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Paula Simon

Family and travel are my priorities!  In many ways I am the quintessential “Jewish Mom”, feeding, baking, hosting holiday meals, and indulging my kids and grandkids.  For each of my daughters’ destination weddings, I baked and transported more than 30 dozen treats to serve at their welcome dinners.  When I’m not home in my kitchen or visiting my daughters in Los Angeles, I can often be found traveling internationally with my husband.  Next stop, Vietnam, Cambodia, and Thailand in 2025.

What or who inspired your love of baking? 

Growing up I had an aunt who occasionally baked cakes, a cousin who decorated them, and a grandmother who made apple pie, but homemade in my house typically meant “Slice and Bake Cookies” or a boxed brownie mix. With excellent local bakeries and Sara Lee frozen cakes always in our freezer, baking was unnecessary. When I moved from California to Minnesota after graduate school the winters were dark, cold, and long, I was unfamiliar with the bakeries and certainly wasn’t going to drive to a grocery store in a snowstorm – all inspiring me to start baking!   

What’s your favorite thing to bake? 

Literally anything that makes my family and friends happy and doesn’t require significant decorating skills (my weakness).  For my daughters, it is always chocolate cheesecake. For my sons-in-law, breakfast date bars or my aunt’s recipe for a sour cream streusel coffee cake. My husband won’t turn down a cookie. Most recently and importantly, anything that my 6- and 3-year-old grandchildren can help me bake is my “favorite”.  We’ve made cupcakes, brownies, snacking cakes, chocolate chip cookies and challah.

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