On The Menu Archives - Positively Petaluma

Interview: Local Girl Makes Good Food! #Petaluma’s Laurie Figone is the World Dessert Champ

Last year Laurie Figone, born and raised on a ranch just outside of Petaluma, was declared the 2014 World Dessert Champion. In the last five years Figone has made a name for herself in the cooking world, where she shows her Petaluma pride by using local products. Figone has also been on the NBC TODAY Show and on TNT with Emeril Lagasse and Ty Pennington. For more information on that see our previous posts about Laurie VIDEO UPDATE: #Petaluma’s Laurie Figone gets her shot on the big screen on TNT’s “On The Menu” and VIDEO: #Petaluma’s Laurie Figone Appears on Good Day Sacramento.

Laurie Figone grew up on her family's ranch and always enjoys coming back — Laurie Figone grew up on her familys ranch and always enjoys coming back

Growing up on a ranch and having large weekly family dinners with at least 30 people gave Figone a passion for cooking and food. Figone speaks fondly about these dinners saying, “My grandmother loved doing all the cooking … I, growing up, wanted to be down at the barn feeding calves but my mother kept me in the house. I hated it at the time but now I have to say I thank her because … I’ve just won another World Championship with my cooking and I never imagined any of this, truthfully.”

Taste of Home 2010 is the first cookbook in which one of Laurie Figones recipe’s was published

Figone’s professional cooking started five years ago when a neighbor helped her realize her talent. Figone was baking focaccia bread for one of her neighbors to take to work and soon her neighbor’s coworkers were requesting and buying Figone’s focaccia. Figone then secretly submitted her focaccia recipe to Taste of Home’s recipe contest and won. It was her first published recipe and the start of her cooking career.

The next step for Figone was participating in her first live cooking competition at the Gilroy Garlic Festival where she, again, won. From there things took off and she went on the NBC TODAY Show for their burger battle and to the Annual Bob’s Red Mill Spar for the Spurtle where she won and was sent to Scotland for the Annual World Porridge Making Championship. In the last year Figone was on TNT’s reality show On the Menu with Emeril Lagasse and Ty Pennington.

CLICK HERE OR PAGE 2 BELOW TO GET LAURIE’S ST. PATRICK’S DAY BAKED CORNED BEEF WITH A KICK RECIPE AND VIDEOS

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VIDEO: #Petaluma’s Laurie Figone Appears On Good Day Sacramento

Our very own Dessert World Champ Laurie Figone appeared on Good Day Sacramento sharing secrets on how to make her Mojito Marvel Money Bars that give all the flavors of a Mojito in a creamy dessert.

The video will appear below and may take some machines a few seconds to populate.

Also check out her website that has a ‘Recipes’ tab where she shares many of her great recipes. Click here to see her dessert recipes. She will be releasing her cookbook in the near future.

For more on Laurie Figone see our previous post VIDEO UPDATE: #Petaluma’s Laurie Figone gets her shot on the big screen on TNT’s “On The Menu”.

VIDEO UPDATE: #Petaluma’s Laurie Figone gets her shot on the big screen on TNT’s “On The Menu”

                            Photo Courtesy of TNT

Update 10/12/2014: YouTube video Cooking With Laurie Figone at the 2014 Sonoma County Fair on September 1, 2014; In the first six and a half minutes of this video Laurie tells the story how she came to be on television and the amazing story on how she chose the music for her show and met country western talent Pete Stringfellow, with records like Pole Dance and titles such as It Ain’t Nothin.

This self-proclaimed “cook-a-holic” is a native of Novato and currently resides in Petaluma. Joe Wolfcale of the Novato Advance interviews Laurie Figone a 55-year-old mother of two whose first show “On The Menu” (a cooking show featuring Ty Pennington and chef Emeril Lagasse) will air for the first time Friday, Oct. 17 beginning at 8 p.m. on TNT and will feature the cuisine of California Pizza Kitchen.

Growing up on the Leveroni Brothers Dairy ranch in rural Novato, she studied agriculture at Petaluma High School. She is a proponent of using locally sourced ingredients from Sonoma and Marin County. In the interview she says “There are some delicious things being grown around these parts,” She also goes on to say “My dream is to one day have a sponsor for my show,” Figone said. “Everyone loves Sonoma and Marin, and they all want to know what’s being produced there.”

Click here for the entire interview.