Even though it is not best known for it's food, I can't seem to visit Ikea without coming out with bags of produce from their Swedish food section. Anything that makes the festive season a bit easier always catches my eye and I immediately saw lots of potential for this block of gingerbread dough, or Pepparkaka Deg.
The dough was extremely simple to use. Even though it seemed like a hard solid block it can still be used straight from the fridge. There were no problems at all in rolling the dough out, it was very smooth and easy to work with. Purely in the interests of this review I had a sneaky taste of the unbaked dough. If you are one of those people that likes to eat raw cookie dough, I can tell you that this one tasted pretty good!
Instead of the usual gingerbread men, we cut out Christmas tree and Snowmen shapes... and of course one or two pac-man and ghost shapes!
I can't take any credit for the Snowmen, my hubby is much more artistic than me and he helped the kids create some super cute Snowmen using white icing and a few mini smarties. For decorating the trees we made some green icing and then used Dr. Oetker Soft Gold Pearls and Dr. Oetker Sugar Stars to finish. I also had a little bag of yellow and green star shaped sweets that were ideal as the tree toppers.
The finished biscuits tasted absolutely delicious. They have a lovely sweet ginger flavour, with added cinnamon and clove undertones. Kids will love these as there is no heat from the ginger. The biscuits also had a soft chewy consistency, pure bliss compared to shop bought biscuits, which are often rock hard. Overall I was very impressed by this gingerbread dough; it was easy to work with, baked perfectly, tasted good, and most importantly, was lots of Christmas Eve fun for the kids!
The only question is; which one should we leave out for Santa tonight?
Grocery Gems Verdict: Ikea Pepparkaka Deg
RATING: 10 out of 10.
Buy them again?: Ja!
Nutrition: None given.
Purchased: Ikea.
Price: £1.85 for a 550g block.
And to everyone who reads this blog, I would like to wish you all: A Very Merry Christmas!
