Stacie Hart from Muncy placed fourth in the apple pie contest at the Pennsylvania State Farm Show for her Apple Blackberry Cheesecake pie.

MUNCY -Stacie Hart is hoping that someday she will go for the gold and win a first place ribbon at the state fair, but winning fourth place from 73 entries isn’t too bad, she said.

For the past 25 years, Hart said she loves to bake. “It relaxes me,” said the owner of Stacie’s Shear Sensations in Clarkstown. Her customers are her best tasters for her cake and pie recipes. Beginning in April Hart starts baking every Monday, all kinds of pies and cakes. She uses her own recipes and everything is from scratch. “My husband is my biggest fan,” she said. “He takes the pie or cake I make each week to work at Penn College where he is an electrical instructor. His colleagues are the judges,” she said. “I taste it, but I don’t eat it. But my husband loves my baking. He grew up on a farm and is used to home made goods.”

From May through July Hart tries to come up with some unique recipes to enter in the Lycoming County Fair. Last July she placed first for the Apple Blackberry Pie and this automatically made her eligible for the state fair. “I love cheesecake and used my grandmother’s sieve to ground the blackberries,” she said. “At $3.99 a pint, I had to get three of them to make enough juice.” On Friday Hart made four pies to take down to Harrisburg and drove carefully that morning on judging day, Saturday, January 5. “I baked all day to make sure I had extras in case of an accident or something.” After entering the best pie from the four, the remaining pies went to the Trinity United Methodist Church in Pennsdale.

Hart also submitted a three layered chocolate gingerbread cake that was eligible because it won a first place ribbon at the Montour DeLong Fair.

A Hershey Lodge Chef was one of the judges so they were looking for something different according to Hart who described her cake as delectable with a chocolate ganache filling with pieces of toffee and topped with a cinnamon cream cheese icing. “I may have won if my judge wasn’t sick,” she remarked. “The judge couldn’t taste my cake.”

Stacie Hart (fourth from left) won a 4th place ribbon for her pie at the Farm Complex in Harrisburg during the state fair earlier this month. She placed in the top five from 73 entries.

Only one winner was eligible from each county, and from 73 pies, Hart placed fourth. She said she won first place at the Lycoming County Fair three years ago, but this was the first time she placed in the top five for the state.

There were five judges and each judge had 15 pies to taste in order to narrow them down to the top 25 and eventually down to the last five. Hart said she left Muncy at 5:30 a.m. for Harrisburg at the Pennsylvania State Farm Complex, and by 12:30 p.m. the winners were announced for the pies.

Hart said she is planning ideas now for recipes for 2013’s fair. The Food Network is always on in her salon and her customers were able to enjoy 13 different kinds of homemade Christmas cookies. “Come May, I will start doing some serious baking.”