BIG RIGS – Max Bennett, 2, checks out the steering on a steamroller during the 3 to 5 Preschool’s Big Rig fundraiser in front of Mt. Edgecumbe High School Saturday. Hundreds of kids and parents braved the wet weather to check out the assortment of machines, including road building trucks, a U.S. Coast Guard ANT boat, police cars and fire department rigs. Kids were able to ride as passengers on ATVs. (Sentinel Photo by James Poulson)
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Big Rig Event
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For All Ages
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Daily Sitka Sentinel
Former Sitkan Competes On Food Network Show
By GARLAND KENNEDY
Sentinel Staff Writer
Elaborately decorated sugar cookies serve as a canvas for the edible artwork of Larissa Codr, a former Sitkan who will be a contestant in a Christmas-themed cookie baking competition Dec. 4 on the nationally televised Food Network.
The daughter of Guy and Vicky German, Codr lived in Sitka until she was 16, when the family relocated to Nebraska.
As a child, Codr attended the Sitka Fine Arts Camp and the Sitka Summer Music Festival, she recalled in an interview. Her exposure to Sitka’s artistic side was a formative experience.
Larissa Codr. (Facebook Photo)
“I’ve always been a good art student, and then I attended the Fine Arts Camp. I couldn’t tell you how many summers I went – every summer that I could,” she said over the phone from Omaha. “So from an early age I was exposed to that culture, if you will, and I attended the Sitka Summer Music Festival religiously. I just have always been into art and excelled at art. But your path sometimes doesn’t take you where you think it’s going to take you, and then you re-figure it out when you’re in your 40s.”
As an adult, Codr works in finance at Heartland Payment Systems, a large corporation that processes electronic payments, and only dove into the world of cookie decorating in 2018.
Since then she has started a sideline custom cookie business, with designs and themes chosen by the customer.
While she has long enjoyed cooking and baking, her passion for cookies revolves around the decorations.
“I love to paint and draw on the cookies, which makes them very unique, very customized,” she said. “I love doing really unique custom orders and making them really special. But to me, it’s the art side. I just use frosting as my medium.”
Her website, https://www.thefinickycookie.com/, displays samples of her work ranging from cookies made to look like baby carriages and planets to an ornate skull cookie made for Halloween.
After receiving an order, Codr does an online investigation to learn more about the buyer and come up with a personalized cookie design.
“There was a girl who had won a state track competition, and her aunt wanted to send her cookies for a celebration, so I went and found a photo of her in the race. And zoomed in and replicated her shoe… I take the time to go above and beyond to make things very unique and special. I like to consult with whoever is placing the order,” Codr said.
Her upcoming appearance on an episode of the Food Network’s “Christmas Cookie Challenge” began with a Facebook message last December.
“That kind of got the ball rolling and I went through the interview process. It was pretty extensive. We had to do lots of tryouts and Zoom presentations of cookies and things like that,” she remembered. “And then they selected me to be a contestant on the show and we filmed it in March.”
Premiering Dec. 4, the five contestants in the episode, titled “Our Better Angels,” are required to bake two cookies – one depicting naughty behavior and another exemplifying a good deed. The winner will take home a $10,000 prize.
Codr described the show as a good time for the entire family.
“My boys and I have watched this particular show… It’s just a good, fun, family friendly show. And I still know a lot of people in Sitka, so if they recognize me it’ll be a familiar face,” she said. Codr was most recently in Sitka this spring for the memorial service for her uncle, John MacDonald.
She credited her grandparents as an inspiration for her designs on the upcoming episode of “The Christmas Cookie Challenge.”
“I can’t really say a whole lot (about the episode), but I will say that I tied both of my grandparents into my project for the competition. And my grandma Hazel, she always cooked and sewed and was very, just really talented in that arena,” she said.
Examples of Codr’s cookie-based artistry can be viewed at facebook.com/thefinickycookie and https://www.instagram.com/thefinickycookie/?hl=en.
“The Christmas Cookie Challenge” can be seen on the Food Network at 4 p.m. Alaska time on Sunday, Dec. 4. The episode will be rerun Dec. 5, 10, 11 and 18. More information is available at https://www.foodnetwork.com/shows/christmas-cookie-challenge/episodes/our-better-angels.
Codr thinks the television appearance “might open up some doors. But, I guess, for anyone who has any type of passion or hobby, follow your dreams. Follow your heart. You never know what doors are going to open. You never know what paths you’re going to go down. Do what you love. People in Sitka should know that – that’s why they’re there.”
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20 YEARS AGO
April 2004
Responding to the requests of athletes, coaches and parents, the Sitka School Board voted unanimously Monday against a proposal that would have changed Sitka High School’s classification from Class 4A, which includes Juneau and Ketchikan, to the 3A, which has schools with enrollment of 100 to 400 students.
50 YEARS AGO
April 1974
Memories of Sitka’s first radio station have been revived by a St. Louis, Mo., man who was one of the founders. Fred A. Wiethuchter recently wrote a letter to “Mayor Sitka, Alaska” asking about the town since he was here during World War II. He was an Army private at Fort Ray when he was attached to Armed Services Radio Station KRAY and WVCX ....
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