MARANA, Ariz. — Like something out of “Hansel and Gretel,” a larger-than-life gingerbread house made with hundreds of pounds of sugar and spice has been luring in guests at one southern Arizona resort.
Much like the fairy tale, they are free to enter and sit down by a roaring fire. But there is no wicked witch.
Instead, there’s a server with a three-course menu.
A team of pastry chefs at the Ritz-Carlton, Dove Mountain in Marana decided this Christmas to go make a gingerbread building that was more than a display. The 19-foot-tall “house” has been operating for the past month as a private dining room and has become valuable real estate in terms of the attention.
There’s no cost to walk through. But for $150, you can reserve the whole thing. Up to six people can sit down and order meals and beverages from the hotel kitchen. The fireside fee does not include food.
The idea of a life-size gingerbread house where people could go in and out drew skepticism, even from some hotel workers. But head pastry chef Daniel Mangione was confident it could be done.
“There’s a lot of gingerbread houses out there, but usually it’s just a facade and the inside is forgotten about,” Mangione said. “But this year we really wanted to see if we could make it different.”
Up since Thanksgiving, the house will be coming down after Sunday. But Mangione assured that they will resurrect it in some form next Christmas.
Pastry chefs first prepped for construction back in June by making batches of gingerbread daily. They baked them with a reddish hue and cut them into “bricks.”
It took about four days to tile the exterior. More than 4,000 ginger bricks made of real gingerbread cover the outside walls and the roof. Gumdrops and peppermints adorn each tile, and the windows are framed with candy-cane trim.
