will cool quickly enough to make clean cuts and be able to manipulate. This is the result of using Honey instead of Molasses, and the additional 50% Rye Flour.

The development and procedure of this recipe was created over several years exclusively with gingerbread house structural integrity in mind. Ingredient properties, and how each is affected by heat and moisture were considered.
These factors include:

Rye Flour: has a low gluten (protein) content which makes the dough denser. Kneading develops the gluten in the All Purpose and Rye flours. It's rough texture provides eye appeal.

Honey: does not soften after baking like molasses does, if baked completely. In fact, it hardens. It is a primary binding agent.

Rye Flour/Spices: create the darker gingerbread color in place of the molasses.

Egg Whites: by reducing the amount of egg white, the yolks and small amount of whites are binding agents and moisture.

Leavening Agents: All leavening agents (baking powder, baking soda, excessive egg whites) have been eliminated. This greatly reduces the amount of spreading or rising as the dough bakes.

Margarine (fat): is minimal to prevent to much spreading, but provides moisture.

Lemon Juice: is additional moisture. It also adds flavor, as does the salt.

http://www.ultimategingerbread.com/

Royal Icing - Glue Frosting

3 tablespoons meringue powder
6 Tablespoons warm water
1 pound powder sugar
½ teaspoon cream of tartar
1 teaspoon Vanilla or Almond flavoring

Note: 3 egg whites may be substituted for 3 tablespoons of meringue powder. Omit the water if using real egg whites.

Because this frosting dries quickly, and very hard, this is the recommended frosting to use for gluing together the walls and roof sections.

1. Keep all utensils completely grease-free. Combine all ingredients, mixing slowly with stationary mixer until peaks form. Beat at high speed for 7 to 10 minutes. This is important for the frosting to be soft enough to use with pastry bag.

2. This frosting is fast drying – keep bowl covered with a damp cloth. If icing is too thick when using fine tubes, add a few drops of water. For thicker icing, beat in a little extra confectioners sugar. Store leftover frosting, tightly covered, in the refrigerator for weeks. Rebeat before using again (if using real egg-whites, the frosting will not keep its cementing properties after the initial beating). This recipe makes about 3 ½ cups of glue frosting.

Frosting Tip: When working with egg whites or meringue powder, keep all utensils grease-free. Any oil or grease will break down the frosting mixture. Note that the "decorators frosting" contains grease (shortening). When decorating, it is helpful to keep one bag exclusively to be used for "glue frosting", and another bag to be used for the decorators frosting. This helps to keep grease away from the "glue frosting".

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Indeed.

Friday Fun For All- Holiday Houses

I want to do a contest. I think it will be really fun, but I need you all to play along. I want to do a gingerbread house contest. I have a great recipe for ginger bread that isn't great for eating, but it bakes up like plywood and holds up wonderfully for making holiday houses. And I will post that, but I don't care if you use a kit from your local grocery store or even an old school lunch milk carton covered in icing and decorated.

Here are the rules:

*Everything must be made out of something edible and held together with frosting. Exceptions-I don't care if your base is not gingerbread and if it is held together with hot glue, but everything else needs to be held together with frosting.

 *If you want to team up with someone else to create your house, that is great. Call your kids together and make a plan, design a house and then build it together. Great family times here.

*After you are finished with your house take a picture or two of it- front, back, sides, inside if applicable and then send the picture to me (post it on your blog if you want) I will then post all of the pictures on my blog and we will all vote on them- I will figure out the categories and let you know by next Friday. I will also figure out some cool prizes to go along with the categories and let you know what they are as well.

 So start thinking about what kind of gingerbread house you want to make, so start buying those candies now when the Halloween stuff is going on sale- small candy bars are great bricks, tiles, shingles, logs, skittles and m&ms are great for rocks.

Anybody willing to play along? and if you have friends that you think would enjoy this, invite them because the more the merrier I always say.

Houses need to be finished and photos to me by Dec. 4th. Voting will then be Dec. 5th to the 12th so I can send prizes before Christmas.

I will post my recipe Monday along with pictures of a house Jess and I made a few years ago when I had extra time.

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Indeed.

I Need Ideas

Ok, I have a friend that likes to go on road trips, hold give-aways and extravaganzas.  This year she is holding an extravaganza in conjuction with the realase of the movie Eclipse from the Twilight series.

 Did you see where she said, "lots of totally cool prizes from our ever-growing list of sponsors" ?

And did you see where she has me listed as a sponsor in the sidebar?
CustomScentsOnline
Inksplasher
Jess
Kristen Landon
LibrisPro
Nichole Giles
Rebecca Talley
Sandra - The Dance
Sarah M. Eden
Suan - Life Is Good
Tristi Pinkston
 
Yes, I told her I would donate an Eclipse themed bracelet for the Extravaganza. Then I told her I would donate a set of 3 Twighlight themed bangles for the gift basket at the end of the extravaganza. But I have no idea what I want the bangles to look like.
 
