Gingerbread house-gingerbread cookies

Gingerbread cookies are traditional treat in Holiday season, especially at Christmas.
One of my dear childhood memories is linked to these fairy tale treats.
As little kids, my brother and I, we were waiting impatiently for our parents to come home from some artisan fair and bring us gingerbread cookies.

If in some part of the world they are not known, I'll tell you what they are:
Gingerbread cookies are cute, colorful pastry made with honey and spices, covered with a variety of candies and icing.

They have all kind of shapes; the most well known is the gingerbread man and the gingerbread house but there all kind of seasonal themes like Christmas trees , hearts, bunnies, edible gingerbread necklaces, Santa boots.

Here by us, they can be bought at artisan fairs on special occasions.
When homemade, it is a great joy for kids to cut out the figures. Though I don't like them homemade; because of my childhood memories, they must be a market gifts.

GINGERBREAD HOUSE

Baking the sweetly decorated houses covered with a variety of candies and icing, are popular Christmas decorations and a

very old tradition.
It is believed gingerbread was first baked in Europe at the end of the 11th century, when returning crusaders brought the bread and the spicy root back from the Middle East.
Ginger had properties that helped preserve the bread, it wasn't merely flavorful.
According to some researchers, the first gingerbread houses may have appeared as a result of the popular Grimm's fairy tales.

According to other food historians, in the Hansel and Gretel fairy tale, the brothers Grimm were writing about something that already existed.
In our modern wold there are amazing Gingerbread house building competitions taking place. For those of you who live in Asheville (NC) or nearby, there is an amazing display of gingerbread houses at Grove Park Inn Resort and Spa in Asheville on November 18, 2009-January 3, 2010 on Mondays-Thursdays.