Gingerbread House? More Like Gingerbread Park!

With the holiday season upon us, the fun of making gingerbread houses to display (and then eat) is a popular activity for all ages during this time of year. But it's not every day you get to see a Gingerbread Park! The Gercke family, previous Durham residents, found inspiration in our very own Duke Park Playground to build a beautiful and delicious structure out of gingerbread!

Emily Gercke and her family of three lived in Durham for almost one year. They are originally from Virginia but moved to Durham following four years in Canada. While they loved their time in Durham, their job has caused them to move around on a frequent basis. Check out our exclusive interview with Emily about their Duke Park Playground Gingerbread house below...

What was your inspiration for creating the Duke Park Playground out of gingerbread?

Every year around the holidays, we pick a structure that was somehow meaningful to us during the past year and pay homage to it in gingerbread. We've made a hut on the Pacific Crest Trail, the North Shore mountains in Vancouver, and a building on our college campus, among other things. Given how much time we spent at Duke Park playground with our toddler in 2018, it was the front runner and just seemed like a fun structure to try to re-create.   

Can you describe what the different elements of the gingerbread park are made out of? 

We try to make as many of the large elements out of gingerbread. The walkways, towers, straight slides, tires, stairs, rock wall, etc, are all gingerbread and the glue is royal icing. The pillars are large pretzel rods and railings are lattice pretzels. We baked gingerbread around a circular cookie cutter for the net and tunnel. The tube slides were the most difficult- we tried a few different things but ended up baking gingerbread around aluminum foil and covering with icing. Since much of the Duke Park playground structure is red, we used Twizzlers to line the railings and slides. The rocks on the rock wall are actually navy beans and some small pieces of already-baked gingerbread. We populated it with sour patch kids and used Kit-kats for the wall around the outside. The final touch was crushed bran flakes for mulch.

How long did it take you to make the park and how big is the structure?

I'd say it took us 4 toddler-naptimes (i.e. about 8 hours?) The plywood base is about 2 feet by 2 feet and the largest tower is approximately 10 inches tall. 

What is your favorite memory of the Duke Park Playground? 

Way before we knew he had any sense of orientation, our toddler led us to the park pretty much on his own. We were playing in our yard and before I knew it he was purposefully strolling towards the park saying "playground." I'm sad he won't get to take advantage of some of the fun elements for older kids- I bet he'll love it when we come back to visit. 

Any other details you want to share? 

Making a gingerbread structure is actually not too hard, and it's a lot of fun. You just need the right recipe for structural gingerbread (use one that has a high flour to fat ratio, or one that can be used for ornaments), some careful planning and measuring, and patience waiting for the icing glue to set. Errors can mostly be fixed with a bread knife or covered with icing. For us, the fun part is always the little details. We actually do end up eating some of it after it's sat around for week or two! 

Thank you Gercke family for sharing your sweet creation with us! The time, patience and energy it took to build the Duke Park Playground out of gingerbread should be praised all around! 

We love hearing stories about how Durham residents are interacting with our recreation centers, facilities, parks and trails. Have something you want to share? Email us at DPRInfo@DurhamNC.Gov.