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Raising money for charity? Might as well have fun doing it, says Montessori Community School. No door-to-door sales, no raking leaves or other elbow-grease-producing activities.
Instead, a handful of students spent a morning last week dipping their hands into bowls brimming with gumdrops, cinnamon bears and jellybeans. They attached these candies to a gingerbread house, which was donated by Grand America Hotel and built by its pastry chefs.
The finished product was later auctioned to raise money for the Salt Lake City school's tuition assistance fund.
"Now that's an awesome gingerbread house," said fifth-grader Nicolas Brown when he first saw the intricate gingerbread house, complete with realistic-looking glass windows, stone porch, carved wood door and cookie shingles -- all edible. Santa Claus appears to be headed down the chimney, his hat and toy bag visible. "I like how it's perfectly made. It's almost like a real house ... or a dollhouse ," said fifth-grader Elise Vandamme .
It didn't take long for students to add their own flavor to the house. Wearing white chef hats and aprons, some students focused on the structure itself, affixing gumdrops and jellybeans to the roof and outer walls, using royal icing, which dries smooth and hard, as glue.
Others busied themselves with the yard, building a cinnamon-bear fence around the perimeter. A few squirted icing, indiscriminately, all over the roof.
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Grand America Hotel donated the delicious domicile to kick-start the opening of its Gingerbread Village, which will be unveiled Nov. 27 at the hotel and will be seen through Dec. 20.
"We thought it would be nice to do something for the community," said Grand America Hotel executive pastry chef Fernanda Dutra. "It's a nice cause. It's Christmas."
The area's top chefs built gingerbread houses, which will be on display and auctioned off to raise money for the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation.
"It's just fun," said Grand America Hotel assistant pastry chef Chris Fitch, watching students decorate his once pristine creation. "It brings back childhood memories. ... It looks great. I almost want to get in there and do it too. They're so creative."
At Montessori Community School, the kitchen is a familiar place for students, says the school's co-director Lisa Carling. Students learn how to cook meals, including gourmet soups, there.
It supports the school's philosophy, which emphasizes "very concrete learning, very hands-on learning," Carling says.
This time, spending time in the kitchen, though, was just for fun. Unless you count the lessons in landscaping and interior design.
