High school students from Hillsborough, Pasco, Pinellas, and Manatee counties competed in the Fair-Tastic Foods competition last weekend all for the chance to be named winners in Best of Show categories and a variety of prizes including having their winning creation added to the Florida State Fair cookbook, published once the fair concludes.
“When the judges were eating my food, I’d look out the corner out of my eye to see their reactions and how they liked it. I wanted to know their initial reactions,” says Natalia Collazo, a senior at Plant City’s Durant High School.
This is Collazo’s second time competing in the Fair-Tastic Foods competition, where she was crowned first place in the Best of Show Sweet category winner for her Apple Fingers and second place winner for her Burger Balls. She says she was inspired to enter the competition again by her culinary teacher Guy Hermis.
“He tries to find different competitions for us to enter. He told me about it last year too and I had so much fun. It was a great experience and I wanted to do it again this year,” she says.
Collazo’s love of cooking comes from television personality Buddy Valastro of the show “Cake Boss.” She says she’d try and replicate a few of his cakes. The first thing she ever baked was a vanilla cake topped with chocolate ganache and chocolate-covered strawberries as a gift to her father on Father’s Day when she was 11. Her most elaborate creation is a three-tiered cake covered in fondant icing when she was 13 for Mother’s Day.
“I find baking really calming. Whenever I’m worked up, that means it’s time to make cookies or something. I can let out my frustration when I’m stirring,” she adds.
Collazo says she had to taste test the Apple Fingers about 5 times before she settled on the perfect recipe: cover the apple slices in caramel, then dip in cinnamon pancake batter before being deep-fried. The slices are then topped with powdered sugar and a caramel dipping sauce. Burger Balls, a slider with cheese inside the patty wrapped in flash-fried pizza crust, was less challenging; coming out flawless upon the first try. Ideas for both submissions came while she was at work.
“It’s so much easier to eat the slices because I could never finish the large caramel apples. They’re hard to bite into and I end up not finishing it,” Collazo says.
She says her mother is her biggest supporter, even if it is a little embarrassing at times.
“When the judges started giving out the awards, she starts running up with her camera and I’m like ‘Mom, what are you doing?’ She’s cute though,” Collazo says.
After she graduates high school, Collazo wants to pursue culinary arts as a career. She says she’s interested in attending Johnson & Wales or Keiser University. Her dream is to open her own restaurant someday.
“I’m obsessed with old-school diners, so I’d like to open one serving Puerto Rican food because that’s where my family is from. We’ll have theme nights and music playing from a jukebox.”
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