Edible star wreath

Edible star wreath

Mima Sinclair’s festive wreath can used for both decoration and eating purposes. This stunning gingerbread creation will also make for a special Christmas gift.

Edible star wreath

  • Serves icon Makes 1 wreath
  • Time icon Hands-on time 2 hours, oven time 45 min, plus chilling and setting

Mima Sinclair’s festive wreath can used for both decoration and eating purposes. This stunning gingerbread creation will also make for a special Christmas gift.

Ingredients

You’ll also need…

  • Variety of star-shape cutters: about 3cm, 5cm and 7cm; piping bag with a fine nozzle (from cakecraftshop.co.uk)
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Method

  1. Heat the oven to 160°C/140°C fan/gas 3. Line 3 large baking sheets with silicone baking sheets or baking paper.
  2. Cut a large piece of baking paper and roll out the gingerbread on top of it until 5mm thick. Put a 25cm plate on the dough and cut round it. Use a smaller plate or bowl to cut out the centre to give a 4cm wide ring of dough.
  3. Using different-size cutters, cut out stars from the remaining dough. You’ll need about 16-20 biscuits. Freeze the gingerbread shapes for 5 minutes until hard, then bake in batches for 10-15 minutes, depending on size, until golden brown at the edges. (Bake the ring for 15-20 minutes.) Leave to cool for 5 minutes on the baking sheets, then carefully transfer with a palette knife/fish slice to wire racks to cool completely.
  4. Add a little water to the royal icing, drop by drop, until it reaches soft peak consistency. Divide between 2 bowls and colour one with the blue colouring paste. Spoon each into piping bags fitted with fine nozzles. Pipe your choice of decoration onto the plain stars.
  5. Squeeze two thirds of the icing out of the piping bags into separate bowls and add water to make flood icing – thick but runny. Spoon onto the biscuits to colour them. Stud a few with silver balls. Leave to set for 2 hours, then use the remaining soft peak icing to pipe more detail onto the stars.
  6. Arrange the stars on the ring, trying out several combinations until you find the best one. Once you are happy with the placing, brush the backs of the stars with caramel glue and stick to the circle. Leave to set firm, then hang with a ribbon.

This recipe is from Mima Sinclair’s book Gingerbread Wonderland (£8.99, Amazon)

delicious. tips

  1. To make flood icing stir water into royal icing, 1 tsp at a time, until you have a thick but slightly runny icing that smooths out on its own within 15 seconds but isn’t so runny that it runs off the edge of your biscuit. Use for filling in larger areas of biscuit.

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