Visitors to Huddleston Elementary School will be drawn to the third grade hall today by the spicy aroma of fresh baked gingerbread set out in slabs on each student's desk.

For the 15th consecutive year, the third graders will build gingerbread houses from the dense brown sweet bread baked by the City Cafe in Fayetteville. Jorge Schatte, owner of the gourmet bakery and restaurant, has prepared gingerbread for the school children since the holiday tradition began.

Before the restaurant was built, Schatte participated as owner of Tendix Bakery in Riverdale.

The night before the children construct their four-sided structures, parents volunteer to make pounds of white icing, which serves as the “glue” to keep the houses intact. The gooey icing also holds the gumdrops, miniature candy canes, cinnamon hearts, marshmallows and tons of assorted sweets in place on and around the fairy tale cottages.

The finished products are carefully transported home to serve as table centerpieces and treasured decorations for holiday homes.

The children love this special project and remember the experience for years after. David Ellis, a 1995 alumna of the third grade recalls, “It was great. You should have seen all the candy we had to work with. I used a lot of marshmallows on my house, along with cinnamon hearts on the roof. My mom kept it until March. By then it was really stale, so we set it out in our backyard for the birds to eat.”

Back to Dining Guide Home Page | Back to the top of the page