Claudia Anton (the Sugarologist)
Hello and nice to meet you. I'm Claudia, a mother and a doctor with a longstanding baking obsession, living in Melbourne, Australia. My home is made up of my little brood of one hungry husband and two hungry children, a flock of heritage hens and a very mischevious German Shorthaired Pointer.
Melbourne is the city in which I was born and which I returned to after growing up on a squab and fruit farm in country, Victoria. I love Melbourne for it's amazing food, incredible coffee, it's cultural diversity, leafy streets, and inhabitant birds - I have a thing for birds (and the colour green). My unique home, my family and my German (and a little bit French) heritage are such a big part of my baking inspiration.
In 2017 I somewhat impulsively, and on the back of years of procrastinating, entered the Great Australian Bake Off. This was the biggest baking challenge of my life and after a long time spent away from my family, and a period of crazy baking, I was lucky enough to have won amongst a team of 11 other incredible home bakers. My bake off experience above all has inspired me to keep following my instinctive drive to bake and create.
On a personal level I love to be lost in a little baking cloud, somewhere in which I am able to reflect and ponder over memories, find inspiration from so many aspects of my life and celebrate and explore my heritage.
I have baked since I was eight years old, scones to start with in my parents' restaurant in the Macedon ranges, then cakes, breads and biscuits, then whatever was in the magazines Mum bought home after school. I would sift through all my Mum's cooking and baking books, and read books about food from the school library on the long bus trip home. Cookbooks were like novels to me and I'm ashamed to say I've developed a bit of a cookbook fetish. I still take them to bed for a bit of night time reading.
My love of food and baking in particular stems from its incredible breadth and depth - Its' historical roots, its' science, its'ability to conjure up memory, stir emotion, celebrate and express culture and fulfil basic needs - as well as more complex ones!
Baking allows me to be creative without end, to explore and combine flavours, textures and colours, to constantly learn, experiment and play. I find it so exciting to respect the seasons and anticipate the first crispy and slightly sour Autumn apples for instance, the first mushrooms, or the brief chance to buy ripe apricots in Summer. Where I can I try to use natural or organic ingredients although there are or course exceptions.
And finally to share a baking creation with others, to give little part of myself to those I care about, to nurture and hopefully delight, that is what is best of all....