Christmas Vegan Gingerbread Fun Times

So I had a lovely afternoon with dear Laura and Eleanor, baking tasty vegan gingerbread creations :)

We learnt very quickly that it's not about what your baked goods look like, but how much fun you have making them!

We used this great vegan recipe from VegNews, with a few adjustments and a lot of crazy shapes :) Some perhaps a little more than others....

Ingrediants:

• 2-3/4 cups plain flour
• 1-1/2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1 tablespoon ground ginger
• 1/2 teaspoon ground cloves
• 1 teaspoon cinnamon
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 3/4 cup non-hydrogenated margarine, softened (we used Nuttelex)
• 1-1/2 cups light brown sugar, packed
• 2 tablespoons soymilk ( we didn't have this, so we opted for some extra Nuttelex and it worked out fine)
• 1/2 teaspoon vanilla

Method:

1. Preheat oven to 180 degrees and grease a cookie sheet.
2. In a bowl, combine pastry flour, baking powder, ginger, cloves, cinnamon, and salt. In a large bowl, whisk together margarine, and brown sugar together until smooth. Add soymilk and vanilla and whisk thoroughly.
3. Add dry ingredients to wet and mix with spatula to form a dough. Cover and refrigerate for at least two hours.
4. Roll out dough onto a floured board, 1/8- to 1/4-inch thick, depending on desired texture (thinner cookies will be crispier, thicker cookies will be chewier). Cut into shapes with cookie cutters and place on prepared cookie sheet. Bake for 10 to 12 minutes, depending on thickness. Go crazy with frosting and decorations!

And we did! We used an array of cookie cutters to make stars, people, and some even more imaginitive creations.

Laura's sassy Ginger(bread)

Eleanor's pretty gingerbread star tree, and iced star cookies. Our icing was a very simple concoction of water, icing sugar and food colouring; you can add butter if you prefer a creamier icing (or Nuttelex if you want to keep it vegan), but it might not be as effective for construction.

Our houses, Hootie, and Laura's festive star cookie

Sure, these may not be ready for the cover of the Better Homes and Gardens Christmas Edition, but we love them nonetheless :)