The Gingerbread House competition is an annual event sponsored by the Association of Building Contractors for their Holiday Social.  Proceeds of the competition go to a local charity. The 1st place house was auctioned off for $300.  Other entries were raffled off with raffle tickets costing $5.00 each.

The participating culinary students were assisted on campus by Rex Thornock who offered use of and assistance with CAD equipment to design the houses, and the faculty and students in the Construction Tech Program who created the  platforms and supports for the houses.

The culinary students worked hard for several weeks and pulled some long hours the final week for assembly of the houses.  They worked with a variety of mediums including fondant, butter cream, poured sugar, and a variety of  doughs.  They learned a lot about suitability of materials for pastry construction, supporting and balancing weights,  translating design into reality, and the textures and strengths of different baking and pastry materials and compounds.  The students also learned what a complicated and time consuming project putting these houses together is!

The scariest moments were carrying and transporting these huge houses to SLC for the competition, but they made it with only one fallen tree (which was easily repaired).

First place was titled “Nightmare Before Christmas” – constructed by Cora Courtney, Christa Courtney, Cami Keith and Lyndee Lloyd.

The other house was “Victorian Christmas” – constructed by Lance Conrow, Alexis Johnson and Lori Goodman.