By: Amy Filippone, Dept. of Parks & Recreation
The second Cupcake Wars at the Parks and Recreation Community Kitchen on April 13 was a huge success. Seven teams of boys and girls in grades four through seven created confections that included: edible flowers, cinnamon frosting and pineapple. The lucky judges were Cindy Quail and Nishat Hughes from Wegmans, Mayor Lisa Petriello and Councilman Mike Locatell
Wegmans has generously been donating pantry items for over a year, such as flour, butter and eggs to the Community Kitchen programs. These mainstays offset the costs of the programs that range from the Bow Wow Bakery, a special needs occupational program to Cupcake Wars. “All of the kids were awesome; they did a fabulous job,” Quail said. “We were so impressed with the set up, the kitchen and we got to see where all the Wegmans products go.”
The teams of two were required to choose three ingredients from a “mystery basket” of 12 ingredients. After an explanation of the rules, the kids had 15 minutes to brainstorm and two hours to bake, make filling, frost and plate their cupcakes.
“Each team got three life line questions,” Chef Katie Sklarow said. “They can ask if something tastes good, or if one flavor will work with another or a procedure question.”
The judges scored the entries on: taste, texture, creativity, flavor and presentation. Here’s a sampling of the entries: strawberry jam filling with strawberry and lemon zest whipped cream frosting; vanilla cupcake with chocolate oreo cream filling and vanilla raspberry swirl buttercream garnished with shaved chocolate; tropical pina colada cupcake; vanilla cupcake with cream cheese frosting and edible flowers.
The winners were Callie Macaluso and Lainey Emmel with a lemon cupcake with berry filling and a cinnamon whipped cream frosting and a lemon glaze topped with edible flowers and berries. Make no mistake this team was prepared. Callie and Lainey had both taken culinary classes at the Rec.’s prior to the competition. They also went above and beyond and used six mystery ingredients.
The next Cupcake Wars will be over the summer for four days. This will include three days of practice and training and one day of competition. It will be from Aug. 5 to Aug. 8 from 2 to 5 p.m. for fifth through ninth graders. So come out and join in on this fun competition that teaches kids to be organized, creative and to manage time efficiently.
“The Cupcake Wars are awesome, we can’t wait to do it again,” Quail said. “Katie does an excellent job – they all do. We’re so happy to participate and that we were asked to. When we got to see exactly what was going on we saw that they are living our values, and we got to take home some of the dog treats!”
