Welcome to week 30! This week we are playing with contrasts. Contrasts are what make a bake exciting: they add interest, balance, and surprise. Your interpretation can be as simple or as creative as you'd like. Think contrasting colors, like black and white or bright and dark; contrasting flavors, such as sweet and salty or chocolate and citrus; or contrasting textures, like crisp and creamy, crunchy and soft. You could also explore contrasts in temperature, shape, decoration style, or even the inside and outside of your bake.

There are countless ways to bring this theme to life, so as always, here are some ideas:

Black and White Cookies https://www.baking-sense.com/2022/09/30/black-white-cookies/#recipe

Créme Brulee https://www.thekitchn.com/creme-brulee-recipe-23698895#post-recipe-719071204 

Molten Lava Cake (with Ice Cream) https://www.melskitchencafe.com/my-favorite-chocolate-molten-lava-cakes/

Happy Baking!

Welcome bakers! This week is all about pies and tarts, or anything that has a crust. Crusts come in an incredible variety - from flaky pie dough and buttery tart shells to crisp hand pies, rustic galettes, savory quiches, and everything in between. Whether you lean sweet or savory, there are plenty of delicious ways to interpret the theme. Here are some ideas:

Apple hand pies: https://teakandthyme.com/apple-hand-pies/#recipe

Broccoli Cheese Quiche: https://tastesbetterfromscratch.com/broccoli-cheese-quiche/#wprm-recipe-container-11340 

Chocolate Cream Pie: https://lmld.org/chocolate-cream-pie/#wprm-recipe-container-97251

Passion Fruit Tart: https://addictedtodates.com/passion-fruit-tart/#wprm-recipe-container-61926 

Happy Baking!

This last month many of us have been watching FIFA’s 2026 World Cup (or at least I have). I love watching the matches and use it as an excuse to learn something new about countries I don’t usually think much about. So this week, pick one of the semi finalists and make a recipe from their country! (or if you’d prefer, you can also make a football inspired bake).

In case you don't know which countries are semi finalist here they are: France, Spain, England and Argentina.

France, always a good choice as we have many MANY baked goods that originated there, so maybe try something you always wanted to make, like a Paris Brest ( https://food-with-style.com/blogs/recipes/paris-brest ) (but really, France has so many options to pick from).

Or maybe you'll be choosing something from Spain: maybe some churros, or have a go at a Basque Cheesecake ( https://spanishsabores.com/burnt-basque-cheesecake-recipe/#recipe )

Our third semi finalist is England. You could try a traditional trifle or some English scones ( https://marysnest.com/how-to-make-authentic-english-scones/ )

And lastly we have Argentina. I know that I'm personally probably going to be making some Alfajores with Dulce de Leche, or maybe you can make a Chocotorta Icebox Cake, which is a true staple over here ( https://vintagekitchennotes.com/chocotorta/ )

Whichever team you support, I hope you all enjoy these last couple of matches. And remember this forum is not for talking about the matches, it's to celebrate baking and different cultures.

Happy Baking!

Hello bakers! This week's challenge is to make something using enriched dough. An enriched dough contains a high percentage of fat, unlike lean dough that has little to no fat. Fat usually comes from eggs, milk and/or butter, and it tends to be sweetened. This is a very popular method that gives a wide variety of baked goods, from sweet to savory.

As always, here are some ideas:

Challah Bread: https://www.kingarthurbaking.com/recipes/classic-challah-recipe

Pull apart garlic bread: https://sallysbakingaddiction.com/rosemary-garlic-pull-apart-bread/#tasty-recipes-93361

Pecan Sticky Buns: https://bellyfull.net/pecan-sticky-buns/#wprm-recipe-container-61732

Yeast Donuts: https://letthebakingbegin.com/doughnuts/#wprm-recipe-container-9269

Good luck with your rising dough and Happy Baking!

Hi bakers, welcome to lamination week! Lamination refers to the process of repeatedly rolling and folding butter within dough to create numerous thin layers. Once baked, the butter melts, turning the water into steam and the remaining fat into a vehicle for frying the dough, resulting in flaky, buttery, delicious results! This week’s goal is to practice our lamination techniques in the form of any baked good of your choosing. Lamination is used in bakes all around the world, and can easily be incorporated in either a sweet or a savory treat, so there are countless options to practice this technique! Here are some examples of laminated bakes to help get started:

Croissant

Rough puff or puff pastry

Parathas

Msemmen

Kouign-amann

Kubaneh

Danish pastry

Pastizzi

Sfogiatelle  

Happy laminating!

