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Baking competition hots up

AFTER months of searching, five ‘baking mad’ students have made it to the North East final of the Warburtons ‘Young Baker of the Year’ competition.

In the hunt for the next best thing in baking, Warburtons, the region’s favourite family baker, appealed to the creativity of North East students from cookery schools and colleges, to develop and enter a unique recipe for a brand new tasty loaf.

The five finalists have been hand-picked from scores of entries which came flooding in after the bakers called for fresh regional talent to ‘step up to the plate’.

The group will now go head-to-head in the regional final at Warburtons Newburn Bakery in Newcastle, where their recipes will be tasted by a panel of ‘bakery boffins’ including Technical Manager, Gillian Bartram and her colleagues.

Thanks to ‘using their loaves’, the finalists are Jonathon Horn and Samantha McCabe from Middlesbrough College, Katie Nesbit and Faye Hughes from Newcastle College and Rachelle Byne from South Tyneside College.

The regional winner will receive £250 to help towards their college tuition and will go on to represent the North East against other regional champions in a live ‘bake-off’ at the national final, held at Warburtons bakery in Bolton this November.

The overall national winner will receive a money can’t buy work experience placement within a Warburtons bakery and £1,000 to go towards college fees.

Gillian Bartrum of Newburn Bakery, said: “We take great care and pride to make our fresh, high quality bakery products and were delighted by the exceptional standard of entries we received.

“The students have been very creative, using a mixture of ingredients to create some innovative recipes which I’m sure will be very tasty.”

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Ruth Mitchell .