This recipe for Gingerbread Salt Dough will fill your home with an intoxicating fragrance and adorn your Christmas tree with seasonal beauty. I like to make ornaments with this, but you could also use it to make long-lasting gingerbread houses. It's great for strong structural builds and beautiful tree adornments.
This post is brought to you exclusively by King of Christmas. They provide some of the highest quality Christmas trees available, perfect for creating lasting memories in your home. While this recipe may be edible, it wouldn't be overly enjoyable to eat, but it makes for a fun craft and is even great to do with kids. The cutouts can be made into any shape imaginable!
Ingredients
This is what I love about this recipe and "craft". It uses all edible ingredients, even if they won't be very enjoyable to eat after you mix them all together. That fact also means it is fairly inexpensive to make, and you might already have all of these ingredients on hand in your house right now.
What you need:
- All Purpose Flour
- Plain Table Salt
- Ground Ginger
- Ground Cloves
- Ground Cinnamon
- Water
- Black Cocoa Powder, optional
See the recipe card for full quantities.
Use the JUMP TO RECIPE button at the top of the post, or scroll to the bottom of the post to see the full recipe card with ingredient measurements and instructions.
Method
In a large bowl, combine all of the dry ingredients and whisk them together. If you like a darker dough, you could also whisk in ⅓ cup of black cocoa powder at this stage.
Add the water to the dry ingredients, then switch to a spatula, the dough will get stuck in the whisk. Work the dough until almost all of the dry ingredients have moistened. Then use your hands to kneed the dough together until completely uniform.
Place ⅓ of the dough on a piece of parchment paper, then place a second sheet on top and roll the dough out between them, as thin as you can get it. ¼ inch or thinner.
Use your cookie cutter of choice or cut out any design you like. I chose an assortment of mushrooms to make ornaments for myself.
Place the cut-outs on parchment or silicone-lined baking sheet and using a toothpick or skewer end, make a small hole in them if you are making ornaments. Bake your cut-outs in the oven till crisp, about 2 hours, longer if they aren't thin enough. Flip them over halfway through cooking.
Let them cool completely, and if you have time, let them dry out, uncovered overnight if you have any that may have been a bit thick or if they have soft spots.
You are then free to decorate. I made a simple egg white and powdered sugar royal icing to decorate with. You can color it if you like but I really enjoy the classic white contrast on the gingerbread.
They are beautiful strung up and hung on this 9-foot King of Christmas King Noble Fir tree. They would also be beautiful strung together and made into garland for a tree or other greenery too.
My inspiration for my tree this year was Modern Nordic Nostalgia and I think I really hit it out of the park. It features a little sophistication, some whimsy, and and bit of old-world charm. Shop my AMAZON faves HERE, and many of my other favorites from a few different retailers, HERE.
Notes & Tips
When first forming the dough, it will take some time to work the water and dry ingredients together. You can do this by hand, or in a stand mixer fitted with the dough hook. It is important to knead the dough for 2-3 minutes so the gluten develops a bit and it becomes a supple dough.
If the dough is too tacky, add a bit more flour, if it is very stiff and won't roll out, knead in a bit more water. The dough should not be sticky and should be easy to handle. I roll between parchment just to keep my work surface clean and keep it from rolling up on the pin.
The thinner the better for drying out the cookies. I try to get the dough down to about ⅛th inch thickness, but ¼ will do if your dough is a bit stiff, they just may take a bit longer to dry out.
Flip the cookies after an hour, this will help prevent warping and help them dry out fully on both sides.
If the cookies have a wet spot after 2 hours in the oven, leave them out overnight to dry some more. They will continue to dry on the tree, the goal is just to get them stiff enough that they can be handled and strung up.
The dry cookies can be painted or decorated like a sugar cookie, I make a simple royal icing made of egg whites and powdered sugar to decorate mine.
Substitutions
Any plain flour will work for this recipe, you could even use that old bag of whole wheat flour hanging in the back of the pantry if you want.
The salt acts as a preservative and helps the cookies harden. I use very inexpensive plain table salt for this, it was $0.67 cents at Walmart and I made 2 and a half batches with a canister of it. You could use kosher or iodized, but kosher is too expensive and a waste if you ask me. Save it for real cooking.
For the ginger, cloves, and cinnamon, the most important is cinnamon for its color and aroma. The cinnamon is the most important and you could use it exclusively if that is all you have on hand, simply replace the others with the same amount of cinnamon.
If you'd like a darker, richer, almost black-looking dough, which I sometimes prefer, you can add ⅓ cup of black cocoa with the flour mixture. If you add the cocoa on top of all the other ingredients, add ½ cup more water or the dough will be too dry.
I went all out on my mushroom theme this year and even made these giant paper mache mushrooms to go in my mushroom tree forest. Of course, the star three is my King of Christmas King Nobel Fir.
More Gingerbread Love
If gingerbread is your jam or if you just want a few more points of inspiration for edible gingerbread treats take a look at these...
