Gluten Free Gingerbread Cookies

If Christmas cookies had a mascot, it would be a cut-out gingerbread man cookie. What screams Christmas more than a cute little cut-out cookie dressed up with royal icing and jimmies? My gluten free gingerbread cookies are so easy to prepare and fun to decorate with little ones! You’ll cut out about four dozen of these to last you throughout the holiday season.

The blessing and curse of cut-out cookies

Needless to say, I bake a lot. But cookie baking is still not my strong suit. There are so many factors involved with working with cookie dough. The oven temperature, the oven racks, the cookie sheets, the cookie sheet liners- the list goes on. Cookies only need an average of nine minutes to bake. The less amount of bake time, the more margin there is for error. However, cut-out cookies are a little more reliable. I compare cut-out cookie textures to pie crust. You go through a similar prep process- chilling the dough, then rolling it out. Unless you’re working with really warm dough, I can guarantee your cut-out cookies will bake just like mine. The only drawback is that rolling out dough and cutting out cookies is time consuming. Plus, then you have an entire afternoon of cookie decorating ahead of you! I suppose once a year, I can try to slow down my speed in the kitchen and relax with a pastry bag.

The easiest royal icing

There are many methods out there for royal icing. For me, I never have meringue powder on hand when I’m ready to whip up some royal icing. So, I’ve been mixing pasteurized egg whites and vanilla extract into confectioners sugar until I have a vert thick texture, and viola! This all comes down to personal choice. If you prefer playing it completely safe with meringue powder, you can’t go wrong with Sally’s Baking Addiction’s royal icing.

How to create pretty pastel colors for royal icing

We’ve all been there. You have this huge bowl of white icing in front of you, and then with two drops of food coloring, the color is way too dark. Now what do you do? If you want to create a light pastel icing color, use my fingertip method. Place a drop of food coloring on your finger, then let the excess drip onto a paper towel. Now, dab the tip of your finger into the icing. Mix it up completely before assessing how much more color you want. Sure, you’ll have some food dye on your fingertips for a couple of hours. But this is the best way to control how much coloring goes into your icing.

DIY Colored Sprinkles

Another creative tip is you can dye any fine-grain sprinkles you have on hand! The sprinkles you see here used to be hot pink. With some blue food coloring, viola!

Don’t have sprinkles? Use plain old granulated sugar! Simple place a tablespoon in a small Tupperware container, add tiny drops of food coloring, and shake it up. Sprinkle colors just became endless!