How to win a bake off: Part 1

Interviews with our community bake off winners for coffee cake and focaccia!

One of my main (and admittedly somewhat vague) goals for the blog this year is to build more community. The more people I meet through events in NYC, the more I’ve realized how important community is—and I’d love to be able to build more spaces for connection in the baking world.

However, when it comes down to it—it takes a lot of momentum to put on an event and I’m not always feeling brave enough to dive in. I’m so grateful to my friend Nick for propelling us into a first 2025 event by asking me to collaborate on a Creator’s Table event where we hosted what we called a “community bake off.” Instead of me doing all the baking, it was a giant bake off potluck!

Below you can find a brief recap of the event—but more importantly, interviews with the winners of two different bake off categories. In the interviews, you’ll find:

• Their winning recipes!

• Helpful tips and tricks for home bakers

• Some of their favorite tried-and-true bakes that might help YOU win a bake off in the future

• Favorite baked goods in NYC and more!

The other winners will be coming in part 2 💫

Big thank you to First Round’s on Me for hosting us in their NYC cafe + event space!

The bake off format

We had capacity for up to 150 people at the event space via First Round’s on Me, and I knew people would get taster fatigue if the selection consisted of 150 banana bread recipes. So we divided baker sign ups into 5 different categories:

• Chocolate chip cookies

• Brownies

• Banana bread

• Coffee cake

• Focaccia

We also sold a limited number of tickets for people who just wanted to taste and judge rather than bake (because we had a LOT of baked goods)!

Everyone who came was asked to judge one full category and enter their ratings in a Google form. This was frankly far too complicated for this type of event; I will be workshopping this for the future. Meanwhile, we had 3 guest judges at the event—they, along with Nick and myself, selected winners for each category.

Our guest judges

From left to right:

• Nick judged banana bread

• I judged focaccia

• Eric King
  of @easygayoven judged chocolate chip cookies

• Allison Chen
  of @al.chenny judged coffee cake

• Bilena Settepani of Settepani Bakery judged brownies

Judging was really no easy feat, so a huge thanks to our judges! So many good recipes!

Allison and Eric taking the judging v seriously; my tasting plate of focaccia.

The winners!

My intention was to have a judges’ pick and a crowd favorite for each category. But given my overly complicated feedback system, not many surveys were actually submitted (again, noodling on a better system for next time!), so we gave out prizes according to the judges’ picks.

The prizes? Some baking molds from Flexipan which were generously donated for the event! These molds are truly a game changer (no need to grease and your bakes will pop right out)!

And now for the judges’ picks:

• Coffee cake: Butternut Bakery’s cream cheese carrot cake by Alex Ten (recipe + interview below)

• Focaccia: Garlic maple soy focaccia by Ryan Littlefield (recipe + interview below)

• Chocolate chip cookies: Whiskey brown butter marshmallow chocolate chunk cookies by The Deeper Living Eats

• Banana bread: Pecan praline banana bread by The Deeper Living Eats (yes, she swept 2 categories!)

• Brownies: Ina Garten brownies by Divya

Our winning coffee cake with Alex Ten

Thrilled to be featuring an interview with our coffee cake guru, Alex Ten of Forest Hills, Queens! She won the coffee cake category with a lightly modified version of Butternut Bakery’s cream cheese carrot coffee cake. Thank you Alex for your thoughtful interview answers and for bringing such a uniquely delicious cake!

Your winning recipe was so unique and the judge ultimately picked it because it had such great flavor and balance of spices. Plus the nuts in the crumb topping really blew her away! Tell us about this recipe—did you make any tweaks?

I originally made this coffee cake for my book club meet-up and everyone really enjoyed it so I knew it was a keeper then. Given this bake-off was in spring, I wanted to combine classic spring flavors (such as carrots) with the coffee cake category, and that’s how I came back to that recipe.

I did make a handful of tweaks to it - I reduced the sugar by ~25% (I generally find almost all recipes I encounter a bit too sweet), increased the amount of carrots and sour cream, added a twist to the spices mix by incorporating a touch of allspice and freshly ground black pepper, and lightly salted both the crumble and the cream cheese layers.

What has your baking journey looked like--when did you get started and what kind of bakes did you start out with vs. what kinds of things do you like to bake now?

I actually vividly remember the moment I started my baking journey - it was 2021, I was a year out of college, moving out of my relatives’ place to live on my own for the very first time, finding myself with essentially zero cooking or baking skills. For some context, my mom is Korean, and growing up with that side of my family, communal dining, hosting, and treating your loved ones was a huge part of my upbringing. That said, I was also always encouraged to focus all my time on studying, getting good grades, and finishing college, so I was never allowed in the kitchen. When I began living on my own, I had to learn from scratch, and I yearned to be able to bake delicious sweets.

