Tina Zaccardi: Where Are They Now?

Spoiler note: this post confirms that Tina Zaccardi won her season of The Great American Baking Show.

Tina Zaccardi won season 4 of The Great American Baking Show in December 2018, the season that rebooted the show after the pulled season 3, with Paul Hollywood and Sherry Yard judging and Emma Bunton and Anthony Adams hosting. An Eastchester, New York mom who was working at Fordham University when she filmed, she has since built exactly the post-show life the title promises and so few winners deliver: a real, working baking education business. Here is the story.

The season 4 win

Zaccardi's 2018 win was a local news event across Westchester County, with Westchester Magazine profiling the "Eastchester mom" champion and Fordham proudly claiming its employee's national title. The season itself carried unusual weight: after the Iuzzini scandal wiped out season 3's broadcast, this was the run that had to prove the American show could still work. It did, and Zaccardi's steady, Italian-American-rooted baking was a big part of why. She is the fourth name in the full list of Great American Baking Show winners.

Tina Zaccardi Bakes

Where many winners drift back to their day jobs, Zaccardi built a brand. Her business, Tina Zaccardi Bakes, runs baking classes, demonstrations, and appearances across New York and Connecticut, from library events to community college tasting programs to Mother's Day baking classes. Her specialty programming leans into her heritage, including classes on classic Italian-American cookies, and she has continued making television appearances since the win. Local press has followed her around the region for years, including a Newtown, Connecticut feature on her scone demonstrations.

Where things stand now

Zaccardi remains one of the most consistently active American champions: her website's events calendar has stayed populated, her Instagram (tinazaccardibakes) is a working recipe developer's feed, and her identity has settled into "baking educator" more than "reality alum." No cookbook has been announced publicly as of this writing, which honestly seems like an oversight on some publisher's part.

The takeaway for fans

Season 4 is the American show's comeback season and worth watching on those terms. And if you live anywhere in the New York metro area, Zaccardi is the rare champion you can actually learn from in person; check her class schedule and bring questions about the tent.