from flop to first

Emma Price with the chocolate angel food cake that she sold at the premium auction on Saturday evening.

By Rod Haxton, editor

Young cook
takes unusual
route to
GC honors

When preparing her chocolate angel food cake for the Scott County Fair, it took two attempts before Emma Price was able to get her entry to turn out the way she wanted.
“The first one was a flop,” says the 11-year-old 4-Her.
So was the second one - literally.
After having a photo taken with each of her baked food entries, Price and her family were returning the items to the table where all food items were being kept prior to being judged. The chocolate angel food cake didn’t make it. A minor collision saw the cake flipped on its top as it landed on the floor.
“I had a terrible feeling in my gut. I thought all that hard work went to waste,” says Price.
The young 4-Her also felt that of all her baked food entries, this was the one that held the best chance of earning top honors at the Fair, which only added to the disappointment as she and her older sister, Addie, were hugging each other and fighting back the tears.
Despite the disaster, intermediate foods judge Crystal Bashford, an Extension agent from Elkhart, never hesitated about judging the cake.
Of course, there was another problem. In addition to tasting a cake that had just landed on the floor, there was the issue of appearance, which accounts for 25 percent of the scoring process.
“I told (Emma) I’d look at the part that didn’t get messed up,” says Bashford, referring to the overall appearance.
As for taste, there was no doubt in Bashford’s mind that it was championship caliber.
“The cake was unbelievable,” says Bashford, who kept the recipe.
Fellow judge Christine McPheter, an Extension agent from Meade County, was in agreement.
“We visited about it and knew this was the winner, hands down,” Bashford says. “We didn’t know how other people would feel about it, but we both agreed this should be the grand champion. And when she told us the entire process as to how to make the cake, it was obvious she did it herself.”
Price was surprised that the judges even agreed to consider her cake for a purple ribbon. She was even more surprised at their reaction given the events earlier in the morning.
“I was surprised they agreed to eat it,” says Price. “Then (the judge) wouldn’t put the recipe down. She told me how good the texture was and she loved the flavor.”
When Price left the 4-H building with a purple ribbon, she figured that was the end of the story until getting a call from her mother to return to the fairgrounds later that day for a photo.
“I was told they needed a picture. Then they brought the grand champion ribbon over and put it on my cake. I couldn’t believe it. I was the happiest person in the world,” Price says. “After that, I wasn’t even worried about my pigs. The fair could have ended for me right then.”
While there was no doubt in Bashford’s mind that Price had baked the grand champion, that wasn’t the only thing which impressed her.
“I thought the way she and her family handled the situation was more important than the cake,” emphasizes Bashford. “They picked up the pieces and went on with their day. That’s a true testament to what kind of people they are.”
Price’s success as a grand champion hasn’t gone unnoticed.
“I’m getting tons of requests to make the cake for birthdays,” says Price with a huge grin.