I started off with beginner-friendly one bowl recipes (the very first thing I ever made was a pumpkin olive oil cake, following a Claire Saffitz x Yossy Arefi video on YouTube), eventually graduating to bake cookies, pies, and multi-layered cakes. Right now, I tend to focus on cookies (you will always find a batch of frozen cookie dough in my freezer, ready to be made) and single-layer cakes like the one I made for the bake-off.

Who else do you like to follow for recipe inspiration?

I’ve mentioned Claire Saffitz already but I will bring up her name again just because I love her too much - I’ve religiously read her recipes and watched her YouTube videos, and that’s how I learnt most of my fundamental skills and tricks (e.g. how to make a pie crust, classic chocolate chip cookie or brownie recipe). Sarah Fennnel, aka Broma Bakery, has incredibly inventive and still approachable recipes in her new cookbook Sweet Tooth. I also love to browse the NYT Cooking app for inspiration.

For any other bakers out there trying to win a recipe competition (or simply just bake the best recipes out there), any other favorite recipes you'd recommend?

• Chocolate Chip Cookies by Matty Edgell, The Great British Bake Off 2023 winner: This is my go-to CCC recipe - it’s so simple yet delicious. Matty adds a secret ingredient - malted milk powder - which I think makes all the difference.

• Caramelized Honey Pumpkin Pie by Claire Saffitz: You will not want to make or eat any other pumpkin pie after trying this one.

• Coffee Cake Cookies by Sarah Fennel: This recipe is featured in Sarah’s cookbook Sweet Tooth, under the inventive sweets section as it combines the classic coffee cake flavors and a soft, chewy cookie (with a crumble!). I’ve made this for several friends, and they unanimously declared them “life-changing.”

Any baking tips you've picked up along the way that you think would be helpful to share?

• Get a scale and measure your ingredients in metric units - this may seem laborious at first but it will save you time and clean bowls in the long run, and you will never risk overpacking your flour into the measuring cups

• Waiting for ingredients to come to room temp (when needed) is worth it and will make a difference in your bakes

• Learning how to tell when your baked goods are ready - by touch, look, or smell - without strictly relying on baking times is an important skill that allows you to bake in any kitchen

Top 3 favorite baked goods in NYC?

1. Chocolate babka from Breads Bakery

2. Raspberry beignet from La Boulangerie (shout-out to my local gem of a bakery in Forest Hills)

3. Honeycake, aka Medovik, from Veselka

Our winning focaccia with Ryan Littlefield

And now for our second interview with our focaccia category winner: Ryan Littlefield of Crown Heights, Brooklyn! This was such a hard category to judge because so many were outstanding, but I ultimately chose Ryan’s bake (a modified version of Lacey Osterman’s focaccia) because of its arrestingly sweet and savory flavor with a perfectly squishy, high-hydration crumb. Thank you Ryan for sharing your recipe with us!

Your recipe was a modified version of Lacey Osterman's focaccia--would you be willing to share your full modified recipe with us?

Yes to both questions! [Find the recipe after this interview!]

What has your baking journey looked like--when did you get started and what kind of bakes did you start out with vs. what kinds of things do you like to bake now?

I've been baking since I was about 4. I used to sell cookies around my neighborhood door-to-door; they weren't very good, but a few people were nice enough to buy them. Then in high school, instead of getting a job, I made baked goods for my classmates. Pies, cookies, and scones were my biggest sellers.

I still like baking all those things, but I've branched out more over time. I made my brother's wedding cake a few years back, so I learned a ton about cakes and pastry in the lead-up to that, but recently I've been more into bread. I started making focaccia this January, and I've come up with about a dozen variations since then.

Any other creators/bloggers you like to follow for recipe inspiration?

Sugarologie is incredible. For anyone who grew up on Good Eats or loves books like The Food Lab, she's unmatched. I also get a lot of inspiration from Max Miller's series Tasting History - there are lots of incredible old recipes almost nobody makes anymore.

Do you have any other favorite recipes you'd recommend (perhaps for those also trying to win a baking competition or just bake the best recipes out there?

The best chocolate cake recipe I've ever found is the Hunka Burnin Love Cake from Zingerman's Bakery in Ann Arbor, MI. It's perfect.

Also, fruitcake has an undeserved bad rap - I keep telling people it's overdue for a comeback. Alton Brown's Free Range Fruitcake is a great place to start.

