Recap: National Food Bloggers Great American Bake Sale – Miami 2010

It finally came off! After weeks of rejection by every commercial venue down here you can think of, and acceptance with open arms by Fairchild Tropical Botanic Garden, the Miami leg of the National Food Bloggers Great American Bake Sale to benefit Share Our Strength, happened this past Saturday! That is, with a lot of help from my friends.

Sweetness Bake Shop donated dozens of delicious mini-cupcakes (red velvet sold out fast!). Thanks, Stephanie!

Our good friends at Dunkin’ Donuts South Florida (@DDSoFla on Twitter) were kind enough to donate dozens of doughnuts and boxes o’ joe (coffee) for us to sell, and believe me, the coffee was especially appreciated.

Friends Astrid W., Kristin H. (also known as “BooBoo” to my very long-time readers), Lynne (Miz Shoes of Girlyshoes), and Paula (of Mango & Lime), and I, baked into the night, resulting in dozens of cookies, brownies, biscotti, rugelach, healthy muffins, quick breads, and so much more! A couple of my co-workers even contributed baked goods (“Sheila, I need you to bake me about a half-dozen banana breads.” “What?!?”)

I even got a volunteer baker referred to me by Tasha of That’s So Yummy, who was running her own GABS in Orlando! Shana lives about an hour away in Broward county, baked some wonderful cookies and brownies, and then drove them all the way down to us. Thanks go out to both of them, too!

This little ladybug landed on my shoulder and stuck around for nearly an hour – a sign of good luck, right?

And good luck we had, too! After threatening us with rain that never materialized during the day, we had a very good day, indeed. Counting the donations, proceeds from our raffle (see previous post), and food sales, we were able to put $748.00 in the mail to Share Our Strength! If you include online donations, that’s a total of $828.00! Not bad for a week-and-a-half’s notice, eh?

Thanks to Fairchild Tropical Botanic Garden, our intrepid volunteers, and wonderful donors! Next year will be even better!

(Photos by Paula Nino, Renée Joslyn, and Lynne Cohen. Additional photos from our day can be found by clicking here.)

For more information, or to donate to my team (and we will happily accept your money, thankyouverymuch!), click here and visit my team page. To find a bake sale near you, click here