How to Decorate a Gingerbread Man

Directions

• 1

  Bake and cool cookies before decorating. You can use Ann Clark's delicious Classic Gingerbread Recipe here, or use Ann's Chewy Gingerbread Cookie Recipe for a fresh take on a classic. Make sure cookies are fully cooled. If they are warm, the icing will run off of them. Make royal icing. Learn how to mix different consistencies of royal icing here>>
  
  Prepare the following icing colors:
  
  Piping Consistency:
  White
  Sky Blue
  Red
  
  Flood Consistency:
  White
  Sky Blue
  Red

• 2Using white detail icing, begin by piping a wavy line across the forehead of your cookie, followed by eyes and a mouth.
  
• 3Outline the sweater with red detail icing as shown.
  
• 4Fill the sweater with red flood icing as shown. You can use a toothpick or a scribe tool to coax the icing to the edges and to pop any air bubbles.
  
• 5Using blue and white flood, immediately pipe horizontal lines near the bottom of the sweater. Do this while the red flood icing is still wet.
  
• 6Working quickly, use a cookie scribe or toothpick to pull vertical lines through the wet stripes, first up, then down, reversing each time to create the pattern shown.
  
• 7Repeat this process on the sleeves--pipe blue and white lines along the hems, then pull lines through the stripes to achieve a herringbone pattern.
  
• 8While the red flood is still wet, carefully add the snowflake sprinkles across the chest. Alternatively, you can wait until the icing is dry and pipe blue dots on the chest using blue detail consistency icing.
  
• 9Using blue detail icing and a tight zigzag motion, pipe a border around the bottom, neck and sleeves.
  
• 10

  Finish by piping wavy lines with white detail icing on the legs.
  

  
• 11

  This sweet sweater design adds some nice visual interest to a traditional gingerbread man shape.