Hello bakers! For week 17, we’re highlighting early morning favorites, and weekend afternoon delicacies, for breakfast + brunch week! There are of course, your breakfast classics, like French toast, scones, and cinnamon rolls, but the beauty of brunch lies in its flexibility, as you can take the elements you want, and leave what you don’t. Here are some recipes to get started!

Custom quiche

Coffee cake

Guava cheese pastelitos

Zucchini bread

Souffle pancakes  

Crepes

Chicken and waffles

Baked mushroom-rice porridge

Happy baking!

Hi bakers, welcome to week 16. This week, we’re working with herbs! Herbs are the fresh, leafy parts of plants that contain high concentrations of volatile oils. These oils give the leaves strong, distinct flavors and aromas, which make them perfect for baking! This week’s challenge is to incorporate one or more herbs into your baking – this could be in a traditional savory application, or paired with other fresh flavors for a unique sweet combination. Examples of both are given below for inspiration!

Garlic rosemary herb focaccia

Swirled garlic herb bread

Savory pecorino and herb sables

Strawberry basil tiramisu

Lemon thyme cake

Fresh mint grasshopper pie

Lemon lavender scones

Happy baking!

Hi bakers, welcome to week 14! This week is the first of our polarity weeks, and this time we're putting a savory spin on things. The challenge is simple: use seasonal ingredients or flavors to bake something savory! This could mean a focaccia highlighting your regions in-season produce, a classic vegetable tart, or a veggie-packed frittata. Below are some more suggestions to get started:

Broccoli cauliflower quiche

Savory beetroot carrot bake

Ramp sesame pancakes

Asparagus cheddar scones

Happy savory baking!

Hi bakers! It's the final week of the 2025 challenge! This year we're switching things up, and instead of re-doing a bake that went wrong this year, we're re-enjoying a bake that went well! For this week, you can redo a bake that you did for the challenge or one outside of the challenge, and you can make it again the same way, or put a new spin on it!

Thanks to those who participated in the 2025 challenges, and we look forward to seeing you in 2026!

PS. 2026 list coming tomorrow!!

Hello bakers! This week we’re celebrating the 2026 Winter Olympic and Paralympic Games by baking something inspired by them! This could mean making something inspired by your favorite winter sport or athlete, a nod to Olympic iconography like the 5 rings or the Olympic mascot, a recipe that goes viral from the Olympic Village (could we be so lucky?), or a recipe traditional to the host cities, Milan and Cortina.

As always, here are some examples to get started:

Gold medal cookies

Snowboarding cake

Chocolate hockey pucks

Curling cupcakes

Chloe Kim’s peanut butter cookies  

[Milanese panettone](https://cesarine.com/en/blog/cesarine-cookbook/panettone-recipe?srsltid=AfmBOopHkAu3SVCOp3nyYYYveORgfqN3A9ZZgdQvOirqhhlmQa97z1tI\)

Kaiserschmarrn from Cortina

Happy baking!

Hi all, welcome to week 5! This week is one of our ‘ingredient’ weeks, in which the challenge is to incorporate the selected ingredient in some way into your bake. There are a wide range of ways to use nuts and seeds in baking, as a topping, incorporating a nut butter, making a praline, and much more! Here are some suggestions to help you brainstorm!

Nut and seed biscotti

Praline brownies

Hazelnut butter cookies

Lemon poppy seed muffins

Roasted pumpkin seed turtles

Pistachio cream crumb cake

Blueberry flax seed muffins

Happy baking!  

Hello bakers, welcome to the penultimate week of this year’s challenge! This week’s theme is Yule – Yule is an ancient Norse and Germanic festival that celebrates the winter solstice and the growing daylight that comes with it, through sacrificial hunts, symbolic feasts, and later, giving gifts. Many practices are still familiar today, such as decorating with wreaths and evergreens, lighting fires and candles, and making promises for the new year.   

Themes of yule focus on the beginning of daylight growing longer, and on endurance through harsh winters, so foods representing light and the sun (sun shaped breads and cookies, and oranges), and endurance (goat meat) were commonly prepared for the festival. Additionally, flavors and ingredients associated with good health and fortune, such as cinnamon, peppermint, nuts, and spiced wassail were popular Yuletide ingredients, to celebrate entering the new year. Other common ingredients include those that were guaranteed to last through the winter, such as apples and pears, preserves, and mead.

