GIANT GINGERBREAD HOUSE

And now for something more fun.  At a local hotel here in Houston, their pastry team created this large gingerbread house...

Check out these stats!

Hilton America's Gingerbread House

Now to be fair, the underlying structure is wood, as are the porch columns, because something this large would need a support structure. The railing "pickets" and the "snow" on the roof however, are white chocolate...

Gingerbread house

...and the detailing along the edge of the roof is white chocolate as well.

Gingerbread bricks

Here is a closeup of the gingerbread "bricks".  You can see where people have broken off pieces, which in a way is good because you can see how they are glued on with frosting.  The bricks look so real. Then frosting is put in between them to make it look like real mortar.  Pretty impressive.  

This "stone" fireplace chimney is made of marzipan.  It smelled wonderful!

Chocolate shingles

And of course, hello, CHOCOLATE FREAKIN' SHINGLES!  Standing this close to it was chocolate overload.  It smelled so good.  You can also see here where people have reached over and pulled off pieces of the chocolate shingles

(I hope not to eat, ewww).  It was really neat to see though, we loved it.

We wished there had been some candy around the outside for more detailing (you know, gumdrops, candy canes, etc) but considering the size, we understand.  Even though it was roped off, you could tell that it was big enough to be able to stand up inside.

Tis the season!