Sweet standoff: Tasters flock to strawberry dessert contest for charitable cause

This wasn’t your grandma’s Strawberry Jell-O Pretzel Salad.

Twelve purveyors teamed up with their favorite nonprofit to present their sweet twist to the iconic Pittsburgh dessert during the Strawberry Jell-O Pretzel Salad Standoff presented by Ya Jagoff! on May 10 at The Block Northway in McCandless.

“It is a Pittsburgh thing. People turn out for it. There were folks who waited to see what they created,” said Rachel Rennebeck, co-founder of YaJagoff Media with John Chamberlin.

“Everybody comes up with something different each year,” Chamberlin said.

This is the fourth year of the event, where Strawberry Jell-O Pretzel Salad lovers register to taste each of the purveyors’ creations, styled and doled out at the mall’s upper floor with their nonprofit teammates.

Pre-registered tasters were then tasked to vote for their favorite. The winner received notoriety, and a $1,000 prize was donated to their partnering nonprofit.

Chamberlain said they increased taster registration to 300 this year, which was full a week before the deadline. The $5 fee was charged to offset some of the purveyors’ costs.

For the third year in a row, the People’s Choice Award went to Jay Obertance of Boujay, with the $1,000 prize going toward Ryan Douglass Field of Dreams. The nonprofit provides free baseball clinics for kids.

The prize money was courtesy of My Preferred Insurance and Home Solutions in McCandless and Mancini’s Bread Co. in Pittsburgh.

Aycho Melange, which partnered with Northland Public Library in McCandless, won the judge’s choice award and will be featured in an upcoming YaJagoff! Late Night show.

Some of the guest judges included local Pittsburgh chef Jackie Page, influencer Ana Anthony of Ana Eats Pgh and Kimberly Rhoades, a Pittsburgh artist, comedian and content creator.

Chamberlin and Rennebeck began the event during the pandemic as a way to bring the community together and support local restaurants. And with restaurants being short on staff, the media duo came up with the idea of purveyors partnering with nonprofits, which would then provide a helping hand at the events.

“We wanted something to celebrate Pittsburgh and strawberry Jell-O salad is very Pittsburgh, just our like our podcast,” Chamberlin said. “The work that the purveyors put in. They really put some creativity into it.”

“Pittsburgh loves to celebrate Pittsburgh,” Rennebeck said.

Bernice Streiff of Emsworth was there with her daughter, Melissa Slepski of Reserve.

“I just wanted to see what everybody else is making,” Streiff said.

Slepski likes learning different ways to make the dessert so she can compare it to her own.

“This is one of our favorite things to eat,” Slepski said.

The YaJagOff! team said they already are thinking about next year’s event with a date to be determined.

Other teams included Burgh Eats and Treats with nonprofit 412 Thrive; Cookie, Cookie Ice Cream with Bender Leadership Academy; Jenny Lee with Hair Peace Charities; Flour Power with Variety Pittsburgh – The Children’s Charity; Spectrum Fudge with Making Strides Foundation; Kemi’s Kitchen with America’s Single Mother; Cooking Comedy Chaos with Community Kitchen; Ambridge with McKees Rocks Rotary Club; Nothing Bundt Cake with Semper Fi Mission; and Doug Heilman with Pittsburgh Emergency Medicine Foundation.