Nine-year-old Madison Prowak of Syracuse got a big thrill at last
year’s Fair when she spotted a first-prize ribbon dangling from her
entry in the Wilton Cake Decorating Award competition, a cutout of a
guitar and microphone. “There were tons of people there, of course.”
recalls the St. Charles School fourth-grader. “I could see from the top
of the stairs that there was a ribbon on it and I got really excited.
And I said, ‘Oh, I got a blue ribbon.’ Then I called my dad. I said,
“You’ll never guess.’ Then I told him I won a blue ribbon.”
Madison will be among more than 50 children who will be entering
culinary competitions restricted to children younger than 18 at this
year’s State Fair. Kitchen-friendly kids have numerous options including
the Spam Kid Chef Contest and the KC Masterpiece Real Deal Recipe
Contest, some of which carry cash or other prizes in addition to
ribbons. “Two or three years ago our Spam Kid went on and won the
national competition,” boasted Art and Home Center Culinary
superintendent Linda Jackson, “and got a $1,000 prize.”
Going for three: Kaylee Brabham keeps practicing her berry custard so it’ll be ready for competition at the Fair.
Some kids have ventured into classes with no age limitations with
surprising results. “Any of our New York State Fair competitions are
open to people of any age,” Jackson explained. “Our junior division for
the Wilton Cake Decorating Award came about because our third-place
winner in 2008 was a 9-year-old girl. So we said let’s open this up for
the youth to be able to enter and to compete against other youths ages 7
to 17. So we have done that and it was very successful this year. The
quality of those cakes was fantastic. Everything on top of the cake has
to be edible, but they can use a cake mix because we don’t taste the
cake.”
Fruit dessert prodigy Kaylee Brabham of East Syracuse also took a
blue ribbon for her chocolate brownie pie filled with cream cheese and
whipped cream, topped with oranges, kiwi and strawberries, repeating in
the 16-and-under category she had won in 2008. “I put a bunch of berries
on it and made it look really pretty,” Kaylee said confidently. “The
year before, I made an orange pie with oranges on top in a smiley face
and that also won first place.”
Twelve-year-old Genevieve Lima’s 2009 honorable mention brownie entry
continued a theme—presentation in King Arthur’s castle—that had won her
a measure of fame, along with a ribbon, when she appeared on
WSYR-Channel 9 News. “When I found out I had won honorable mention, I
was excited,” she remembered. “Then I found out, too, that I was going
on the news and I was really excited about that. Ever since, I was like,
I want to keep doing it. I was really encouraged to keep doing it and I
love baking anyway.”
Having tasted success, all three girls will be entering this year’s
competitions. Madison has practiced her banana-chocolate chip muffins
and holiday-themed cookies on her family, trying to perfect the recipe
to enter in the baking contest. Her victorious 2009 project taught her
that hard work can pay off when she beat out such creative entries as
cakes decorated as a caterpillar, a bear picnic on top of a green
two-layer cake, a rocket ship, a castle, a purse and a State Fair
poster.
“We didn’t use a guitar-shaped pan,” said her mother, Christine
DiTrinco Prowak. “We got a template on the Internet, printed it and
Madison cut the cake out accordingly. So, it was a little bit more from
scratch. I think they were impressed because it really looked like a
guitar.”
A first for everything: Madison Prowak entered the cooking contest for the first time last year, and won a first-prize ribbon for
her creation, a guitar-and-microphone-shaped cake.
Since Madison won last year with her decorated cake, she is
ineligible to enter one this year, leaving an opening for Genevieve’s
work of art commemorating the 75th anniversary of the Art and Home
Center. “I chose quilting as my theme,” said Genevieve, known to friends
as Gigi. “The first layer is going to look like a quilt and it’s going
to say ‘Art and Home Center 75th Anniversary.’ The second tier is going
to be things that you use when you quilt, like a sewing machine and a
ribbon like somebody wins for their quilt at the Fair and the top is
going to be a basket with scissors and things that you use in a quilt.”
Kaylee, 13, will go for the three-peat this year, primarily with an
exotic entry that she’s been testing out in her home kitchen. “I’m
thinking about doing a French dessert,” she explained, while pouring
ingredients into the bowl of her stand mixer. “It’s a custard with
berries in it. You bake it and it’s supposed to get really fluffy. But
every time I’ve made it so far, it’s been really thick, so we have to
figure it out before we decide what I’m going to enter.”
Preparing baked dishes for the King Arthur Flour Children’s Contest
is a particular favorite of many youthful entrants. “I really like to
bake and decorate cakes because I like the detail of it and I love art,”
said Madison. “I’m OK in science, but I’m in accelerated math class.
That means you move at a higher speed than the other kids.”
Kaylee, who hopes to become a chiropractor, also applies academic
aptitude to her projects. “I’m always in the kitchen to cook and
experiment,” she said. “Baking is something that has to be exact and I
like math. So it just made sense to learn to bake. Mom talked about the
Fair and I said, ‘Let’s try it one year.’ I tried it and won and then I
wanted to try again.”
Often the kids draw upon inspiration from family in discovering their
talent. Like her mother, Patty Lima, Genevieve, a seventh-grader at
Living Word Academy, is a true renaissance woman, doing crafts and
artwork as well as baking. This year she’ll be entering three non-food
creations, including a mixed media piece of a watercolor painting with
actual shells attached and a silk flower wreath. “I’m also doing a
sculpture and I’ll be scrapbooking downstairs,” she said.
Kaylee, a fan of celebrity chef Rachael Ray, has a baking mentor in
her grandmother, who presented her with an apron embroidered with the
slogan “Take No Prisoners” and the family crest below Kaylee’s name. “My
grandma lives in Massachusetts and she gives me tips when she comes
up,” said the Pine Grove Elementary eighth-grader. “Like she showed me
how to make a pie crust. Most of the tips she gives me I use at the
Fair.”
Although 2009 was the first time Madison entered a culinary
competition, her mom is already behind her daughter when it comes to
winning entries, having picked up some second- and third-place ribbons
in the Fleischmann’s Baking Contest. “It eludes me every year,”
Madison’s mom said. “I don’t know what it is.”
Meanwhile, Madison’s 4-year-old sister Sarah is anxious for her turn
to cook up an entry. Last year, Sarah captured an unofficial blue ribbon
with an impromptu entry. “She used the extra that I cut off my cake and
she made her own concoction,” Madison said. “She brought it in and the
judges were nice enough to give her a blue ribbon.”
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