Holiday Baking Championship Season 3: Recap, Bakes and Winner

Spoiler note: this recap names the Season 3 winner and covers how the season played out.

Season 3 produced the franchise's biggest crossover star. Jason Smith did not stop at winning the holiday title, he went on to win an entirely different Food Network competition the following year and became a recurring face on the network. It remains one of the clearest cases of a Baking Championship win launching a full television career. The full season by season record lives on our Holiday Baking Championship show hub.

Season 3 at a glance

The finalists

Jason Smith, a cafeteria manager from Grayson, Kentucky, won the season. The runners-up, both listed as co-finalists, were Cheryl Storms and Shawne Bryan.

How a Holiday Baking Championship episode works

Season 3 ran on the franchise's now-familiar two-round format: a preheat challenge to open each episode, followed by a bigger, festively themed main heat that decides who is eliminated. Contestants bake in a shared studio kitchen against a countdown clock rather than in private stations, with the judges tasting and critiquing each dish in turn before sending a baker home.

Notable moments of Season 3

Jason Smith's personality carried this season, and it kept paying off well after the finale aired. In 2017 he went on to win Food Network Star Season 13, which led directly to him hosting his own shows on the network. That double win, first a Baking Championship, then a Food Network Star title, makes him one of the rare contestants across the entire baking championship franchise to parlay a single win into an ongoing television career rather than a one-off appearance.

This was also the last season to air an episode on Christmas Day itself, with the finale landing on December 25, 2016, a scheduling quirk that gave the season an unusually festive finish even by this show's standards.

What was at stake

Holiday Baking Championship's cash prize, reported at $50,000 in its early seasons, sits alongside the title as the show's main reward, a different structure from The Great British Bake Off, which gives out no money at all. For a contestant like Jason Smith, that prize and the exposure of winning were enough of a launchpad to go on and compete for an entirely separate Food Network title the following year. It is a reminder that this franchise, unlike the amateur-only British format, often draws contestants who are already building careers around food and are looking for a bigger platform rather than a first break.

Three seasons in, this eight-episode run matched Season 2's length, though the show would trim to seven episodes for the two seasons that followed before settling permanently on eight from Season 6 onward. Jason Smith's crossover into Food Network Star remains one of the clearest examples of one competition win opening the door to an entirely different show.

Where to watch and what to read next

Season 3 is generally available to stream on Discovery+ and Max, alongside periodic reruns on Food Network's own broadcast schedule. The complete champion list across all twelve seasons is in our Holiday Baking Championship winners roundup, which also covers the current host and judging lineup in full. Season 2 came before this one, and Season 4 marks the point where Jesse Palmer took over hosting duties from Bobby Deen.

Judge Duff Goldman has judged nearly every season of this franchise, and his path from cake artist to television judge is covered in our Duff Goldman profile. If Jason's showmanship has you wanting to build a bigger cake presentation at home, a sturdy cake stand is the simplest way to make any home bake look competition ready.