The History of Gingerbread
Who Started Eating Gingerbread First?
And I had but one penny in the
world, thou should'st have it
to buy gingerbread.
-- William Shakespeare,
"Love's Labor's Lost"
History of gingerbread -- Long Story Short
Volumes exist on the origins of gingerbread.
For these purposes, suffice it to say an
early form of gingerbread can be traced
to the ancient Greeks and Egyptians who
used it for ceremonial purposes.
Gingerbread made an appearance in Europe
when 11th-century crusaders brought the
spice back from the Middle East for the
rich folks' cooks to experiment with.
As ginger and other spices became more
affordable to the masses, gingerbread
caught on.
An early European recipe consisted of
ground almonds, stale breadcrumbs,
rosewater, sugar and, naturally, ginger.
The resultant paste was pressed into
wooden molds.
These carved works of art served as a
sort of story board that told the news
of the day, bearing the likeness of
new kings, emperors and queens, or
religious symbols.
The finished cookie might be decorated
with edible gold paint (for those who
could afford it) or flat white icing
to bring out the details in relief.
In the 16th century, the English replaced
the breadcrumbs with flour, and added
eggs and sweeteners, resulting in a lighter
product.
The first gingerbread man is credited to
Queen Elizabeth I, who knocked the socks
off visiting dignitaries by presenting them
with one baked in their own likeness.
Gingerbread tied with ribbon was popular at
fairs and, when exchanged, became a token
of love. On a more practical note, before
refrigeration was a twinkle in someone's
eye, aromatic crumbled gingerbread was added
to recipes to mask the odor of decaying meat.
So What Is Gingerbread Like Today?
Gingerbread is a baked sweet containing ginger
and sometimes cinnamon, cloves, nutmeg,
cardamom and anise, and sweetened with any
combination of brown sugar, molasses, light or
dark corn syrup, or honey.
Gingerbread can take the shape of thin, crisp
cookies like snaps, Polish pierniczki, Czech
pernik, Scandinavian pepparkakor and Dutch
speculaas cut into hearts or other fanciful
shapes. The Germans like a softer, puffier
version known as lebkuchen.
Gingerbread also can be a dark, spicy cake
like Polish piernik, or an American version
served, sometimes, with lemon glaze, or the
lighter French pain d'epices.
The third form gingerbread takes today is
in a house-shaped confection made with a
variation of gingerbread cookie dough.
Major European Gingerbread Centers
Gingerbread is considered an art form in
Nuremberg, Ulm and Pulsnitz in Germany,
Torun in Poland, Pest in Hungary, Pardubice
and Prague in the Czech Republic, and Lyon
in France where gingerbread baking guilds
were sanctioned by the government starting
in the Middle Ages.
Vast antique mold collections are displayed
in Torun and Ulm museums, and some are used
to make beeswax Christmas ornaments that
are in great demand.
Gingerbread Houses
The gingerbread house became popular in
Germany after the Brothers Grimm published
their fariy tale collection which included
"Hansel and Gretel" in the 19th century.
Early German settlers brought this
lebkuchenhaeusle - gingerbread house -
tradition to the Americas.
Gingerbread houses never caught on
in Britain as they did in North
America, where some extraordinary
examples can be found. But they
do exist in other parts of Europe.
In December 2001, bakers in Torun,
Poland, attempted to beat the
Guinness Book of World Records
for the largest-ever gingerbread
house. It was made in Szczecin,
Poland, with 4,000 loaves of
brick-shaped gingerbread measuring
11 1/2 feet high.
It took a week to create and used
6,000 eggs, a ton of flour, and
550 pounds of shortening.
Alas, they lost to an American team!
By Barbara Rolek
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