Gingerbread Christmas Tree

Total Time: 55 mins Preparation Time: 30 mins Cook Time: 25 mins

Ingredients

• 500 g plain flour
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 3 teaspoons ground ginger
• 1/2 teaspoon cardamom
• 1 pinch salt
• 150 g unsalted butter, softened
• 175 g dark brown sugar
• 150 g honey
• 1 egg
• 1 egg
• 240 g icing sugar, sifted, plus extra, for dusting
• silver cachous, to decorate

Recipe

• 1 preheat the oven to 180 deg celsius.
• 2 sift flour, baking powder and soda, spices and a pinch of salt into a bowl.
• 3 using an electric mixer, beat butter and brown sugar until fluffy. add honey and egg. beat until combined.
• 4 on low speed, beat in sifted dry ingredients until mixture comes together.
• 5 divide the dough in half. wrap separately in plastic. refrigerate for 30 minutes.
• 6 trace 19 cm, 15 cm, 10 cm, 7.5 cm and 4.5 cm stars on to cardboard and cut out. for the 2 smaller sizes cutters may able to used.
• 7 roll out dough halves until 4 mm thick. using star templates and 7.5 cm cutter, cut out 3 stars of each size from dough. using the 4.5 cm star, cut out as many stars as possible from the remaining dough.
• 8 place same sized stars together, 3 cm apart, on baking paper-lined oven trays. bake larger stars for 8-10 minutes; smaller stars for 5-7 minutes or until deep golden. stand biscuits for 5 minutes. transfer to wire racks to cool.
• 9 place eggwhite in a bowl. stir in icing sugar, 2 tablespoons at a time, until combined.
• 10 stack the largest stars at offset angles, placing 2-3, 4.5 cm stars in between. glue each layer with icing.
• 11 continue stacking in decreasing size until all 7.5 cm stars are used. finish with one 4.5 cm star flat and a second one upright. use icing as 'glue' to decorate tree with cachous.
• 12 tie up remaining small stars to look like gifts. leave tree to set for one hour. serve dusted with icing sugar.