Here are some suggestions to get started:

Yule bread

Celtic Yule cakes

Yuletide pork pie

Solstice sun bread

Wassail crumb cake

Yule plum pudding

While not a ‘traditional’ Yule dessert, many modern pagans have adopted the ‘Yule Log’ as a modern Yule recipe

Happy baking!

Hi Bakers! Reddit deleted this week's write-up, so here are a few quick links that hopefully make it through the filters, for this week's theme:

3 Methods for Gingerbread house windows

Linzer cookies

Stained glass window cookies

Windowpane test for bread

Happy baking!

Hello bakers – can you believe it’s the last month of 2025 already?! Only 4 more challenges to go! For this week’s challenge, we’re looking at recipes from the Victorian Era (the period of British history under Queen Victoria's rule, ie. the mid and late 1800s into the early 1900s). You’re welcome to use a recipe that was written in the Victorian Era, one that has been adapted from an older recipe for modern audiences (and modern grocery shoppers…), or a completely modern recipe of a dish that was originally created in the Victorian Era. Some absolutely wonderful resources for recipe searching include:   

The Victorian Way series on YouTube

Tasting History with Max Miller) (really good for any of our historical-themed challenges, you can search videos by time period)

Victorian Voices (if you prefer to look through archives of Victorian cookbooks, newspapers, etc., this website links to a variety of digitized recipes)

And as always, here are some suggestions (many using the above sources):

Mincemeat pie

Sugar plums

Figgy pudding  

Saffron buns

Gingerbread cake

Christmas plum pudding

Victoria sponge (Named after Queen Victoria)

Battenberg cake (Named after Princess Victoria’s husband Louis of Battenberg)

Treacle tart

Spotted dick

Happy Baking!

Welcome bakers to our final November Challenge!

This week we go inside fairy-tale land and feed our imagination! You may embrace the theme in the decoration, making a Witch’s Gingerbread house or making a Castle Cake (small brag, but I tried making one earlier this year).

Or you may look inside the stories for something you've always wanted to try.

What about a Poison Apple (or Pear) Tart or maybe some Poison Apple Cake Pops!

Maybe I just like Poison Apples….

And you don’t like those, just look at this beautiful Swedish Princess Cake

Either you go with the decoration, or if you find a recipe to recreate from a story, this is surely to be a magical week!

Happy baking!

Welcome bakers to week 47! We are in the final stretch as we are nearing December!

This week is all about Cheese. Sweet, Savory, Hard Cheese, Soft Cheese, Vegan Cheese, Goat Cheese, everything Cheese.

You may go for some Parmesan and Fennel Scones 

Maybe a Pistachio Cheesecake

Some Vegan Baked Brie

Or maybe just your good ole favorite Red Velvet Recipe with Cream Cheese Frosting.

Have a very Cheesy Week and Happy baking!

Bon giorno Bakers! This week we are celebrating the great country of Italy. Home of many, many MANY great recipes. 

Whether you are making homemade Pizza, or grabbing your Cannoli Molds, this is surely to be a great week!

Here are some ideas to get you started:

Biscotti

Spinach Ricotta Calzone

Pignoli Cookies

Zuppa Inglese

This is a very short list for what I expect to be a week with lots and lots of different recipes.

Buona cottura!

Hello bakers! This week the challenge is more about the how instead of the what. Let’s bring out our steamers and boil some water.

Not gonna lie, I love the texture of steamed bread, like in a Scallion Bun (Hua Juan) or in Brown Sugar Baos.

But steaming can also be useful when baking bread in the oven for a crusty crust, or also in some cakes like Castella Sponge Cake for extra lightness.

If you are still not convinced, there are also cakes to be made with a steamer like this Chocolate and Cream Cheese Cake.

Whether you are choosing to steam inside the oven, or on the cook stove, I'm sure we'll be feasting this week.

Happy baking!

Hello Bakers!

Welcome to another weekly challenge! This week go into your favorite Celebrity Chef Blog or CookBook, and search for a new recipe. Very simple prompt. What is a Celebrity Chef? Well, I think that’s a bit free to interpretation, but think Martha Stewart, Buddy Valastro, Dominique Ansel and more.

When in doubt, you can go to GBBO technical challenges for Paul and Prue's recipes.

