At 8 p.m. this Tuesday, July 26, Cleveland's Courtney Bonning of Bonbon Bake Shop will appear on Food Network's "Cupcake Wars." Bonning says she and an assistant traveled to Los Angeles to compete against other bakeries.
The local pastry chef describes the process as involving three rounds, with the final requiring the production of a 1,000-cupcake display centered on the week's theme: The LA Dodgers. The cupcakes had to be completed in two hours.
Bonning opened Bonbon in the Detroit Shoreway neighborhood in October of 2009. They recently moved to Pilgrim Church while their new shop, Bonbon Pastry & Café, is being constructed in Ohio City. That bake shop is slated to open in October.
"It was exciting," Bonning says of the show. "Doing food competition shows are not easy but it's definitely worth it no matter what the outcome. We were really driven to try to do well for Cleveland. It was really important for us to show the country that [Cleveland] is bursting at the seams with talented chefs."