Delaware Hayes High School senior Jacy Mox walked away from the Delaware County Junior Fair Baked Goods Auction this week with the title of grand champion and a new recipe.
Mox said she’s been participating in the competition as part of 4-H for the past three years, but since she’s aging out of the program, she decided to challenge herself for her final year.
The competition process was a bit different this year, Mox added. Instead of a traditional auction, people could instead donate directly to her. Mox said the baked goods competition included cookies, cakes, donuts and pies. This year, a judge tasted the cake and called the bakers of the best cakes back for an interview if they made it to the next round.
Mox, who’s been making pumpkin spice cake with cinnamon buttercream icing for years because it’s a family favorite recipe, said this year she decided to make the cake gluten free since a family member recently switched to a no-gluten diet.
“I made a cake that I hadn’t made before,” she said. “My family liked it, but I wasn’t sure if someone else would like it. I’ve made this cake before, but I decided to make it gluten free this year. It tasted different, but it was one of our recipes and we wanted to see if it tasted just as good.”
Mox said the grand prize showed her that it did.
“It was really awesome. It was my last year this year because I’m aged out,” she said. “It was a really amazing opportunity to win in my last year.”
Mox said she’s planning to spend the money she received from donations to plan another field study trip to Andros Island in the Bahamas, adding she did a marine biology field study on the island a few years ago where she helped repopulate a coral reef that had been bleached.
Donations to Mox can be made at https://www.bwfinaldrive.com/.
