St. Nicholas Baking: Gingerbread, Treat Bags & Baking with Kids

St. Nicholas Day calls for baked goods that keep for a few days in a treat bag and can be decorated: gingerbread biscuits, linzer biscuits, firm shortbread-type biscuits, and shaped yeasted buns. Save pieces that crumble or get crushed easily in a bag, like vanilla crescent cookies or cream-filled biscuits, for the Christmas box instead.

• Gingerbread is the staple. It holds its shape, decorates well, and keeps for a month. If you don't want to wait for it to soften, bake soft honey gingerbread that stays soft or extra-soft gingerbread biscuits.

• Linzer biscuits cut into stars and hearts. On their own, a single round is firm and keeps well in the bag — only sandwich them with jam right before packing for St. Nicholas Day. Find the method in the recipe for crumbly linzer biscuits.

• Cocoa "devil" biscuits: just a plain butter biscuit dough with cocoa added. The dark dough with red icing horns looks like a devil, and kids love them.

• Shaped yeasted buns for the morning of 6 December: a soft, sweet bear or little figure, like the yeasted St. Nicholas bear bun.

With gingerbread, both softness and final appearance depend on temperature and baking time. Check out what temperature to bake gingerbread at depending on thickness.

Bake classic honey gingerbread 7–14 days before the big day, so between 21 and 28 November. If you're baking it dark brown, start as early as mid-November. Fresh out of the oven it's usually hard, and it softens gradually as it draws in moisture from its surroundings. Darker-baked gingerbread takes longer to soften — sometimes several weeks.

• If you have time: bake a classic honey dough towards the end of November and let the biscuits rest in a sealed container. For tips on storing them so they soften faster, see how to store gingerbread so it softens.

• If you're short on time: choose a recipe for gingerbread that's soft right away. Then baking just 2–3 days ahead is enough.

• Decorating? Icing needs 12–24 hours to dry fully. Decorate by 3 December at the latest, so you're not packing still-sticky gingerbread.

St. Nicholas gingerbread is often the first batch of the whole Christmas baking season. For how to follow it up with the rest of your biscuits, see the calendar for when to bake each type of Christmas biscuit.

For St. Nicholas gingerbread, all you need is white royal icing and two colours: red for St. Nicholas's robe and the devil's horns, black for the devil. Always mix both colours from gel food colouring, never liquid. Liquid colouring thins the icing, which then spreads and takes longer to dry.

• Red is the trickiest. A small amount of colouring tends to give you pink. Add gel colouring to the icing a toothpick-tip at a time and let it sit for an hour or two — the colour will deepen on its own. For a rich, true red, reach for a concentrated gel colour, such as ProGel ruby gel colouring.

• Go easy on the black. First darken the icing with a teaspoon of cocoa, then add black gel colouring. You'll need much less of it, and the icing won't turn bitter.

• Leave the white white. Make the beard, angel wings and the trim of St. Nicholas's hat from undyed icing. To make it stand out against the dark gingerbread, thicken it with a little extra icing sugar.

You'll find gel colours in every shade in the colours and dyes for decorating gingerbread category. If you want to dig deeper into icing itself (ratios, consistency, which to use when), read the guide to the different types of icing for biscuits. Don't throw away any leftover icing — see how to store royal icing and how long it keeps.

A classic St. Nicholas treat includes a gingerbread biscuit, a few pieces of other biscuits, an apple or tangerine, nuts, and a small sweet. To keep everything in good shape, pack each moist item separately.

1. Let everything cool and dry completely first. Warm baked goods sealed in a bag will steam, go soft, and smear the icing.

2. Don't put fruit in the same sealed bag as biscuits. Apples and tangerines release moisture, and crumbly linzer biscuits would turn soft by morning. Put the fruit loose in the stocking or a little basket, and keep biscuits in their own bag.

3. Pack soft gingerbread separately from crisp biscuits. Moisture travels from the softer item to the drier one: the gingerbread dries out while the crisp biscuits turn soft.

4. Pack decorated gingerbread biscuits individually in bags, or layer baking paper between them. Dried icing won't smudge, but it will crack if the biscuits rub against each other.

5. Put the treat bag together 1–2 days ahead, not a week in advance. The gingerbread will keep, but fruit and nuts lose quality sitting out in the warmth.

For general rules on storing baked goods so they stay crisp, see the article on how to store Christmas biscuits.

Split St. Nicholas baking with kids across two days: dough and cutting out shapes on day one, decorating on day two. Young children won't last a whole afternoon in one go, and you won't be rushing to decorate while the dough is still workable.

• Make the dough yourself, a day ahead if you like. Chilled dough rolls out more easily and sticks less. Let kids join in once it's time to cut shapes.

• Roll it out a bit thicker, 5–6 mm. Thicker gingerbread breaks less easily when you move it and holds up better to kids' decorating. For more tips, see how to cut out biscuits so they keep their shape.

• Split the tasks by age:

• Ages 3–5: cutting out large shapes, sprinkling sugar decorations, and brushing with egg wash.

• Ages 6–9: piping icing with a small-tipped bag and simple designs (devil horns, St. Nicholas's beard).

• Ages 10+: decorating independently, mixing colours, and keeping an eye on baking time.

• Add sprinkles while the icing is still wet. They won't stick once it's dry. Keep sprinkles ready in little bowls right next to the gingerbread.

• Leave the oven to the adults. The tray gets hotter than 150°C (300°F), and burns from a hot tray happen fast and hurt — so only an adult should handle the tray or the oven.

• It's fine if the gingerbread isn't perfect. A kid will happily eat the wonky devil they decorated themselves over the prettiest one you made.

You bake St. Nicholas gingerbread towards the end of November, roughly 1–2 weeks before the main Christmas baking push, so it doubles as a test run for your dough, your oven's actual temperature, and your icing consistency. Anything that doesn't quite work, you can fix for the Christmas batch. If you make a bigger batch of dough, freeze the rest right away.

• For how long different biscuits keep, see the guide to biscuit shelf life by type.

• For how to freeze both dough and finished biscuits, and how to thaw them without going soft, see how to freeze biscuits and dough.

• For when linzer biscuits taste best and why resting improves them, see how long linzer biscuits keep.