Jess and I have been kicking around a few ideas, but I have not settled on any one of them as what I really want the bangles to look like.
 
So I am coming to you to get some help. I need to have the bracelets done before my turn to post so that everyone can see it and want it. So if you were going to design a bracelet- either for Eclipse or for the set, what would it/they look like?
 
In the next couple of days, I will be posting some more on my jewlery blog and in my etsy shop so you can look at them if you want to see what I have done in the past.
 
 

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Indeed.

I did it

I entered a contest. Scary.
Click on the icon below or in my sidebar

for details.

I can't tell you which one is mine,

But I can ask you to go vote.

I have a smaller button in my sidebar to remind you to go vote.

So go vote

_________________________________________________

Indeed.

Candy wrappers

Do you ever buy a candy bar that has a contest code inside? Then you open the candy and it always, always says,
"Sorry not a winner, try again" or some such thing.

Sometimes they have a code that you can enter at the candy website. Of course when you go to the website and enter the code it alway says,
"Sorry not a winner, try again" or some such thing.

Did you know that when you go to the website and enter the code that all sorry not a winner codes are entered into a second chance drawing (if you enter your name and address along with the code).

I didn't know this. But I found this out the cool way. I came home from work today and a package was waiting for me. I hadn't ordered anything. But I had been entered in a second chance drawing. And this is what was in the package.

An 80 GB iPod along with a car dock thingie and $100 gift card!

I've been wanting one, but you know there was always that bill thing getting in the way.

Now I just have to decide what to put on it. It will hold 20,000 songs!!! 20,000!

And movies. Oh, tell me what movies should I get. I do not have to share it with my kids, so I can get whatever I want. If you could only have 1 movie, what would you choose? Tell me your all time favorite, must have, must see before you die movie.

Contest time

I think it is time for another contest.

Up until now, our products were available only through an individual Fragrance Designer or by purchasing a Fragrance collection kit from a UB designer's website. Also, when a hostess would hold a workshop, there were always guests that could not attend for whatever reason. These guests would always want a catalog- and we didn't have one. Well, now we do. Let me tell you, they are beautiful and we have several new packages to help you create your own fun and fragrance.

So, with Valentine's Day coming up (14 days and counting- see sidebar), now would be a great time to purchase (or tell your sweetie that you want some UB product) you Valentine's gift.

I have a basket sitting at my house full of unscented Urban Botanic goodies. Leave me a comment between now and Wednesday, Feb 6, 7 pm Mountain time, and I will enter your name in the drawing to win this basket. Send you friends and family my way and get another entry.

The winner will be drawn at 7pm Mountain time on Feb 6th and will win the basket with:

Nourishing body lotion 8oz
Of course the most important feature of your Urban Botanic products is your signature scent. But still, all we hear is ranting and raving about the quality of our Nourishing Body Lotion! What can we say? We designed it to quickly quench your skin's thirst for moisture and nourishment without feeling greasy - your skin still feels good at the end of the day without reapplying! It's completely hypo-allergenic and contains amazing ingredients like Grape Seed Oil, Avocado Oil, Jojoba Seed Oil, Shea Butter, Aloe Vera, and Vitamins A, C, D, & E!

Refreshing Shower Gel 8 oz
Who doesn't love a billowing, silky lather without having to use ¼ bottle of shower gel? Our Refreshing Shower Gel is just that - refreshing… and scented oh-so-perfectly for YOUR morning routine. Hypo-allergenic and gentle as can be.

Parfum Spray 2 oz.
You're going to love your Urban Botanic Parfum Spray. This is a perfume that lasts all day and feels wonderfully silky when you put it on. Our perfume is safer than most because it doesn't contain harsh preservatives like alcohol, formaldehyde, and other scary stuff you'll find in your typical department store perfume. Instead, we use silk amino acids that don't cause irritations and perfume allergies that a lot of people suffer from.

A wonderful back loofah
Pedicure brush and pumice
Assorted other goodies
Pumps for the lotion and showergel

All packaged in a lovely Valentine bag, ready to use yourself or give as a gift. (remember UB products make great gifts for men as well).

I will contact the winner and we will work together to create a fragrance that is Original and Unique, just like you!

And the winner is....

The winner of the Urban Botanic Home collection is Kris of Gardens by the Lake

So Kris, if you will e-mail me with your snail mail address and which three oils you would like in your collection, I will get it sent to you. You can see the different oils at my website. (e-mail, sandra@urbanbotanic.com)

For everyone else, UB corporate has decided to extend the introductory special through the end of October:


The UB Home Collection includes an Oil Warming Plate and three fragrance oils of your choice. That's enough to fragrance your home for over 2000 hours... all for the price of just two large candles elsewhere. You save $10.50 when you purchase the collection.

