Nov 14, 2010: Paging Hansel and Gretel

[xoxoxoBruce]

Yo Hansel! Hey Gretel! Your gingerbread house is ready... almost.

The Great Wolf Lodge in Niagara Falls, Canada, is preparing its third annual giant gingerbread house, complete with more than 600 pounds of gingerbread, 1,000 pounds of icing, 2,000 chocolate wafers, 750 cookies and 4,900 pretzels.
Construction of its two-story-high wooden frame began Monday, and today a culinary team will begin applying confections to the life-size candy cottage. Three full-time bakers, an executive chef and one sous chef will be dedicated to the project for the next two weeks.

"People stop in their tracks, the kids' eyes open up, and they just stand awestruck at this thing," Simmonds told AOL News. "And then when they figure out that it actually is made of candy, we see them secretly and discreetly trying to sneak away and get a piece of icing sugar that's hanging off to eat or grab a piece of licorice that's on a door. And that would be kids of all ages."
He said it happens about every five minutes.
"We do a lot of repairs on the fly and overnight. We try to keep people off as much as we can, but it's part of the fun. I mean, it is a totally edible structure."

They charge an extra $20, which goes to charity, to eat dinner inside the house. Then after New Years they tear it down.

"With the amount of hands and such that have been around it, it goes into the composting," Simmonds said. "We save the structure, then have to compost the consumables."

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