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Feature article
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Exhibit showcases confectionary marvels
By Fred Sauceman
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| Emily Spafford’s scene from “The Wizard of Oz.” |
In 2004 we began one of those traditions that has come to define our Christmas season.
Last week we made our now annual visit to the Grove Park Inn Resort and Spa in Asheville, North Carolina, for the National Gingerbread House Competition and Display.
This year’s competition set a record for the number of entries, with 400, topping the 2004 total of 325.
Even the most cynical of faces melt into smiles in the presence of these all-edible marvels, many from cities and towns in Western North Carolina but also brought in from Michigan, Louisiana, Connecticut, Illinois and other points across the U.S.
Maggie Faulkner’s gingerbread barn advertises Tootsie Rolls.
Thom Peterson’s gilded creation recalls the second act of “The Nutcracker,” performed at the Orpheum Theatre in Omaha, Nebraska.
Jacqueline Pederson’s orange “Loch Ness Monster” swims in a lake of blue and white royal icing.
Laurie Grissom has recreated the Bellamy Mansion from her Wilmington, North Carolina, home, with a postcard of the antebellum house alongside for comparison.
To Oliva Van Praag of Asheville, Santa’s sugary dream is to beat Tiger Woods on the golf course by one stroke.
Julia Navin of St. Charles, Illinois, took first place in the Youth Under 12 category this year for building a miniature version of the competition itself.
Five tiny tables support thimble-sized gingerbread structures and scenes, including a gingerbread man tucked into bed and covered with a sky blue blanket. Judges circulate among the tables, one indecisively scratching his head.
The winner awaits a trophy made of candy cane curves.
Emily Spafford of Greenback, Tennessee, apparently a hotbed of gingerbread house production, turned hard candy lozenges into the Yellow Brick Road in the Land of Oz. Dorothy and Toto stand before their house, which has just taken a hit from the tornado, an upside down candy cane Christmas tree.
Donna Rorabaugh’s entry celebrates the skyline of Detroit.
Suzanne Smith of Mulberry, Florida, took first place in the Adult category by capturing the amazement of Orville and Wilbur Wright as they see Santa Claus land his sleigh at Kitty Hawk.
This year’s grand prize winner, Patricia Howard of Winter Springs, Florida, had never made a gingerbread house before entering the Asheville competition.
That’s like winning the Masters the first time you pick up a driver.
Patricia’s entry, “A Woodland Winter,” is a three-story octagon with tortilla shingles and gingerbread planks stained to simulate wood grain.
Last I heard, her house, and several other entries, are scheduled to be featured on ABC’s “Good Morning America” on December 22.
It’s the ninth time the competition will have been covered on the program.
Community viewing of the display takes place Mondays through Thursdays at the Grove Park until Jan. 6, 2007.
Overnight guests, diners, and lounge customers, says the resort’s Web site, can view the exhibit any time.
Be sure to pick up a map, though. The entries were once housed only in the Vanderbilt Wing. Now they’re scattered throughout the building.
And some 40 of them are on display downtown at the Grove Arcade.
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This column will take a hiatus until Jan. 11.
Meanwhile, I’ll be filling the reporter’s notebook with new material for 2007 — fried bologna breakfasts at Sit-‘N’-Bull in Gray, the sumptuous Super Sopapilla at Kingsport’s Molcajetes Mexican Grill, cabbage rolls at Creekside and some ruminations on Dr. Enuf.
I wish all of you a Merry Christmas and a 2007 filled with joy around the table.
--------GoTriCities--------
Food writer Fred Sauceman, author of the book “The Place Setting: Timeless Tastes of the Mountain South — from Bright Hope to Frog Level,” is senior writer and executive assistant to the president for public affairs at East Tennessee State University. E-mail him at sauceman@etsu.edu.
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