Gingerbread Star Destroyer!

So, as I mentioned, there was a Star Wars Christmas Special viewing party last night, which was a blast. The SWCS was great, in that "it's horrible but I can't take my eyes off it!" kind of way. As promised, Mark Hamill looked like a drag queen (too much mascara, Luke!), Harrison Ford looked embarrassed and Carrie Fisher seemed high -- how else could they have convinced her to sing that "Life Day" song over the Star Wars theme at the end? Throw in some ridiculous scenes with Harvey Korman, Bea Arthur and Art Carney, plus a 15 minute stretch in which nothing but Wookie was spoken, and you've got yourself a train wreck!

The other event at the party was an Inappropriate Ornament contest. Basically, we were to come up with the weirdest, most offensive or otherwise inappropriate Christmas ornaments possible, with the promise of a "big prize," which turned out to be a large Santa Claus lawn sculpture. Extra points went to those who combined the Christmas and Star Wars themes.

My entry into the contest was a gingerbread star destroyer -- the arrowhead-shaped imperial ship that makes appearances throughout the original three Star Wars films. I went online and found some reference images for the design, including a series of CAD drawings of the ship, and made some basic templates based on them.

Making the gingerbread was harder than expected. Because the kitchen was so warm from the oven, the dough got too warm to lift off the counter after it was rolled out and cut. I ended up rolling it out directly on the baking sheets and just doing more batches than originally planned.

After letting the gingerbread dry for a day, I began assembling the star destroyer. The diamond-shaped construction made it a bit difficult -- it was hard to glue to a ~30 degree angle using only frosting -- but eventually it took shape.

Here's the final product. Yes, the bridge (the horizontal bit up at the top) is a bit out of scale, but I'm happy with it.

A little detail in the back -- red hots formed the glow of the engines.

Here I am, modeling the Star Destroyer at the party. The "big prize" Santa is in the background.

I didn't win the contest -- Louisa's pipecleaner Santa with an enormous pink penis, titled "What do you want for Christmas, little girl?" won -- but I was awarded the "dedication award," just beating out Phineas's manger scene with Han and Leia as Joseph and Mary and R2D2 as the baby Jesus.

We all partook of the destroyer at the end of the party. The verdict: The Dark Side never tasted so good!

Posted by Andrew Huff at December 19, 2003 12:43 AM