Gluten Free Gingerbread Cookies

These Gluten Free Gingerbread Cookies are the perfect holiday baking activity! This soft and chewy gingerbread recipe is so easy to make and super pliable to work with, perfect for making gluten free gingerbread men as they’ll hold their shape perfectly!

Whether you want to make gluten free gingerbread men (gingerbread people!) or a gluten free gingerbread house, this is the recipe you need.

This gluten free gingerbread cookies recipe is so easy to make and perfect for Christmas baking or school holiday activities.

Kids will absolutely love decorating these cute gingerbread men and you can make them into whatever shapes you like – stars, trees, pumpkins or even Easter eggs!

Whatever gingerbread cookie shapes you choose to make, this easy gluten free gingerbread cookies recipe is the perfect fit.

Why not try some other holiday baking once you’ve made these? My chocolate crinkle cookies, easy gluten free lebkuchen and gluten free mince pies are all classics!

And if you’re a big fan of ginger flavours, try my sticky gluten free ginger cake, gluten free parkin or my oaty cherry and ginger crumble bars next.

Ingredients

There’s a printable recipe card for these gluten free, soft gingerbread cookies below. But for the shopping list you will need…

• Light Brown Sugar: This is essential for getting that chewy texture and caramelised flavour in your gingerbread.
• Butter: You can subsitute this for a vegan margarine for a gluten free dairy free gingerbread recipe.
• Golden Syrup: In the US look for light treacle. If you can’t find this, molasses should also work but may result in a deeper flavour.
• Plain Gluten Free Flour: Any plain gluten free flour blend will work, I tend to use the FREEE flour. An all purpose gluten free flour will work in the US.
• Ground Ginger: You can add more or less depending how much spice you want. I like my gingerbread to be quite fiery!
• Mixed Spice: This is typically a spice blend of allspice, cinnamon, nutmeg, cloves, coriander, ginger and mace.
• Xanthan Gum: This is essential for making the gingerbread dough easy to handle. If your gluten free flour already contains this you can omit this extra from the recipe.
• Bicarbonate of Soda: Or in the US look for baking soda.
• Egg: I use one large egg, in the US you’ll need an XL egg.

You’ll also need some icing sugar (or confectioner’s sugar in the US) and sprinkles to decorate your gluten free gingerbread men.

How to make gluten free gingerbread cookies

There’s a printable recipe card below with the method. But here are some step-by-step photos to show you how easy this gluten free gingerbread is to make.

Add the light brown sugar, butter and golden syrup to a large saucepan and place on the lowest heat. Stir until melted and combined and then remove from the heat – don’t let it boil.

In a large mixing bowl, add the gluten free flour, ground ginger, mixed spice, xanthan gum and bicarbonate of soda and stir to mix together.

Pour in the melted butter/sugar/syrup mixture and stir with a wooden spoon until it starts to clump together.

Add the egg and continue to mix until it forms a sticky dough. Wrap the dough in clingfilm (plastic wrap) and chill for at least one hour.

Don’t worry about the dough being sticky at this stage. After chilling it will be a lot easier to handle and less sticky to work with.

After chilling the dough:

Line two large baking sheets with baking paper and set to one side. Place a sheet of baking paper on the worktop and dust with flour.

Pop the dough in the middle of the paper and then cover with another sheet of greaseproof paper. Roll the dough between the sheets to around 6mm thick.

Peel back the top sheet of parchment paper and using your cutter of choice, cut the shapes from the dough. Use a fish slice to transfer them carefully onto the lined baking sheets, leaving plenty of space between them.

Re-roll the dough and continue to cut out shapes until all the dough is used up. When you have all your shapes cut out on their baking trays, preheat the oven to 180’C / 160’C Fan / Gas Mark 4.

Baking the cookies:

Place the baking trays with the cookie shapes on in the fridge for 15-20 minutes until the oven has preheated – this helps to stop the gingerbread spreading in the oven.

Once the oven is hot, bake the gingerbread cookies for around 8 minutes (for small shapes around 2-3 inches or less) or 10-12 minutes for larger shapes (such as gingerbread men).

You want them to be golden brown, so you can judge the correct cooking time by checking the colour of them as they near the end of the bake.

Once baked and golden, remove the tray from the oven and cool completely on a wire rack before decorating.

How to decorate your gingerbread people

Once you’ve baked your gingerbread men (or gingerbread people) you have a few options as to how to decorate them:

To decorate with piping icing:

• Mix 100g icing sugar with 2-3 tsp water until it forms a thick paste. Use a piping bag with a very small round nozzle to pipe faces and patterns onto your gingerbread men, adding extra sweets and sprinkles as you like!

To decorate with flood icing:

• Mix 10g egg white powder, 330g icing sugar and 60ml cold water together until it forms a thick paste. You can then pipe this on to create the outlines, for example, of a scarf or jumper.
• Leave this to dry for 15-20 mins, then mix a tiny amount of water to the icing until it is a slightly runnier consistency (flood icing).
• Pour this icing into a piping bag and then fill the outline, using a cocktail stick to make sure the flood icing goes all the way up to the edges. Bake for 30 mins at 40C to set.

To decorate with a glaze:

• Mix 100g icing sugar with 5-6 tsp water until it forms a thin, runny icing. Dip the gingerbread cookies into the glaze, shake off any excess then leave to set on a wire rack. You can pipe on top of this glaze or leave the cookies as they are – see my leaf-shaped gingerbread cookies in the gallery below as an example.

Storing and Freezing:

Once baked these gingerbread cookies will last a week in an airtight container at room temperature. You can also freeze them before or after baking.

Simply freeze the gingerbread dough at step 3 (where you would usually chill it) and defrost before continuing with the recipe to bake your cookies.

The baked gingerbread cookies can also be frozen (before or after decorating) and defrosted at room temperature whenever you fancy a treat!

Ideas for more gingerbread creations:

Now you’ve made your gluten free gingerbread cookie dough, there are lots of options for what you can make with it other than people.

Here are some suggestions along with a gallery of my own (and readers’) gluten free gingerbread creations!

• Gluten Free Gingerbread House: Follow my gluten free gingerbread house recipe with downloadable templates to create a festive centrepiece everyone will love.
• Mini Gingerbread Houses: Want to make these into cute little mini houses to pop on the side of mugs? Download this mini gingerbread house template and watch my video tutorial to learn how to make them using this cookie dough!
• Gingerbread Leaves: For an easy autumnal or Thanksgiving recipe, make these gingerbread cookies into autumnal leaves and glaze with a thin icing.

You can also make them into pumpkins or bats for Halloween, or eggs and bunnies for Easter. Gingerbread is great to work with and super fun to decorate!

If you make this recipe and love it, please do let me know by tagging me on my Instagram or using #theglutenfreeblogger. You can also share your creations in my Facebook group! And please do leave a 5* review ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ to let others know you loved it too! It would mean the world to me and really helps support my website.