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If you've been following me for a while, you might know that last year I placed first in the junior category of the Hudson Valley Gingerbread Competition at Mohonk Mountain House in New Paltz, NY. I really wanted to up my game for this year's competition, so I started designing this year's entry, Hogwarts at the Holidays, in July!
To create as realistic a scene as possible, first I sketched out the building's layout on a 2'x2' board, and then I made a scale model of each Hogwarts building out of cardboard, noting each location on the board. When the time came to bake the gingerbread, I took apart each building and used the cardboard pieces as templates. Rather than cut the pieces and bake them, which could cause the pieces' edges to become a bit wonky, I rolled out large squares of gingerbread and baked them first. I then used the templates to cut out the pieces while the gingerbread was still warm. This allowed me to have sharper edges that were easier to piece together with royal icing. For the rounded tower, I wrapped the still-warm gingerbread square around my wooden rolling pin and then slipped the rolling pin out before the gingerbread got too hard/cool for me to remove it. I was happily surprised that it didn't crack or break!
Because I wanted to let the gingerbread be the star, I kept the decorations simple. I used food dye to paint the windows and doors, including a stained glass window in the chapel and a Christmas tree in the window of one of the main buildings. To give it a holiday feeling, though, I also piped on strings of colored lights on each building; I piped everything using white royal icing and then went back and individually painted each light by hand with the food dye. (I know, I'm a little obsessed with details!) I also made a Christmas tree out of gingerbread and decorated it with sprinkles and royal icing to dress up the exterior.
Each roof tile was piped using colored royal icing, and the snow was artificial sweetener (it has a rougher texture than regular sugar, so it looks more sparkly). The buildings were placed on Rice Krispie treats, covered in fondant that I hand painted with food dye to look rough and rocky. The water was clear decorating gel dyed blue.
I was handpainting the details right up until the last minute and I spent a LOT of hours on this project, but I was pleased with the results and it was all worth it when they announced that I had won first place for the second year in a row! You can see all of the winning gingerbread entries here.
I have already started thinking about next year's entry, since I want to keep my winning streak going! If you have any ideas for me, be sure to let me know in the comments.