Any baking tips you've picked up along the way that you think would be helpful to share?
Don't undersalt your baked goods. If you want to cut back on sodium, there are better ways to do it. Bread, cookies, brownies... they all need salt to be their best.

Also, if you're nervous about working with high hydration bread doughs, sub out a third of the flour for King Arthur's keto flour. It's almost all gluten and fiber, and it can soak up an absurd amount of water while still preserving the high hydration texture of the final product.

Top 3 favorite baked goods in NYC?

1. The bread from Foxface (I miss when they used to make sandwiches)

2. The pizza from Emily West Village (not NY style, but incredible)

3. The babka from Coffee Redefined (the gooiest, most indulgent babka I've ever had)

Recipe: Ryan’s Maple Garlic Soy Focaccia

A note from Ryan: If you’ve never made focaccia before or worked with higher hydration bread doughs (this one’s about 90%), don’t worry – this is a flexible, forgiving recipe. A little more/less flour or a little extra salt or sugar will all affect your final product, but chances are your results will be tasty regardless. Just don’t skimp on the oil.

Equipment

• Kitchen scale

• Large mixing bowl

• A sturdy stirring implement

• 9x13 metal baking sheet (i.e. quarter sheet) or cake pan

• Measuring spoons

• Small saucepan

• Basting brush (optional)

• Large, flexible spatula

Ingredients

For focaccia:

• 450g warm water (between 105 and 115F)

• 20g sugar, honey, or 30g maple syrup

• 7 to 8g active dry yeast (one packet)

• 500g all-purpose flour (at least 11% protein content)

• 12g salt

• 5 to 6 tbsp good olive oil

• 8 cloves of garlic

For glaze:

• 3 tbsp maple syrup

• 1.5 tbsp dark soy sauce

• 1 tbsp molasses

• Pinch of salt

• Pinch of MSG (optional)

• 2 or 3 pinches of cayenne pepper

Instructions

1. Using your kitchen scale, measure out your warm water into a mixing bowl. Dissolve your sugar, honey or maple syrup into the water, then stir in your active dry yeast. Let rest until a foam begins to appear on the surface of the water, ~5 to 10 minutes.

2. Add flour and salt to the yeast mixture and stir to incorporate until a loose, homogenous dough forms. At this stage, it should resemble a thick batter – loose enough that it settles into the bottom of the bowl over 10 seconds or so. Cover and let sit for 15 minutes.

3. With a clean, wet hand, scoop around the outside of the bowl and stretch a portion of the dough from the outside up and fold over the top. Turn the bowl and repeat several dozen times, scooping from the outside and folding over the top. By the end of this stage, you should begin to feel some elasticity and strength building in the dough. Cover and let sit for another 15 minutes.

4. Repeat step 4. At this stage, the dough should be holding together more firmly – if you grab a portion and lift, all the dough should pull off the bowl, though it will still be a bit sticky. Cover and let rise for 90 minutes.

5. Line your baking sheet or cake pan, including the walls, with parchment paper or nonstick aluminum foil. Drizzle enough olive oil over the bottom of the pan to coat – 2 to 3 tablespoons.

6. Preheat your oven to 450 degrees Fahrenheit and move one rack to the lowest position in your oven.

7. Gently pour your risen dough out of the mixing bowl and into the lined pan, scraping it away from the sides of the bowl as needed. Grab one end of your dough and fold about 2/3 over itself, and then repeat with the opposite side – then flip the dough so the seam side is facedown against the bottom of the pan. Cover with plastic wrap or similar and let rest until doubled in size, about 30 minutes.

8. While dough is resting, peel 8 cloves of garlic and chop each into medium size chunks: about 4 per clove.

9. Coat your clean hands with a small amount of olive oil and dimple your dough; push your fingers straight down through the dough until you reach the pan, and then lift straight back out. Repeat several times until the surface of your dough is covered with dimples about 2 inches apart.

10. Disperse your garlic chunks evenly across the surface of your dough, pressing in a bit where necessary for them to stick.

11. Sprinkle the surface of your focaccia with a pinch of salt and 3-4 tablespoons of olive oil – it should look like a lot of oil – and immediately move to the bottom rack of your oven for 20 minutes.

12. While your focaccia is in the oven, make the glaze by heating the maple syrup, soy sauce, molasses, salt, MSG (if using), and cayenne pepper in a small saucepan over medium-low heat until it cooks down to a syrupy consistency.

13. Remove your focaccia from the oven and brush or drizzle the glaze over it’s surface. Return to the oven for an additional 4 minutes.

14. Remove your finished focaccia from the oven – allow to cool for at least 20 minutes before slicing and serving.

A big thanks to all the other bakers who brought their best to the event! Stay tuned for part 2 💕