Gingerbread People

The Saturday Museum | Digital Image | #flowcellular

Ingredients
50g plain flour
100g butter
5 teaspoons ground ginger
1⁄2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
1 teaspoon bicarbonate soda
175g light brown soft sugar
1 medium egg
Raisins and cranberries
Icing sugar in 4 colours (blue, yellow, red, green)

Equipment
Bowl, rolling pin, people cutter

Method
Preheat the oven to 180 ̊C. Place the flour, butter, ginger, cinnamon, raisins, cranberries and bicarbonate of soda in a bowl. Mix it together. Add the sugar and egg and mix it until it forms a pastry mix. Using the rolling pin, roll out the pastry to about 5mm thick. Dust the surface with flour. Use the people cutters to cut out a crowd. Place the cut-out pastry on a non-stick baking tray. Bake in the preheated oven for about 15 minutes. Once cooled, cover each person in a mixture of multicoloured polka dots.

With a friend attempt to group them, decide on your classification parameters: colour, number of dots etc. Be aware that there are some dots made by the raisins that were part of the gingerbread before it was cooked.

This recipe was devised by Sarah and Lynne. Lynne added the cranberries and raisins into the dough, some hidden some visible as a metaphor to think about what is inherited and what is environmental. Whilst doing this experiment Sarah and Lynne discussed the challenges of classification, rough cut marmalade, the complexity of cancer, food as care, broth and how patients and researchers relate differently to research.