Meet Jai Xiong, the Talented Pastry Chef on 'Spring Baking Championship'

Minnesota native Jai Xiong is a contestant on Season 9 of Food Network's Spring Baking Championship. She hails from Amour Patisserie, and creates delights for customers that include strawberry shortcake, wedding cakes, and everything in between, according to the bakery's Instagram account.

Let's get to know the executive chef and owner of the bakery, who is competing against 11 talented contestants to win the ultimate prize of $25,000, all while wowing viewers with incredible and drool-worthy confections we'd die to nibble on.

In June of 2021, Jai founded Amour Patisserie in St. Paul, Minn. The bakery is described as featuring "Korean- and French-inspired custom luxury cakes and desserts" and the photos online are making us crave sugar!

As Jai gushed on Instagram about her bakery, "This has been my dream ever since I was in high school and it has been such an incredible accomplishment to make it a reality. I still can’t believe that, as of today, I am a business owner!"

Prior to launching her dream business, Jai worked as an executive chef for a country club. "After working in the hospitality industry for almost a decade, I was mentally exhausted [and] overworked, and [I] felt suffocated," she noted about the change she felt in her heart "it was time for."

At the age of 19, Jai had tried launching a home-based bakery business, and Amour Patisserie is basically a rebrand of that original concept.

Jai shared with her followers that her parents are her biggest inspiration for the business. "I grew up helping my parents run their own food business for local Hmong festivals," she shared, adding, "Their dedication to their craft in perfecting every single recipes, fueled my passion for baking."

Jai shared in February of 2023 that she was approached by the Food Network to be a contestant on Season 9 of Spring Baking Championship.

"I hope you all will join in watching me compete and have a good laugh at all my awkwardness and clumsiness," Jai joked in her post, adding, "It was such an incredible journey that was both thrilling and challenging. I am grateful for the opportunity to have taken part in this with a fantastic group of talented chefs."

The new reality star is already winning fans with her infectious personality. As one viewer enthused on Twitter, "I would buy a cake from Jai." And that person is not alone in being team Jai all the way.

Jai is competing against chefs from Mississippi to South Carolina to Vermont and Florida. According to her bio on the Food Network site, and as the name of her bakery suggests, Jai "always bakes with love."

We wish her the very best of luck on Spring Baking Championship. New episodes air Mondays at 8 p.m. EST on the Food Network.