Summary
Hi there, I’m Peter Sawkins. I’m a baker from Edinburgh, and was the winner of The Great British Bake Off in 2020. I became the show’s youngest winner at 20 years old and am the only Scot to have won the competition. I also took part in and won The Great British Bake Off’s New Year/Hogmanay special in 2025.
While competing on The Great British Bake Off, I was studying for a degree in Accounting and Finance at the University of Edinburgh. I graduated in 2023, before being elected as the Edinburgh University Sports Union President for 2023-24. Beyond baking, I’m passionate about sports and am a keen competitive badminton player.
Since my time on Bake Off, I have published two baking books, studied at pastry school and turned my passion into some sort of a career through working with multiple brands and sharing my passion for baking online. Thank you for supporting my work by being here and reading my website. I hope you’ll enjoy reading my recipes and trying them out in your kitchen!
If you want to hear a little more about my journey through baking – keep reading this page. But I wouldn’t blame you if you just wanted to get straight to the cake recipes!
Baking Beginnings
I started baking, as many people do, with my Mum in the kitchen. In Edinburgh, the capital city of Scotland where I have always lived, we had the marvelous joy of a half-day from school on Fridays. This was a joy for my brother and I, but maybe not for my parents who had to fill 15 years worth of Fridays afternoons with activities to keep us occupied. Along with tennis, the odd bit of snooker or occasionally golf, baking often fell quite high up on the list of acitvities to keep two 5-12 year olds active and out of too much trouble!
My Mum is a great baker, so I was very lucky to have her teach me the basics. We started baking simple things – shortbread, flapjacks (the British kind that’s like an oaty biscuit bar) and even, to the horror of many coming here for homemade recipes, packet cupcake mixes! In the photo below, you can see me and Mum baking luminous pink cupcakes with the specific flavour that is only created by the many, many E-numbers present in a Tom and Jerry packet cupcake mix!
Back in these early days of baking, if I’m being completely honest, I think I was mainly interested in eating part at the end of the experience. A passion must have been brewing, but it wasn’t until a few years later when this casual Friday afternoon activity became a full-flung obsession!
Inspired by Bake Off
The first series of The Great British Bake Off aired on TV in the UK in 2010. I was 10 years old. Our family watched and enjoyed the first two series of the show, but in 2012 I became completely and utterly hooked on the third series. I didn’t know it then, but reflecting on this, I pin this hook on John Whaite and James Morton, two of the show’s finalists that year. These were two young men with an unapologetic passion for the hobby of home baking. They became role models and gave me confidence to explore baking without worrying what anyone else would think (I later found that people always support your baking hobby because they love to eat cake!). And that was it, I was now obsessed with baking!
From that age on, I watched and rewatched Bake Off episodes, the Bake Off masterclasses, Great British Menu, Saturday Kitchen, Masterchef and anything else foodie on TV and tried to replicate the techniques I saw. My baking book collection grew a little out of hand, and I would combine different recipes to test out as many new techniques as possible. For the next six years, my evenings after school would either be filled with playing sport or trying a new baking technique. I found what I loved, and for no real reason other than the sense of satisfaction and joy for the process I was hyper-focussed on improving and expanding my skills all the time.
Bake Off 2020
The reason I’m writing this webpage and the reason I get to call all of this “work” is all because of The Great British Bake Off and my great fortune to get on the show and win the competition in 2020.
From the age of 12, as I was having fun experimenting in the kitchen, failing frequently and improving a lot, I didn’t realise I was, in a sense, training for the show that inspired me to love baking. So at my first opportunity at the age of 17, I applied for Bake Off. I didn’t get on, so I applied again when I was 19 and was accepted. Baking had a significant impact on the previous eight years of my life, so the chance to take part in Bake Off, my original inspiration, was beyond exciting!
We shot the show in the middle of the first UK Covid-19 lockdown, so we lived and baked in this surreal, intense and lively ‘Baking Bubble’ for seven brilliant weeks. I had the most amazing time and met the most amazing people. The experience of meeting, baking and living with my baking peers, and the cast, crew and support team working together to create Bake Off only made me love the show even more.
I will always be grateful for the immense impact that The Great British Bake Off has had on my life, from the inspiration it gave me, to the experience I had on the show, and now to the career it has opened up for me. I am truly blessed for all that this amazing, warm show has provided.
After Bake Off
Following competing on the show, I have been incredibly fortunate to turn my passion for baking into a career. I was in my 3rd year of a 5 year degree when the show aired, so for 3 years I balanced this new line of work with my studies. Then I worked full-time for a year as the University of Edinburgh’s student sport representative (a job I loved!). For these years, this line of work was in essence the best part-time job or side hustle that anyone could ask for. I was able to engage with brands, write receipes, prodcue videos, appear on tv and radio and even publish my first two books. All of this was incredibly exciting, I had found a way to explore my creativity and call it ‘work’! In this time I was also able to gain more experience doing short stints in pastry kitchens in the UK, and I studied at the Amaury Guichon Pastry Academy in Las Vegas, graduating in September 2024.
Since my time at pastry school and finishing my studies, I have focused much more on this part of my life. I still work a part-time job in Sports Fundraising at my University (a job which, again, I love!), but I now have much more time to dedicate to this side of my life and work. As I am growing this line of work, I am looking for more ways to share my knowledge, ideas and passion for baking with as many people as possible. This will mainly be online through my Instagram (@peter_bakes) , new website and YouTube channel. I’m incredibly grateful to everyone who continues following and supporting my work, and hope that in return as thanks from me to you, you will find enjoyment and value from the work that I share.
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