Bakers Extraordinaire: Festival of Breads, Part II

Kansas Wheat photo

RaChelle Hudsmith didn't receive a bouquet of roses as winner of the National Festival of Breads' Home Baker division. She didn't need one: She'd created her own "roses" with her Chai Ube Rosette Rolls. 

RaChelle, a baker from North Logan, Utah, was one of eight finalists in the 2019 National Festival of Breads in Manhattan last Saturday, June 8. There were four finalists in the Home Baker division and four in the Food Blogger category.

Photo from the Festival of Breads website

When I talked to her during the baking competition, RaChelle said that the love of cooking and baking is in her blood. She grew up in the kitchen alongside her mom and grandmas, learning while standing beside them at the kitchen counter.

Besides being chosen as the home cook winner by three professionals, RaChelle also won the People's Choice Award as festival goers tasted her rolls and dropped money in a jar, all of which went to feed the hungry at Flint Hills Bread Basket.

 

Perhaps the popularity contest was due in part to one of the ingredients. Purple sweet potatoes - or ube - looked like a perfect choice for festival-goers who love all things purple in Wildcat Country. The dough is also flavored with chai, a seasoning blend that RaChelle's family loves.

While this was RaChelle's first trip to the breads festival as a finalist, she is no stranger to cooking and baking contests. 

"Cooking contests came into my life when I was going through some trials and struggles. The cooking contests brought some positivity and a new focus into my life. I think all of us have issues of one kind or another. We all need to change our focus from our hardships to other things that bring us happiness and confidence.”

--RaChelle Hubsmith, interview with The Cache Valley Daily

By day, RaChelle is a real estate appraiser for Cache County, Utah. But her side gig as a cooking competitor also brings in some cash. She has competed three times at the World Food Championships and has many other food competitions on her resume.

Being a cake decorator and having an artistic eye has come in handy when competing in food competitions, she says.  For example, she used a cake decorating method for shaping fondant to shape her rosettes.

She rolled out her dough with a rolling pin.

She then used a circular ring to cut perfect circles.

To make the roses, she stacked three circles and rolled them up in cinnamon roll fashion. Once rolled, she cut them in half and placed each part in a muffin tin for rising, then baking.

For a video demonstration on how RaChelle shapes the rolls, go to this link on Facebook or visit the National Festival of Breads Facebook page. I happened to be standing there as they were filming the segment, so I got the demo, too!

Once out of the oven, RaChelle brushed the tops with a butter and honey mixture.

RaChelle's rolls weren't the only breads that were easier to shape than the finished product appeared. According to Wheat Foods Council-funded research, there’s been a surge in demand for European-style artisan bread.

Chicagoan Kristin Hoffman’s entry — Tart Cherry, Pecan and Rosemary Boule — offers a great example of that style, said Cindy Falk, a nutrition educator at Kansas Wheat and chair of the National Festival of Breads baking contest.

“She bakes it in a Dutch oven and dusts it with rice flour, so when it comes out of the oven, it’s really crusty like a true artisan loaf,” Falk explained.

Kristin was the only baking competition novice among the eight finalists. The creator of the baking blog, Baker Bettie, Kristin was invited to attend a Kansas Wheat-sponsored bloggers event in June of last year. Even though Kristin grew up in Hutchinson, Kansas - which is home to some of Kansas' largest grain elevators - she had never been on a combine or in a wheat field until last summer. Her experience enticed her to enter the new food bloggers division of the National Festival of Breads.

While Kristin hasn't been part of the food competition circuit, she is no stranger to the kitchen. As a college student, she saw the Food Network show Good Eats, in which host Alton Brown explains the "why" behind baking and cooking. The science of the kitchen eventually led her attend a culinary institute and become a chef.

Her round bread loaf may look fancy, she says, but the ridged bowl does a lot of the shaping work. And, with a few strategic cuts in the risen dough, the visual effect becomes even more attractive.

"It's a lot easier than it looks," Kristin said as she made slashes in the bread. "I want to develop recipes that my readers can duplicate easily."

Finalist Brenda Watts, of Gaffney, S.C., also believes in dramatic shaping to increase visual appeal. She used a star-like pattern and Italian flavors in a large, centerpiece-worthy round bread, Sicilian Star Bread.

