A team led by Miami Culinary Institute sophomore Christian Barruos-Brens was awarded the 2024 People’s Choice Award for Best Dessert during the Orange Bowl Food & Wine Festival on April 12.
Brens’ Cafecito Brownie—a chocolate confection augmented by coffee-flavored ganache, coquito whipped cream and a shot of cold coquito on the side—took home the prize.
With the help of MCI chef instructor Rowan Finley-Jacobs, MCI student Emma Ojito and Barruos-Brens’ mother Celeste Brens, he prepared 1,000 brownies.
“Winning this award meant a lot, it meant all that work paid off,” the 20-year-old said. “It’s the story of my brownie and how I came to be where I am now.”
The celebration, held at the Seminole Hard Rock Hotel & Casino in Hollywood, Florida, featured culinary competitions and food and beverage tastings from more than 30 of South Florida’s finest chefs and restaurants.
Barruos-Brens started selling brownies in 2018 through Moonlight Sweets, his home baking business, to help his mother, who was battling thyroid and breast cancer.
His Cafecito Brownie, which also won the Golden Plate Award for Best Dish (Sweet) at Easterseals South Florida’s 33rd Annual Festival of Chefs in January, pays homage to his father Fernando Barruos—a Cuban coffee aficionado—who died during Barruos-Brens’ senior year of high school.
