Content Warning: The following article includes descriptions of graphic themes from the Halloween Baking Championship finale, including fictional depictions of violent or gory scenarios.

West Jordan’s Melanie Bjork-Jensen takes home the Food Network Halloween Baking Championship Season 11 grand prize of $25,000.

In the finale, the remaining four bakers were challenged to make a cake that portrayed a terrible way to die. Each contestant got one of their own or fellow contestants’ worst fears. Other assignments were being skinned alive (Alan), being eaten by bugs (Oksana), and drowning (Cory).

Bjork-Jensen, a registered nurse and business owner, won with a two-tier, monochrome black Victorian piped cake, filled with chocolate and peanut butter (her most ordered flavor). Her challenge was to portray being crushed to death.

Three hours into the five-hour challenge, Bjork-Jensen threw out her original design of a crushed human body, to personify “crushed by perfection.” The cake was topped with a blood-streaked sign that read ‘You are not enough.’

As a nurse, Bjork-Jensen has seen plenty of crushed limbs. Personally, she has experienced a crushed spirit. “One small smash can kill you,” she said. When bones are crushed, they release chemicals that are healthy for bones, but toxic if released in large quantities into your bloodstream. One crushed foot could cause a fatal heart attack. Likewise, a crushed human spirit is destructive and potentially fatal. “This cake represented me getting crushed by what other people want,” she said.

Her personal interpretation of the challenge brought the judges to tears and ultimately won her first place.

She plans to use the $25,000 for “the boring things,” she said, like paying off her car and getting a heater for her home. She is also granting some of her kids life-long wishes. Her daughter has always wanted to “eat at a restaurant that has clothes on the table,” a.k.a. with a fabric tablecloth, and her son has been obsessed with boats since he was little. The family cruise will be a well-earned celebration of her hard work and creativity.