What’s the history of gingerbread? European, Asian cultures collide to create a holiday dessert (2024)

The sweet, syrupy, spiced confection we now turn into frosted houses and soft holiday loaves has roots dating back thousands of years.

Historians say an Armenian monk first brought gingerbread to Europe from Greece in the 10th century. The first known recipe for gingerbread came from Greece in 2400 B.C.

The flowering plant that gives the cookies and houses their signature spicy snap was first cultivated in ancient China. The ginger root was used in medical treatments and eventually arrived in Europe through the spice trade along the Silk Road.

Gingerbread didn’t become a sweet dessert until the 15th century. In the Middle Ages, gingerbread meant “preserved ginger” and was often used as a spice to disguise the taste of preserved meats.

King Henry VIII of England is said to have used a ginger concoction – most likely a ginger wine – to fend off the plague.

Now, the term gingerbread is used to describe any type of sweet that combines ginger with honey, treacle or molasses.

Hard gingerbread cookies shaped like animals, flowers and kings and queens popped up as a staple at medieval fairs. Ladies often gave their favorite knights a piece of gingerbread for good luck and several cities in England and France often held “gingerbread fairs.”

Henry VIII’s daughter, Queen Elizabeth I, is credited with the idea for decorating gingerbread cookies. By 1598, gingerbread was popular enough to get a mention in William Shakespeare’s Love’s Labour’s Lost ("An I had but one penny in the world, thou shouldst have it to buy ginger-bread...").

The Germans are credited with crafting sweet, miniature houses with the snappy spiced cookies in the 16th century. The popularity of the craft confections rose when the Brothers Grimm wrote and published the story of "Hansel and Gretel." Later, gingerbread became associated with the Christmas and winter season.

In North America, gingerbread arrived with English colonists. Americans have been baking the spiced cake and cookies since before the Revolutionary era.

George Washington’s mother gets credit for one American recipe with shapes ranging from miniature kings to eagles.

Mary Ball Washington even served her gingerbread recipe to the Marquis de Lafayette when he visited her Virginia home. George Washington’s Mount Vernon estate shows a recipe for this Lafayette Gingerbread on its website.

Before the turn of the 19th century, the first American cookbook – American Cookery – had recipes for three different types of gingerbread.

Now, gingerbread cookies, cakes and houses are a staple of the holiday season. Children decorate crunchy gingerbread men with white frosting and gumdrop buttons. Competitions are held for the world's largest, most elaborate gingerbread houses. And restaurants and retailers – including coffee giant Starbucks – debut annual their sweet takes on gingerbread cakes and cookies.

Five years ago, Texas A&M Traditions Club in Bryan, Texas, nabbed the record for the world's largest gingerbread house. The house used nearly a ton of butter, 7,200 eggs and 68 pounds of ginger. It came in at 35.8 million calories.