1. Add the butter and brown sugar to a large bowl and mix until light and fluffy. Add the sugar beet syrup and mix until well combined. Combine flour, gingerbread spice, ground cinnamon, and salt, and add it to the bowl. Mix with a rubber spatula or wooden spoon until the dough starts coming together, then knead briefly on a floured surface. Prepare the second batch the same way. Wrap the two both batches in plastic wrap and place them in the fridge for at least 1 hour. The dough can be refrigerated for up to two days if you don’t want to start right away.

2. Preheat the oven to 180°C (350°F). Place a large piece of parchment paper on your work surface and dust it with some flour. Roll out a portion of the dough on the paper to a thickness about 0.5cm. Place the templates for the components on top and cut them out with a sharp knife. The cut-out pieces shouldn’t be too close together, as the dough will spread slightly. Once the dough pieces are cut, you should move them only with the help of the baking parchment and not drag or lift them otherwise to prevent them from deforming. Once several pieces have been cut out and placed on the baking sheet, they can be baked for about 20-23 minutes in the preheated oven. The gingerbread should look golden brown, but not too dry or even burnt. Remove the gingerbread from the oven, pull the pieces (using the baking parchment again) onto a wire rack and let them cool down completely. Thinner pieces, such as the skylight and the gate, should be baked for a shorter time, as they are prone to burning. The thinner pieces need only about 12-15 minutes. For the window on the back, you’ll need two more rings, which you can cut out with round cookie cutters – a template for those aren’t included. We also shaped and baked a tree for the inside using leftover dough.

3. For the icing, mix the confectioners’ sugar and cream of tartar in a large bowl. Add the egg whites and lemon juice and mix until smooth. The icing for the house construction should be relatively thick, with a consistency similar to buttercream. For the decoration, you might need a slightly softer/thinner consistency – you can easily adjust this with a little more lemon juice (or water).

4. The icing for assembling the book nook should be colored brown so it doesn’t stand out too much from the gingerbread. You’re free to choose colors for the rest of the decoration – for the exterior walls (brickwork), we used gray icing as well as some brown and green icing for the vines. We decorated the cookie house inside the book nook with slightly softer icing and added shadows or accents with edible markers. The same applies to the glass window on the back – you can use markers here, or dilute the gel food coloring with a little water and use a paint brush. To give the whole construction a slightly weathered look, you can also age the icing and gingerbread with some dark food coloring. However, you shouldn’t use too much here – neither icing nor gingerbread tolerate too much moisture.

5. We recommend decorating the individual components with icing first – once everything is assembled, many of the parts inside the book nook will be inaccessible. For the skylights, cut gelatin sheets and then glue them to the gingerbread frames with a little icing or edible glue.

6. Once all the components and decorations are ready, you can start assembling. To do this, place the baseplate on a flat surface – preferably a board, which you will later use as a base/stand. Attach one side wall and the back wall to the baseplate with icing and secure them – e.g., with glasses or other objects that will press slightly against the components and hold them in place. Once everything has dried a little, you can place and secure the interior and the front, then add the second side wall and thus enclose the interior. Finally, the skylights go on top and then the gate at the front, and you’re done. ;)