The Wayne Public Library held its third annual “A Sweet Taste of Wayne” on Saturday, Nov.2, from 6 to 7:30 p.m. at the city auditorium. 

Fifty-nine people were in attendance throughout the night to support and judge the 15 bakers. Categories of competition included youth, professional and home bakers. 

Desserts from the evening included peanut butter sheet cake, cheesecake balls, clementine cake, banana bread and monster cookie fluff cups among others. 

The evening consisted of dessert tastings, trivia led by Wayne State professor Melissa Derechailo and other fun questions and worksheets for attendees. 

The winners of the night were Carol Ellenbecker for home bakers, Sophia Spieker for youth bakers and Emilie Osten for professional bakers. Each winner received a certificate, a gift bag and a check for $50. 

Ten bakers were in the home baker category including WSC freshmen Miranda Strizek and Nissi Ramos-Perez. 

Strizek from Valparaiso and Ramos-Perez from Sioux City, Iowa, are both family consumer science education majors. They first heard about this event from their professor, Carol Erwin. 

“They are my first students to do it,” Erwin said. “I’m really proud of them. They [didn’t know] what they got themselves into.” 

Strizek made mini pumpkin and apple cheesecakes, but her favorite thing to make is kolaches. 

“I grew up watching my grandma bake, especially around the holidays,” Strizek said. “Baking reminds me of my heritage, and it’s very sentimental to me.” 

Ramos-Perez made banana bread. Her favorite thing to make is carrot cake with homemade frosting. 

“I have a big family,” Ramos-Perez said. “I grew up watching my aunt bake, and we were forced to bake for each of our families. I have just always been around baking.” 

Strizek and Ramos-Perez received extra credit in their class for their participation in the event.  

Three bakers were in the youth category, one of which was Sophia Spieker, the winner. This is her first year participating in the event. 

Spieker, a junior at Wayne High, made mini éclairs for the evening. She combined a normal creampuff and an éclair to make a hybrid pastry. 

“A creampuff usually is more sandwich, and an éclair is usually more pastry cream,” Spieker said. “Since they are so small, I combined them so it would be a good balance of both.” 

Spieker has been baking for around 10 years now. She started by licking spatulas in her mom’s kitchen while helping her bake. 

“I started with pancakes, then moved onto cookies and then it escalated from there,” she said.

The junior’s favorite dessert to bake is cakes, particularly lemon pudding cake. She has already been commissioned by several Wayne residents to make and decorate cakes for different events, including a wedding and an anniversary. 

Spieker offered advice for anyone interested in picking up baking.  

“Build your way up,” Spieker said. “You can’t do harder recipes without first knowing the ingredients. Also, get actual cookbooks too, and don’t just use online recipes.” 

The final category was professional, in which there were two contestants. 

Osten technically doesn’t have a professional license, but she still competed under the category. She says it is because of how many baked goods she has made over the last five years. 

“I have probably made 10,000 cupcakes,” Osten said. “In one month, the most I probably have made was 1800.” 

Osten made lemon cake with a raspberry frosting and glaze for the evening. Her favorite thing to bake is peach yogurt bread. 

Though her day job is working at the Edward Jones office on Main Street, she also has several fridges full of baking supplies. One fridge holding her regular food, a deep freezer that holds a lot of frozen and freeze-dried fruit, a fridge for eggs and garden produce and a fridge entirely for butter. 

Osten usually charges $12 a dozen for regular-sized cupcakes which she sells at farmer’s markets or makes for weddings and graduations. She can make 15 different kinds of cake with 12 different types of frosting. 

After the votes were cast, several rounds of baking trivia ensued. Some trivia questions included “What ingredient is added to milk to make buttermilk,” “What is the chemical name for baking soda” and “When were the first Girl Scout cookies sold, and for how much?” 

Wayne Library Director Heather Headley also wanted to share what the upcoming craft night will look like on Tuesday, Nov. 5. 

“We really want to have new events and opportunities for our members,” Headley said. “A lot of these craft evenings coming up will be take and make as it gets colder.” 

Headley also said the library wanted to bring more people in to teach others how to do new skills, so they are starting crafternoons in January. 

“People are able to start learning crochet or knitting among other things,” Headley said. 

Regular craft nights at the library are the first Tuesday of each month at the Public Library.