This week marks the kick off of the Gingerbread Contest, an annual Purdue Dining & Catering event featuring Dining & Catering employees working with students to build their gingerbread houses. Houses in the past have been massive, creative and very detailed. The gingerbread houses are displayed in the dining courts of their origin to help make the holiday mood more celebratory! Themes in the past have included Around the World, Santa’s Workshop, and Tunes of Christmas; this year, the theme is Toy Land, which will inevitably turn up some great culinary works of art. The contest officially kicked off on Nov. 7, the first day to start building. Dining courts will work until their houses are finished and then display them in the dining courts until they will joined the giant Christmas tree in the Union for voting and judging on Dec. 6.
The dining courts are provided with up to ten sheet pans of gingerbread and $250 for decorations. Everything must be edible beyond the initial structure and any electrical component the team might choose to add. All entries must have a name to capture the overall feeling of the work. In the past, for example, Hillenbrand called its house “I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus, Hillenbrand Style.” Most importantly, students must be heavily involved in building the house, to give them a chance to show off their decorating skills.
After judging, the gingerbread houses will be returned to their respective dining courts for the remainder of the semester. After judging, be sure to check in with us, we’ll be following up with all the contest details!
Purdue not only celebrates Christmas, but also Hannukah, Kwanza, Chinese New Year and other events, so keep your eye out for events coming up!
See you next week!
Sarah & Amanda
Purdue Dining & Culinary 
Love this! Great write up! Would love to come see the gingerbread houses!
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Wow! Those are some gingerbread houses! Wonder who gets to eat all those LOL!! (-;
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