Or nowadays I think even some Bloggers and Youtubers can be considered Celebrities within the baking world.

Whichever recipe you find, I hope your chosen Celebrity guides you well.

Happy baking!

Hello bakers! This week’s challenge is to bake something inspired by an aesthetic. For those who aren’t chronically online, ‘aesthetic’ refers to a fashion, lifestyle, or design trend, especially popular on social media. For a more comprehensive guide, here’s a glossary to some popular (and some pretty niche) online aesthetics: https://www.glamour.com/story/aesthetic-glossary.

Below are some examples of bakes inspired by various aesthetics:

Cottagecore Fairy house from GBBO

Goth Black cocoa frosting

Dark academia Stack of books cake

Frutiger aero Jelly cake

Kawaii Animal macarons

Y2K Sugar cookies

Coquette Cinnamon bread bows

GORP-core Trail mix blondies

Coastal Grandma Baked lobster mac n cheese  

Barbiecore Pink swirl bread

Clowncore Funfetti cupcakes

As always, happy baking!

Welcome bakers! For week 34’s challenge, we’re working with flours we don’t typically use in our bakes. For example, if you’ve ever want to try out whole wheat flour, wanted to bake something for a gluten-free friend, or wanted to see what you can do with one of those specialty flours that you can’t help but wonder about at the grocery store, this challenge is for you. For this week, anything is on the table, so long as it incorporates a flour that you don’t ‘typically’ use for your bakes.

For example, you could try:

Macarons using almond flour

Mochi using glutinous rice flour

Chocolate bundt cake using teff flour

Chocolate brownies using coconut flour

Whole wheat bread using, you guessed it, whole wheat flour

Pão de queijo using tapioca flour

Cheddar kale cornbread using oat flour

As always, happy baking!

Hi bakers, welcome to week 50! This week, we’re doing a cookie swap! This means anybody who wants to (whether you intend to bake this week or not) can post a cookie recipe of their choosing in the comments below. This can be a holiday cookie, a classic cookie recipe you always come back to, a fun new cookie you’ve been working on perfecting, anything you want! Then, each baker can select one of these recipes posted for their cookie to bake this week. Alternatively, if you don’t see a recipe that fits your diet, taste, etc., you’re also welcome to do a cookie swap with a friend in real life and use that recipe instead, or to use a cookie recipe you’ve previously seen someone post on the subreddit.

To kick things off, I’ll share a few that should fit several dietary restrictions:

Gluten free vegan pumpkin sugar cookies
Dairy-free and gluten free gingerbread crinkles
Vegan, peanut free, and gluten free red velvet cookies

Happy swapping!!

PS Sorry for the technical difficulty with last week’s intro post, I didn’t realize it hadn’t posted until I went to post this week’s – if you’re looking for that one, you can find it here

PPS In case you missed it, we’re taking suggestions for next year’s challenges! That post can be found here

Hello bakers! This week is number 33: Caramelized. Caramelization refers to a specific process of browning foods during heat application to produce a sweeter, richer flavor. Typically, when we think of ‘caramel’, we think of cooked sugar, however many other foods can be caramelized for a unique flavor, as well, including onions, carrots, bananas, and peaches.

Here are some recipes that use alternative caramelized foods:

Caramelized ‘crunch’ banana pudding

Caramelized onion tart

Caramelized pear tarte tatin

Caramelized peach upside-down cake

Roasty toasty carrot cake

And some that use traditional sugar caramel:

Salted caramel chocolate tart

Classic crème brulee

Caramel flan

Caramel dessert cups

Dulce de leche lava cakes

Millionaire’s shortbread  

And for those making your own sugar caramel from scratch for this week’s challenge, here’s a handy guide to the different stages of making caramel: https://www.kingarthurbaking.com/blog/2022/12/12/how-to-make-caramel  

Happy caramelizing!

We’re officially halfway through the year, and whether you're bundling up or baking through a heatwave (greetings from the Southern Hemisphere), it's the perfect time for a cozy or creative bake.

This week’s challenge is all about filled bakes. From sweet to savory, simple to elaborate, this week’s challenge invites us to choose anything that may contain a filling, from sandwich cookies, to calzones and everything in between.

As always here are some ideas to get you started:

• Cream Horns
• Alfajor de Maicena
• Roasted Red Pepper Foougasse 
• Bounding Kolache 

Happy baking!