During the month of October, receive a UB Oil Warming Plate FREE with the purchase of a Signature Fragrance Collection. That's an extra $20 value! Now you can use your Signature Fragrance to not only create one-of-a-kind perfume, lotion, shower gel, and bubble bath, but also fragrance your home to your mood. Today: Apple + Cinnamon, Tomorrow: Brown Sugar + Fig... the possibilities are endless!

Visit my website and click SHOP to order. Your FREE Oil Warming Plate will be added automatically to the shipment of your Signature Fragrance Collection.

Or you can hostess a home workshop and earn your warming plate and oils!
This would make a great gift for the upcoming holidays!

Well, I am off to do the first of my holiday season open house workshops!

Contest time

This is my first contest and I am so excited about it.
For those of you that do not know, I am an Independent Fragrance Designer with the company Urban Botanic. I love this company and I love their product. I have been a consultant for other companies in the past, but none had a product I could get so excited about and none of them treated their consultants so well.

This week, two very exciting things happened.
1. I was interviewed yesterday by Emily Eyring at Utah Valley Magazine If you read the magazine, you know that in each issue they have a page of spotlights of things made in Utah Valley (click to see this month's page) I sent them a press release wayyyyyy earlier this year and Emily e-mailed me and asked if I would like to be included in the Nov/Dec issue on this page. A no brainer if you ask me. The picture will be of product but it will be my web address (www.yourscentyourway.com) in the magazine.

2. Urban Botanic introduced it's Urban Botanic Home Collection today. I am so very excited about this. I have had customers asking me for something like this for a long time. I know McKenna and everyone else at coporate has been working hard to find the best way to deliver this to us, the end user. Well, they found it in this cute little oil warmer.

I am going to paste what McKenna told us in this month's issue of our newsletter and then I will get to the contest.

"we found the best method to be oil warming. Your UB Perfume Oils make the most fabulous home fragrances and are safe to use in an oil warmer. We are astonished at the quality of home fragrances our products make. We probably shouldn't be so surprised, but we found the Urban Botanic Home Collection to be more fragrant and clean smelling than any candle or other form of home fragrance we'd experienced before. Ever. We can't wait for you to discover the same!

The best part is your customers can enjoy our fragrances in their home for about one-tenth the cost of candles. Not to mention UB Home Fragrances are a safer, more environmentally friendly, and a no-hassle way to scent your home. Here's how it works:

Place 2-3 drops of your favorite UB Perfume Oil directly into our Oil Warming Plate (SKU UB470) and turn it on. Within five minutes, you'll be enjoying rich, inviting fragrance throughout your home. It takes just a few drops to scent your home for 6-8 hours. You can also turn the Warming Plate off after a period of time and the scent will linger in your home much longer than candles and other home fragrance methods."

So now the contest. I am going to give away an Urban Botanic Home Collection. Now the rules-
*Each post on my blog gets you one entry

*Each person that comes to my blog and post and mentions that you sent them, gets them one entry and you another entry (then they send someone etc)

*When you take the personality test on my site, another entry

*contest ends at midnight Sept 30, 2007.

I was going to give an entry for every workshop booked, but if someone is not in Utah, it migh be hard for me to come do a workshop, so instead for every workshop booked and held between now and Oct. 31, I will give you 10% off of your order on top of the other hostess benefits.

Oh, and did I mention:
For the month of September, all Signature Fragrance Collections ordered by customers will receive a FREE Oil Warmer Plate in their shipment. That's an added $20 value.

Free books, free books, free books

August seems to be not only get ready to go back to school month, but also the contest/give away month. If you like free books, how about a whole tote full of free books? Click here to enter

Blog Contests

Over at Ashwin’s blog, you will find one crazy blog owner!! You can win $2500!! To enter just copy this text and paste it in your blog!! But hurry, this competition will not last long! So get posting!

So I don't know Aswhin, I found her through another blogger, but hey, whats to lose and what's to gain? So here it is folks. Of course, the more of you that post this, the less chance there is for the rest of the quadrillion of us that have posted, but really, isn't it all about getting hits to your blog? So for Ashwin, I would say a pretty good move. But the contest only lasts for another couple of days, so.....

I have spent the last little while looking over her blog, ok really the last 5 minutes, but it looks interesting. I think I can learn some things from her about blogging and just stuff. We'll see. I bookmarked her front page and as I have a spare minute or two, I will peruse her pages and see what knowledge I can glean from her. I'll keep you posted, unless of course, you want to hop over there and see for yourself what she has to offer.