Where Are All 11 ‘Holiday Baking Championship’ Winners Now?
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Every year, Food Network fans kick off the holiday season with the long-running Holiday Baking Championship, cheering contestants on as they create festive treats for judges Duff Goldman, Nancy Fuller, and Kardea Brown. But what happens when the cameras stop rolling? Here’s where all of the past winners are now!
Holiday Baking Championship has gotten bigger and better every year since it premiered over a decade ago in 2014. Originally starting with eight bakers competing over six weeks and later expanding to feature 12 bakers over eight episodes, home bakers and professionals alike battle it out for $25,000 and other perks over the years, including $1000 preheat prizes and features in Food Network magazine.
Bachelor and Bachelorette host Jesse Palmer stepped in to lead Holiday Baking Championship in 2017, later explaining why he was so happy to have the opportunity.
“As a big-time foodie, it’s a dream job,” he told Sports Illustrated in 2018. And as a former athlete, he recognizes the similarities between the high-pressure baking competition and football.
“This show really felt like a sport. It is a competition,” he said. “There are winners and losers, cash prizes and a title at the end of the show. I’m the play-by-play sideline reporter and color analyst.”
He also confessed that while the competitors look extra festive on camera, the show is filmed months in advance to be ready for the holiday season. “We shoot that show in New Orleans, [for] about 10 days in July,” he explained. “So it’s the dead of summer, and we’re putting on winter outfits and sweaters, filming from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m.”
In 2024, Season 11 winner Steven Levitt admitted that the process of baking and filming meant more to him than any prize. “For me, it’s not about winning, although that’s nice,” he told Village Report. “I love the process of it. I love being there. I like the clock ticking. I like the baking. I love the cameras and the producers and all the background people. I love all of that.”
Here’s what each of the former Holiday Baking Championship winners are up to after taking home the title, ahead of the Season 12 premiere on Nov. 3, 2025!
Dru Tevis, Season 9
In 2022, a professionally trained pastry chef from Delaware named Dru Tevis became the season 9 winner of Holiday Baking Championship. After learning the ropes at the French Culinary Institute in New York, he blew the judges away and took home the win.
However, nobody knew he won — not even his husband, Chase Cline — until the episode aired months later. “It was hardest when I first got home,” he told Delaware Live. “It got easier as we got closer to the end. Honestly, the fact that I won made it easier to keep the secret since I knew the payoff would be good.”
He reflected on the win after the finale aired in December, writing, “Dirty. Exhausted. Emotionally & Physically Spent. And STILL SMILING. We baked our butts off for 17 challenges, and I am so proud of everything the four of us managed to achieve. We all walked out of that final bake PROUD… I am so thankful to have had this entire epic journey with these 3 incredible people.”
Tevis, who was the director of the pastry program for Rehoboth Beach-based SoDel Concepts before the show, now owns a bakery and pop-up called Brûlé Bakery, which he started in 2025.
