The Bake-Off

In the village of Llanfair, in the hills of north Wales, there are few things that people take more seriously than the summer bake-off. It is held every August in a tent on the cricket field, and for thirty years it has been won by one of two women: Gwen Hughes, who lives at number seven Chapel Street, and Megan Price, who lives at number nine.

Nobody can remember exactly how the rivalry began. Some say it was over a lemon cake in 1994. Others claim it started even earlier, at school, over a boy who later moved to Cardiff and married somebody else entirely. What everyone agrees on is that the two women have barely spoken for decades, except to say "Good morning" over the garden fence in a tone that makes it sound like a threat. Gwen has won fifteen times. So has Megan. This year, everybody said, would decide it.

As the day approached, the competition became more and more intense. Gwen's curtains stayed closed for a week, and the smell of butter and cinnamon drifted down the street at all hours. Megan was seen at the supermarket in Bangor buying so much flour that the girl at the till asked if she ran a bakery. Each of them was determined to bake something bigger, richer and more spectacular than ever before.

Then, two weeks before the contest, a new name appeared on the entry list. Valentina Ruiz had moved to Llanfair in the spring with her Welsh husband, who had grown up in the village and met her while working in Buenos Aires. She was small and cheerful, she was learning Welsh at evening classes, and she had very little idea of what she was getting into. "It's just a little competition, isn't it?" she said to the woman at the post office, who looked at her with something like pity.

On the day of the bake-off, the tent was hotter and more crowded than ever. Gwen arrived with a four-layer coffee and walnut cake, decorated with sugar leaves so thin you could almost see through them. Megan brought a Black Forest gateau so tall that her son had to carry it in from the car. People whispered that the two cakes were the most ambitious anyone had ever seen in Llanfair.

Valentina arrived last, with a plain tin. Inside were two dozen alfajores: small, round biscuits sandwiched together with dulce de leche and rolled in coconut. Next to the two enormous cakes, they looked almost embarrassingly modest. Gwen raised an eyebrow. Megan smiled a little too kindly.

There were three judges: the vicar, a retired headmaster and a woman from a bakery in Caernarfon who was said to be the strictest judge in the county. They tasted Gwen's cake slowly and made a few careful notes. They tasted Megan's gateau and made a few more. Then they each picked up an alfajor.

What happened next became a story that people in Llanfair still tell. The vicar took a bite and closed his eyes. The headmaster took a bite and reached immediately for a second one. The woman from Caernarfon took a bite, put the rest down and said nothing at all for so long that everyone in the tent went quiet. Finally she looked up. "Well," she said. That was all. The judges had very few words for Valentina's alfajores, but their faces said more than enough.

Valentina won first prize. Gwen and Megan came joint second, which was the first time in thirty years that neither of them had won. They stood side by side in front of the results board, looking at it in silence. Then, to the astonishment of the whole village, Gwen turned to Megan and said, "Cup of tea?" And Megan said, "Why not?"

The more they talked that afternoon, the less they could remember why they had stopped. These days, the two women have tea together every Wednesday, and they have a new project: the harder they practice, the closer they get, they believe, to the perfect alfajor. Valentina has promised to teach them. She has not yet told them the secret, but she says that the less sugar they use, the better. Next August, they have all agreed, will be very interesting indeed.