Method (cherry pie filling)

1. Place the cherries into a medium-sized saucepan and sprinkle over the sugar, cornflour / cornstarch and lemon juice.
2. Place on top onto the hob over a medium to high heat and bring to the boil. This will take around 5-8 minutes. Keep stirring with a heatproof spatula or wooden spoon to prevent the mixture from sticking and burning, being careful not to burst the cherries too much as you want some to stay whole. It will start to turn thick. Once thick, remove from the heat and allow to cool before using. As it cools, it will thicken up even more and turn jelly-like.
3. Store in a sealed container in the fridge until you’re ready to use it. As the pie filling cools, it’ll turn thick. If this happens, give it a gentle stir before using.

Method (pastry and assemble)

1. Preheat oven to 200°C fan and line 2 large baking trays with grease proof paper.
2. Unroll the pastry sheet leaving in baking paper. Use a rolling pin to slightly flatten out any wrinkles in the pastry.
3. Using a large gingerbread man cookie cutter, cut out your shapes. Roll out the scraps to cut out a few more shapes.
4. Transfer these pastry shapes to the refrigerator while you cut out the other sheet.
5. Turn the gingerbread man upside down so ‘legs become for the antlers’. This is what creates the reindeer shape. make sure they are spaced out on the tray as the pastry will puff up.
6. Fill the center of half of the shapes with a tablespoon of the cherry pie filling, leaving a small border around the edge.
7. Brush the edges with dairy-free milk and place another shape on top to sandwich in the filling.
8. Dip a fork in some flour and crimp the edges of the pastry together (watch the tutorial here). This prevents the filling from oozing out when baking.
9. Brush the top of each pastry with some dairy-free milk.
10. Place the tray one at a time in the oven and bake for 10 – 12 minutes or until the pastry is golden in colour.
11. Once fully baked, remove the tray from the oven and place the other tray in to bake and repeat.

Method (icing)

1. In a small bowl, sift in the icing sugar and add in the almond extract and milk. You want the icing to be a little thinner than tooth paste consistency. You might need to add in a splash of more milk.
2. Remove a small amount of the icing and transfer into a separate bowl. You want the majority of the icing to be left plain white. Colour the icing with a dot of brown food gel. Transfer into a piping bag and snip off the tip.
3. Transfer the white icing to a piping bag and snip off the tip. Pipe white icing over the top of the entire pastry, and press on a glaće cherry for the reindeer nose while the icing is still wet. Allow this to set for 5- 10 minutes.
4. Once set, using the brown icing, pipe on two small dots about the nose for the eyes and antlers. Allow to this dry / set for a further 5 minutes.