This pop tart gingerbread house is so fun to decorate and perfect for the holidays! Once you make a gingerbread house out of pop tarts you'll never go back to graham crackers again. I'll share tips and tricks for decorating your gingerbread house with candy and royal icing.
You will be making cuts on 4 out of 6 of the pop tarts. The 2 that aren't cut are the roof pieces. You can set those 2 pop tarts to the side if you'd like.
Front and Back Walls
Take 1 pop tart and place it on its side, right next to another pop tart.
Cut on a diagonal from the corner of the pop tart that it on its side, to the center of the middle pop tart. Repeat on the other side.
You should now have a pop tart that looks like a house. Repeat this step so that you have 2 house-shaped pop tarts.
Side Walls
Remember that pop tart that you turned on its side? Go ahead and stand it up again. Place it next to one of the house-shaped pop tarts, lining up the corners, and cut horizontally across. Repeat.
You should now have two roof pieces (un-cut), 2 house-shaped pieces, and 2 wall pieces.
Combine powdered sugar and water to make a royal icing glue. Add water ½ teaspoon at a time until desired consistency is achieved (2 ½ teaspoons works well for me). Spoon icing into a Ziploc bag and cut the tip off. Glue the 4 walls together with icing and hold in place for a minute or so.
Add the roof pieces and hold in place for a minute or so.
Let houses stand AT LEAST 30 minutes before decorating. If making these with kids, assemble the houses the day before you want to decorate them to allow the pop tarts to harden a bit.
Dip decorations into icing or pipe icing onto houses to decorate.
Video
Notes
Icing should be the consistency of craft glue.
When cutting pop tarts, use a serrated knife and gently saw. Don't press down hard with the knife.
To add heavier candies to the houses, like M&Ms, add a line of icing to the house and let the icing stand for a couple of minutes before placing the candy on it. This will allow the icing to dry a little and become tacky.
You may need to hold the candy in place, or readjust the candy that starts to move as you wait for the icing to dry.