I developed this recipe for Gingerbread Oatmeal Cream Pies a few years ago and they have been a welcome addition to my Christmas cookie trays ever since.
Make holiday breakfasts a little extra special with my Gingerbread Pancakes, perfectly spiced for the season, and a fun play on a treat from Santa!
Spice any of your holiday bakes up with my homemade Gingerbread Spice Mix, from cookies to pancakes, to anything your imagination can whip up, it adds a wonderful seasonal spice to just about anything.
And if you are looking for a little bit of Gingerbread House making inspiration, take a look at my Oreo "Gingerbread" Houses I make from scratch. They can be made into just about ANY form you can dream up and are so fun and tasty!
Did you make this recipe? Let me know by leaving a review or comment! And be sure to sign up for my newsletter, and follow along on Instagram, Pinterest, and Facebook!
📖 Recipe
Gingerbread Salt Dough
While this recipe may not be an enjoyable one to eat, it is a fun craft made with all edible ingredients. That makes it very inexpensive to make as well, for about $5 worth of ingredients you can make a whole tree's worth of ornaments.
Ingredients
- 3 cups All-Purpose Flour
- 1 cup Plain Table Salt
- ¼ cup Ginger, ground
- ¼ cup Cloves, ground
- ½ cup Cinnamon, ground
- 1 ½ cups Water
- ⅓ cup Black Cocoa Powder, optional
- for decorating:
- 2 Egg Whites
- 1-1 ½ cups Powdered Sugar
Instructions
- Place the flour, salt, ginger, cloves, and cinnamon in a large bowl and whisk them together.
- Add the water to the bowl and switch to a rubber spatula and bring the dough together. Work the water into the dry ingredients until fully saturated.
- When the dough is mostly formed use your hands to kneed the mixture together and get all of the dry ingredients wet. Work the dough with your hands for 2 minutes to get it well developed.
- Heat the oven to 250˚F.
- Between two pieces of parchment paper, roll out ⅓rd of the dough to ⅛th inch. It should be fairly cracker thin. Do your best to get it to at leasts ¼ inch thick.
- Use your cookie cutters to cut shapes, place them on a parchment or silicone lined baking sheets, and use a tooth pick or skewer to make a hole on the top so you can string them up as ornaments after baking.
- Bake in the low heat oven for 1 ½-2 hours flipping halfway through until dry and crisp, the thinner the better, I had a thick and thin batch and the thinner ones dried in about an hour and 15 minutes.
- After baking, if the shapes have a bit of a white haze to them, you can rub them with a little vegetable oil and let them air dry for a darker, more gingerbread color. Optionally, you add some black cocoa at the beginning if you’d like a darker, almost black gingerbread look. I made some this way too and they are very pretty. Especially when decorated with the white icing.
- If you’d like to ice the cutouts, whip some egg whites till they begin to get foamy, then whisk in the powdered sugar until a spreadable consistency is formed. You can then color the icing if you like, but I keep mine classically white. Place in a piping bag fitted with a small tip and you are ready to decorate any way you desire.
- Let the frosting dry on them overnight or for at least 4-6 hours, then add a string and they are ready to hang on your tree or garland.
Notes
Notes & Tips
When first forming the dough, it will take some time to work the water and dry ingredients together. You can do this by hand, or in a stand mixer fitted with the dough hook. It is important to knead the dough for 2-3 minutes so the gluten develops a bit and it becomes a supple dough.
If the dough is too tacky, add a bit more flour, if it is very stiff and won't roll out, knead in a bit more water. The dough should not be sticky and should be easy to handle. I roll between parchment just to keep my work surface clean and keep it from rolling up on the pin.
The thinner the better for drying out the cookies. I try to get the dough down to about ⅛th inch thickness, but ¼ will do if your dough is a bit stiff, they just may take a bit longer to dry out.
Flip the cookies after an hour, this will help prevent warping and help them dry out fully on both sides.
If the cookies have a wet spot after 2 hours in the oven, leave them out overnight to dry some more. They will continue to dry on the tree, the goal is just to get them stiff enough that they can be handled and strung up.
The dry cookies can be painted or decorated like a sugar cookie, I make a simple royal icing made of egg whites and powdered sugar to decorate mine.
Substitutions
Any plain flour will work for this recipe, you could even use that old bag of whole wheat flour hanging in the back of the pantry if you want.
The salt acts as a preservative and helps the cookies harden. I use very inexpensive plain table salt for this, it was $0.67 cents at Walmart and I made 2 and a half batches with a canister of it. You could use kosher or iodized, but kosher is too expensive and a waste if you ask me. Save it for real cooking.
For the ginger, cloves, and cinnamon, the most important is cinnamon for its color and aroma. The cinnamon is the most important and you could use it exclusively if that is all you have on hand, simply replace the others with the same amount of cinnamon.
If you'd like a darker, richer, almost black-looking dough, which I sometimes prefer, you can add ⅓ cup of black cocoa with the flour mixture. If you add the cocoa on top of all the other ingredients, add ½ cup more water or the dough will be too dry.
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