Many finalists have won a trip to the Bake-Off® Contest the very first time they entered-and many of these people have never entered any previous cooking contest of any kind. Is it any wonder that many contestants feel like fate was smiling down on them?
* One contestant's entry arrived badly burned around the edges, attached to a letter from the U. S. Post Office saying: "Our sincere apologies for the present condition of the enclosed mail. The damage resulted from an accident and fire while the mail was being transported by a commercial carrier." The charred entry made it all the way through the selection process, and saw its creator all the way to the Bake-Off® Contest.
* One baker's wife was shocked when she found herself a finalist. Her husband's professional status had led her to think that her own recipes were too plain, but her daughter had entered her recipe anyway. She went on to win a cash prize.
* Another contestant was stunned when she received the call from Pillsbury, because she had finished the entry blank, but forgot to mail it before the deadline. It turned out her young son had mailed it himself, since he wanted to accompany his mom to Disney World, where the contest was taking place that year.
From "Pillsbury Best of the Bake-Off® Cookbook." Copyright 2004 General Mills. Used with permission of the publisher, Wiley Publishing, Inc. All Rights Reserved.