Yesterday, my mother and I delivered the most recent addition to holiday displays on Church Street in Burlington - a gingerbread carousel at Danforth Pewter (right next to Leunigs - buy pewter, get great food, what could be better?). This carousel is made entirely of candy, gingerbread, and frosting to show off the Danforth Christmas ornaments. The ones here are a special line featuring the hand carved wooden animals from the Shelburne Museum's Dentzel Carousel display.
The carousel took several days to make. My mother is the architect, building the pattern, baking the pieces, and assembling the final structure (that's the stressful part). I do decoration using the mountains of candy we've collected for these displays (after all, it's for looking at - the candy is allowed to be stale!). Below is a snapshot of the process.
You Start With a Pile of Candy
Then make the really detailed bits - these are the Danforth shields
And some candy gets made from scratch - this is the glass for the mirrors inside
We make structural elements from candy too (don't get attached to these pillars, they didn't work)
Patterns get made for the repeated panels
We add structural elements - these are the hooks in the roof the ornaments hang from.
Then we build it from the bottom up - each stage needs a day for the icing to dry.
And voila. . ..
Ready for display
Vermont is full of wonderful holiday craft and food traditions. DigInVT partner the Vermont Department of Tourism offers a great online guide to shopping for Vermont crafted products. The Vermont Fresh Network produces its own holiday gift guide with recommendations from its network of chefs and farmers. Many towns also offer holiday and wintertime farmers markets. And, of course, watch our Events page for special holiday events through December and into the New Year!
Helen Labun Jordan writes about food and the business for food for local and regional publications, and online at www.discoveringflavor.com
