Benton’s Pre-Assembled Gingerbread Cookie Kit

Nearly every year, my family purchases some kind of gingerbread kit from Aldi. Whether it’s a traditional gingerbread house or something more novel like a gingerbread train, come December, you’ll find us gathered around the kitchen island trying to glue hard gingerbread walls and roof sections together with frosting.

Inevitably, we have a little trouble getting some of the pieces to stick together. Before the frosting dries, roof pieces have a tendency to slide downward. Wall joints may teeter. We find ourselves having to pipe extra frosting here and there to reinforce the gingerbread structure. We ultimately succeed, but it takes some patience and a lot of grownup help.

This year, in 2021, Aldi has introduced a new gingerbread house kit to its holiday lineup. The new kit features a house that is already assembled, so all you have to do is decorate it. Easy peasy.

Benton’s Pre-Assembled & Ready to Decorate Gingerbread Cookie Kit cost $9.99 at the time of publication. It includes an assembled on house a printed piece of cardboard. This is a product of China and Cambodia.

It includes:

• The pre-assembled house
• Ready-to-use white icing
• Multi-colored candy decorations (some look like holly leaves and berries, and others are multi-colored Christmas lights)
• Peppermint candy
• Gum drops
• An icing pen

If you’re looking out for allergens, this contains wheat.

Benton’s Pre-Assembled Gingerbread Cookie Kit nutrition information and ingredients. (Click to enlarge.)

The gingerbread pieces are typically too hard to truly enjoy eating, although my family does nibble on some of the candy pieces. In case you were curious, though, this house contains thirty-two 30-gram servings, with a serving netting you 130 calories, 3.5 grams of total fat (4% DV), 3.5 grams of saturated fat (17% DV), 35 mg of sodium (1% DV), 24 grams of total carbohydrates (9% DV), and 12 grams of added sugars (25% DV).

To prepare to decorate:

1. Carefully remove the pre-built house from the box and plastic wrap. Empty candies into small bowls.
2. Knead the icing pouch for one minute to achieve a soft, smooth consistency. Remove the cap. To start the flow of icing, cut a small tip. Hint: start with a small tip for fine details and cut it larger, if necessary. Cut a tip off the icing pen.

To decorate, use the icing pouch and icing pen to decorate the house with festive swirls and snowy details. Apply candies, using dabs of icing to adhere them. The embossed designs on the cookie pieces can at as creative guides. Refer to the box for inspiration.

Hint: leftover icing can be piped onto the cardboard piece the house sits on to create snowy sidewalks and drifts against the house. Peppermint wheels look great on rooftops as well as along a walkway. Allow the gingerbread house to dry completely for at least 30 minutes before carefully moving, if necessary.

The decorated gingerbread house.

This house is sturdy and looks nicer than any gingerbread house I’ve stuck together — messily — with icing. It was also fun and easy to decorate. I turned it over entirely to my kids who are in middle school and elementary school. They needed no adult help, which meant my husband and I could relax quietly around the Christmas tree, which was perfect.

There was plenty of icing and more than enough candy pieces to decorate the house. The kids especially liked the candy pieces that look like holiday lights. We also had a lot of hard candy pieces left over.

I like how this gingerbread house has a nicer-looking cardboard stand with images of snow and greenery printed on it. In the past, gingerbread houses I’ve purchased from Aldi are built on white plastic trays that don’t look as pretty.

Overall, this kit is a big win, and I’m not sure I’ll easily go back to non-pre-assembled houses after this. We’ve been spoiled.

The Verdict:

Benton’s Pre-Assembled Gingerbread Cookie Kit costs only a few dollars more than a non-assembled gingerbread house kit, and unless you enjoy painstakingly gluing cookie pieces together with icing and watching them fall apart, the small extra cost is worth it. The kit has plenty of icing and candy for decorating, and this is one of the cutest gingerbread houses we’ve made in recent years. Recommended.