Bake Off Winner Jasmine Mitchell on St Andrews, Crumble Competitions and Newfound Fame

Freshly out of the tent, with five Star Baker titles, two Hollywood handshakes, and an engraved glass cake stand to her name, 2025 Great British Bake Off winner Jasmine Mitchell was grinning from ear to ear. 

“It’s felt pretty crazy,” Mitchell told The Saint. “It’s all a lot of fun adjusting to a different pace of life.”

The 23-year-old medical student graduated from the University of St Andrews in 2024 and won the Great British Bake Off just months later, on 4 November, 2025. 

After missing the acceptance call from Bake Off producers in February of last year whilst on a GP placement, Mitchell eventually rang them back. “I was literally on a train and had to talk in code,” she laughed. 

Since receiving the life-changing call, winning the show, and charming the nation with her infectious smile and iconic cowboy boots, Mitchell has made quite the media debut.

“It’s really kicked off these past couple of weeks,” she explained. The Bake Off Champion has appeared on the BBC, Lorraine, and has over 143,000 followers on Instagram. 

After competing and making lifelong friends with fellow finalists, Mitchell recalled her time between the semi-final challenges. “We were just lying there and Tom [Arden] and Toby [Littlewood] were doing hand-stand walking competitions,” Mitchell said. “I was just thinking, this is such an awesome experience, and we are never going to be here again.” 

Mitchell had an incredible support network behind the scenes during her time on the show. She lives in London with her two cousins and has friends and family rallying around her. “They put up with so much mess and chaos,” she said. “I remember I would finish a bake, and it looked like a bomb had gone off. Ella would say, ‘Get out of here and I’ll clear it up.’ It was such a saving grace.”

“Every morning, I would have a bit of time to sit and pray and be quiet, I think it almost meant that I didn’t have this pressure on myself,” Mitchell explained. She emphasised how important her faith was throughout the entire process of Bake Off filming. 

Mitchell is in her fifth year of studying medicine. Despite her Bake Off success, she still plans on becoming a doctor, alongside pursuing her passion for food. “I also really want to push the creative, cooking side of things. I’m really excited about what's coming next,” she explained. Mitchell plans on writing at least one cookbook — hopefully more. 

“I have memories from a very young age, standing on a little stool or chair next to the counter helping to mix or add ingredients,” she recalled. Growing up in a big family that loved having people over, she remembers helping with baking, cooking, and preparing in the kitchen. “That's definitely shaped my love for food and baking.”

Mitchell was born and raised in the north of Edinburgh. “I love that city a lot,” she said fondly. Although now spending time further south, she still misses home — and especially her former university town.

“In St Andrews, you have the small town vibe and feel, being able to swim in the sea every day. I miss it a lot being in London, this concrete jungle basically,” she added. 

No stranger to remote life, Mitchell did a week of cooking in the highlands for family friends during university holidays. Given the remote location, which was only accessible via boat, she faced the challenge of managing supplies, cooking, and transport. “It was all a logistical nightmare, but I think it definitely set me up well for the Bake Off,” she said. 

For Mitchell, St Andrews was a formative time, both academically and personally. “I was constantly trying to work out how little sleep I could function off the next day and how I could be stood up in dissection the next day for two hours.” A challenging balance to get right: “I got it wrong quite a few times,” she admitted. 

More than just a place to study, Mitchell has fond memories of food in St Andrews. “One of the things I love is, because it’s so small, you can easily just knock on each other’s doors,” she recalled. In autumn, when people leave boxes of apples outside their doors, she remembers making a lot of crumble. 

This became a regular habit for Mitchell, even leading her to be unknowingly signed up for a crumble-off by two of her flatmates: “I got a text at 1am, saying, ‘Jasmine, you’re making us a crumble.’” That was the one bake off she didn’t end up winning. “I think it was probably a good thing I didn’t win,” she laughed. “It was humbling.”

Mitchell learnt a lot in St Andrews from juggling medicine with having fun, something that came into play when she was balancing medical revision with long days of Bake Off filming. “I had to really focus for an hour or two a day instead of doing a whole day of revision, because that’s all I really had,” she said. 

Whilst studying for exams at the same time as whipping up mini meringues in the tent, Mitchell spoke publicly during bread week about her Alopecia, saying to the cameras, “[It’s] ironic that I am plaiting when I have no hair to plait myself.”

During her first year at St Andrews, “I would always wear a wig and never go without it,” Mitchell recalled. However, after spending some time travelling during her first year summer, she decided to return to university without a wig. 

“St Andrews was honestly the best place I could have been in the process of stopping wearing wigs,” she said. “It’s such a fun place, people are quirky, interesting, and have stuff that makes them different and unique.”

In her final year, Mitchell modelled for charity fashion show DONT WALK, St Andrews’ largest student-run fashion show.

“I could never imagine being in a fashion show, let alone being in a fashion show with no hair,” Mitchell recalled. “It was a massive confidence boost, just being on a catwalk.”

Beyond strutting on the runway, the Bake Off winner loves to combine her two passions of friends and food. “It’s such a beautiful way of getting people off their phones and actually deeply connecting, chatting, and building a community, which I feel like we don’t have at the moment,” That’s why she loves hosting, believing that enjoying food in good company can add so much to our society.

Mitchell has plans to share even more food, cooking, and lifestyle content online, alongside her passion for all things beautiful and aesthetic, from table settings to fashion and food. 

Although active on social media, “I live with the app [Instagram] deleted off my phone because I just end up scrolling and I hate that,” she said.

Through juggling newfound fame, cooking, med school, and an active London social life, Mitchell manages to seem incredibly put together.

“It sounds ridiculous, but when I have a lot on, I write everything down and just prioritise,” she said. “Start with what you have to do, and everything else will follow. And just try and enjoy it.”

Image: Channel 4