Brenda's husband, Mike, was watching the timer on the oven in her festival kitchen while she shaped another bread loaf and chatted with festival goers. He was definitely a one-man press corps, sharing that his wife has competed in the World Food Championships, three times in the Pillsbury Bake-Off and has won a Betty Crocker contest.

"Come stand over here, where I'm standing and smell that bread baking," Mike said. "There's no better smell in the world."

Another trend in this year's entries was the use of natural coloring agents like fruits and vegetables to create uniquely hued breads, Cindy Falk said. Besides RaChelle's use of the purple sweet potato, fellow Utah resident Shauna Havey, of Roy, Utah, used beets in her Beetroot Amaretto Rolls. Shauna, who also competed as a finalist in 2017, has a degree in nutrition, so incorporating healthful items into her baking is a priority. The bodybuilder likes the nutrition, the taste and the pop of color the beet puree provides. 

Shauna was a finalist in the food blogger division and shares recipes on her blog Have Yourself ... a Time. Shauna, like many of the other finalists, is a competitive cook. Just last month, she won second prize in a cornbread contest.  

"The competitions have taken me all over the country and have given me and my family an opportunity to experience different places," Shauna said, as her son, Luke, checked in with her while she was shaping rolls.  "I feel incredibly lucky to have a hobby that has provided opportunities for me to show my kids how other people live, what they eat,  their accents, and all the uniqueness and charm that can be found in each and every place you go. I also love being able to express myself through food." 

Kansas Wheat photo

Merry Graham of Newhall, Calif., who won the Food Blogger division (and whom I featured on Kim's County Line on Tuesday) added ribbons of color to her Danish wreath with fresh blackberries and blackberry jam.

RaChelle's sweet potatoes weren't the only potatoes featured either.  Lauren Katz of Ashburn, Va., paid homage to her family’s love of mashed potatoes by creating her own version of Loaded Baked Potato Bread.

 

Lauren actually offered me a sample still warm from the oven. It was so good! Lauren may look familiar if you're a cooking show fan: She won The Great American Baking Show Holiday edition in 2015. Lauren has won so many contests, they would be too numerous to list here.  Just a couple include the Sutter Home Winery Build a Better Burger contest, and being a two-time Pillsbury Bake-Off contestant. Lauren was the 2017 honoree in the Cooking Contest Central Hall of Fame.

 

Tiffany Aaron of Quitman, Ark., (below) stuffed her bread with apples and lots of spices.

I personally loved her Mulled Spice Apple Cider Crisp Loaves. Tiffany is no stranger to baking. She began selling homemade cinnamon rolls as a sixth grader growing up in rural Montana. With a grocery store and restaurants an hour away, she learned to feed a family by working at her mom's side in the kitchen.

For this year's recipe, Tiffany discovered a mulling spice mixture at a local market. She tweaked the spice ingredients until she could recreate the same warm flavors in a yeast bread. The recipe combines her long-time love of cinnamon rolls with another favorite sweet - apple crisp.

"It's a matter of trying ... then trying again," Tiffany told me. "You rarely get it perfect the first time, and that's part of the adventure - to keep at it until it suits you."

This was Tiffany's second trip to the National Festival of Breads. She was also a finalist in 2017. This year, she brought all five of her children and her husband with her to experience Kansas.

Suzy weighed the dough to make sure they were uniform in size before shaping them.

The tastes of childhood were also a theme for Suzy Neal, of Sautee Nacoochee, Ga., who earned another spot with her Peanut Butter Pretzel Rolls.

Suzy and her husband Clark own Unicoi Preserves, so coming up with a flavor to complement their fruit spreads was second nature to the cook and blogger.

The Neals live in the mountains of Georgia, about 90 minutes from Atlanta. Their location along the Unicoi Wine Trail makes their small batch preserves a natural pairing with yeasty breads, crackers and, yes, wine, she says. Their unique flavors - like salted caramel peach spread and apple cider pepper spread - caught the attention of a regional grocery store, Ingles Market. Both she and her husband blog for The Ingles Table and also share recipes on their Unicoi Preserves website.

Find the winning recipe for Chai Ube Rosette Rolls on the Festival of Breads website, along with recipes from the other finalists. I've shared links to all the recipes if you click on the recipe titles. Or just go directly to the National Festival of Breads website and click on recipes.