Saturday, November 25, 2006

no, I am not about to make gingerbread using an american recipe

Orange is a very popular color for Thanksgiving. I am kind of glad we are done with it, though, because when it comes down to it I am in favor of Christmas.

I need to go to IKEA in search of that gingerbread dough. If they don't have it I will have to make my own, which would involve buying a metric scale because I won't be responsible for converting metric weight measurements into American volume measurements. That's probably 5th grade math, but I just don't feel like it. Not where there is baking involved, and the stability of a gingerbread house is at stake. The Fahrenheits of the oven are bad enough.

I also need to draw a plan for the house and test out the construction. And see if I can find a cheapo version of the silicon mats Martha Stewart uses to line her cookie sheets. Gingerbread house construction requires that you roll out the dough onto something that can go in the oven. If you try to lift and transfer the pieces they will become stretched out and will not fit when it's time for assembly.

2 comments:

JaCal said...

Didn't see dough at IKEA last week... but did see unassembled gingerbread houses...

After my first Christmas here I got a set of metric "mått" next time I was in Sweden (you know, the krm,msk, tsk, dl...). Hepp - no converting and strange cookies!

And my engineer husband calculated a conversion guide between Celsius-Fahrenheit that sits on the refrigerator since 5th grade math was way too long ago...

And yes - now Christmas can begin!

Lotta K said...

I have the Swedish mattsats too, but my brain just froze when I read the gingerbread recipe calling for 1.3 kg (or whatever it was) flour.

The gingerbread kit sounds like a great compromise. I'll go look tomorrow!

I found the fancy adventskalendrar with little chocolates behind each door at Cost plus, by the way.