Can you recommend a good gingerbread house making kit for kids please?

[Bedsidedrawer]

Thanks!

We have used the ikea one and the tiger one and they’re both good. I help with the initial build as that’s tricky but once the walls have dried they can take over.

Depends on the age of the kids.
And on how much space you have to "store"/display it.
And on how much will be eaten or wasted with all the other goodies on offer.

We have reduced and reduced 'til now the kids bake gingerbread men/Christmas trees and decorate them.

(we have no surface space, storage space is limited and we threw out half of it uneaten because it was everybody's third or fourth choice of "treat")

Ikea hands down.

We’ve had the IKEA’s one, it’s great and tasty! I’d recommend using caramel to stick not icing. And icing just to decorate and stick smaller decorations on.

If yours are teeny I would consider a prebuilt one (I think aldi had one last year) as trying to get them to stay up can be a right pain in the Arsenal they can lose interest

NOT THE COSTCO ONE - it's FOUL.

That out of the way, I do as everyone else here - the Ikea one (this year you buy all the bits separately, so I'm going to get my own sweeties, and make my own icing) - which I put together, then they decorate. Then 2 days later they lever all the sweets off and eat them, and DP and I get the gingerbread.

They are 10 and 5
Would rather have a pre made kit. Just want it simple!

Morrisons did a pre made kit last year which was easy to build and tasted very good. I'm hoping they're doing it again this year

Not a kit but we made one last year using a gingerbread man recipe from the Hummingbird Bakery cookbook and a set of house cutters from Aldi. It was really not difficult and was delicious and my daughter loved helping with the baking as much as the decorating. Also had a cutter to make tiny houses to perch on a coffee mug which everyone loved.

I rate the Lidl one well ahead of Ikea's. But no mention of it in their Christmas leaflet yet. Use icing not caramel to stick it together, a) it works and b) it is far less dangerous if you have small children around. Nasty burns from hot sugar.

Good to rate the Lidl / Aldi ones ahead of Ikea’s but in my experience the houses in Lidl and Aldi were all broken And therefore useless. Ikea stores it’s products better.

Interesting. In several years of Lidl's version, I have never had any broken parts. Maybe our local Lidl treats them kindly.

Use royal icing for sticking also looks like authentic snow

I’ve never got the royal icing to set quick enough, it just leaves me standing there for ages holding it together whilst the kids have fucked off, so have resorted to caramel. Or the pre assembled. I go over it with the royal icing to look like snow though.

When the kids are helping with the caramel I have it just warm and just keep microwaving it. It sets so much quicker than icing, so the roof doesn’t slide off or walls cave in.

The Morrisons one is lovely and really tasty gingerbread.

You dont need a kit
Surely half the fun is letting them use their maths skills to make a pattern, then just cut round it.
We used to find triangular "swiss chalets" the easiest.

We got one that was a little village from Morrison’s last year. It was great because the kids could have one house from the village without the whole thing being destroyed.

Slaver on the royal icing when sticking the pieces together and it will hold quite quickly

@evilharpy that's amazing, so good.

Yes, I can vouch for the Morrisons one being very tasty - I thought these things were for entertainment purposes and generally binned, but it was actually really good! It was also nut free last year, if anyone has a family member with a nut allergy, as we do.

I have extensively tested this - in terms of ease and flavour, it’s the Lakeland kit for us. Ikea one was good to put together, but I didn’t love the taste...