Historic Newton Throwback: Legendary Holiday Houses

For sale: New construction. Includes generously spiced walls, a cookie roof appointed with green gumdrops, and a level front yard landscaped with meticulously swirled frosting and a candy cane fence.

Gingerbread houses like this one heat up the real estate market each December, but where did this tradition come from? Part of the answer goes back to medieval Europe, when crisp cookies made with ginger became a popular treat served at fairs. The cookies were cut into fun shapes, including flowers, animals, and letters of the alphabet. Eventually, gingerbread became a term for something fancy, including the elaborate hand-carved wooden decorations you might see on 19th century homes around Newton.

In America, gingerbread was more of an everyday recipe until the late 19th century, when immigrants from around Europe brought their Christmas traditions with them. Germans created houses made of spice cookies to represent the witch’s house in the “Hansel and Gretel” story, which the Grimm Brothers wrote down in the early 19th century. People sometimes gave these “houses for nibbling at” as holiday gifts, and the connection was made. The Dutch molded gingerbread dough into the shape of St. Nicholas, otherwise known as Santa Claus. The Dromedary Cake Mix Company in the 1930s got into the spirit of making gingerbread easier for people by creating a mix based on the recipe from George Washington’s mother, Mary Ball Washington.

Now you can find gingerbread houses around Newton, from hotels and restaurants to private homes. Newton resident John Morganti and his family have been making houses together for many years; the pictures that he shared show their handiwork. One of their houses will be on display Sunday at 5:30 p.m. at our Candlelight Tour of Durant-Kenrick House – there’s still time to register. Nibbling the house will take place after Christmas.