Scout Sisters Take on Baking Challenge!
If you're a fan of cooking shows and have been keeping up with Kids Baking Championship: Next Gen, you might recognize the sister duo Jovie and Lenore - two talented young bakers who recently wrapped up their run on the popular Food Network show. What you may not know is that these sisters are Scouts from right here in the Atlanta Area Council!
Newly minted Life Scout Jovie and Second Class Scout Lenore from Troop 644 in Mableton have been baking together since they were little. Growing up, they spent plenty of time in the kitchen with Mom and Dad cooking dinner or baking treats - igniting their passion for baking. When a family friend told them about the opportunity to audition for a new kids baking program on Food Network, the girls jumped at the chance to show off their talents.
The audition process was rigorous, with several interviews and a lot of baking. The duo was particularly proud of a Scouting-inspired cake they submitted that featured a tent, campfire, and hand-piped trees - the cake was thouroughly appreciated by the other Scouts at the Troop 644 meeting.
After several weeks of auditioning, the sisters were accepted onto the show, joining eleven other sibling duos from across the country. The baking challenges were, at times, exactly that - challenging. Lenore recounts one moment when she had to bake without Jovie because another team earned the ability to put a competing baker in “timeout.”
"I was just baking by myself, which is why my cookies weren't baked with love - they were baked with stress!"
Throughout the competition, their creativity, teamwork, problem-solving, and resilience were constantly put to the test - skills their family credits in large part to their experiences in Scouting.
But what required the most resilience wasn’t making a cookie look like an egg or working with finicky puff pastry to make a galette - it was completing interviews in front of the camera after a long day of filming. Some interviews lasted as long as two and a half hours, and Jovie and Lenore had to maintain the same level of enthusiasm and excitement they showed while baking several hours earlier.
The sisters’ mother, Judy, believes one unexpected way Scouting prepared them was in receiving feedback and accepting criticism. A Scout’s Board of Review is not unlike submitting your work to a panel of judges on a baking show. Both situations require patience, composure, and grace - and Jovie and Lenore were prepared.
Jovie shared this perspective on their experience:
"We've made it onto a show, which we already more or less had to compete to get on. So we're already winning. And the fact that we're there is a cool and unique experience. So if we went home the first day, I still would have been happy, because it was an amazing experience."
And they baked their way well beyond just one day, making it all the way to the quarterfinals! Though the duo didn’t quite make it to the end, their early departure was a blessing in disguise because the day after they returned home, both Scouts were headed off to summer camp! Any more time on the show and they would have missed it.
Lenore seemed to be in good spirits about it. “I was like, we'll be famous for a little bit, and then we get to go to Scout Camp. Yeah, that's pretty awesome!”
Congratulations to Jovie and Lenore on such an incredible showing! If their story inspired you to try some baking of your own, see below for a version of the no-bake cheescake recipe they used on the show!
Jovie & Lenore's Perfect No-bake Cheesecake
Makes 6-8 servings
Ingredients
- 1 cup white chocolate chips
- 16 oz cream cheese, softened
- 8 oz Cool Whip, thawed
- 1 (9 inch) graham cracker crust
Directions
- Melt the white chocloate chips
- Stir in the softened cream cheese and whisk vigorously until smooth
- Fold in the thawed Cool Whip and pour the mixture into the crust
- Cover and refrigerate for 4 hours or until set
- Enjoy!
The duo used their no-bake cheesecake to mimick a parfait for the Breakfast Imposters Challenge. Pretty convincing!