LEOMINSTER >> City resident Lisa Clark is thrilled to be a contestant on the season 11 of the Food Network’s “Spring Baking Championship.”

The executive pastry chef and cake designer extraordinaire — who works at the award-winning, Northboro-based catering and event design company Peppers Artful Events — recently announced on social media that she will be on the competitive cable TV show debuting on March 10, which was met with a flurry of positive comments and congratulations.

“I was beyond excited when I got the call that I would be one of the 13 contestants on the show,” Clark said. “I was also incredibly nervous — I didn’t want to let anyone down, including myself. Once everything sank in, I realized that simply being on the show is a huge accomplishment. Not many people get this opportunity, and I’m very grateful I was able to push myself and get out of my own way. I’m very proud of myself and how far I’ve come!”

The Redmond, Washington native graduated from the Fashion Institute of Design & Merchandising in San Francisco with a degree in Fashion Merchandise Product Development. After working in the fashion industry for a few years, she decided to change careers and attended culinary arts institute Le Cordon Bleu in Portland, Oregon, for pastry and baking. After graduating, she relocated to Leominster where she has been living for 11 years and she and her husband Joel have a three-year-old daughter named Audrey.

After graduating from Le Cordon Bleu, she began working at a farm-to-table restaurant called The Country Cat, also in Oregon. She was the head pastry chef there for two years before moving to Massachusetts, where she took on her current role at Peppers Artful Events.

“Within Peppers, we have our own bakery called CakeArt,” she said. “We offer everything from wedding cakes, pies, and tarts to mini sweets, cookies, and brownies. We’re an off-site catering company, so we go to different venues and cater people’s events. We can cater anything a client wants or dreams up, including weddings, birthdays, holiday parties, corporate events, and more.”

Clark boasts over 15 years of expertise in her field and her dedication to impressing clients not only with her artistic presentation but also with the delightful flavors of her creations has paid off. In 2019 she earned the “Best Celebration Cake” award at the National ICA Catie Awards and has since won “Best Dessert” in both the Fork it Over and Taste of Nashoba competitions.

She shared that she has enjoyed baking since she was a little girl.

“I would stand on a stool in my diaper and roll out pie dough with my mom, Gloria,” Clark said of the beginnings of her passion for baking. “I then started using a Barbie Easy-Bake Oven and eventually graduated to using the real kitchen. Baking has always been a passion of mine. The joy of creating something from scratch and putting smiles on people’s faces when they try my desserts is something I just love.”

Her favorite things to create are wedding and birthday cakes, which are often a meaningful focal point for celebratory events.

“I love feeding off the client’s excitement and getting to be creative in the design process,” she said. “I also enjoy turning those clients into repeat customers because the cake not only looks amazing but tastes even better.”

Clark disclosed that she was discovered by the Food Network casting team through her Instagram. They contacted Peppers Artful Events to ask if she would be interested in participating in the show and she “nervously said yes.”

Her husband stayed back to hold down the fort with help from her parents while she went to Burbank, California to film “Spring Baking Championship” in May of last year.

“The experience was surreal,” Clark said, quipping “to be honest, looking back I feel like I blacked out a lot of the time, but I had the best time.”

“It was definitely one of the most stressful periods of my life, but also the most rewarding,” she said. “The other 12 contestants I met have truly become some of my closest friends, and I’m genuinely grateful for all of them. We really bonded and because we were all in it together, it was comforting to have them there.”

Future goals and plans include opening her own tea house one day.

“I love the idea of creating little tea sandwiches and mini pastries,” Clark said. “I spend a lot of time visiting other tea houses to gather inspiration and hope to make this dream a reality one day.”

But for now, she is excited to share her “Spring Baking Championship” experience with her family and friends and relive it from another perspective with insider knowledge.

“When watching the show from home, you might think it looks easy, or that anyone could do what the bakers are doing. However, I learned that being part of it is completely different,” Clark said. “The stress level is incredibly high. Nobody wants to go home; there are over 50 cameras surrounding you, tons of people watching, and the constant hope that you have enough time to complete whatever was assigned. Like I said, it’s super stressful [but] I also discovered that I’m a lot stronger than I thought and I am a quick thinker who can be creative on the fly.”