Diana Takes a Bite shows off Ludo's Napoleon.

Last December, the inaugural Eat My Blog bake sale raised over $3,000 for the Los Angeles Regional Food Bank. Pretty nice for a first time effort. But this past Saturday’s event went further by exceeding Eat My Blog founder Cathy Danh’s goal of over $5K; $5,427 to be exact. Congrats to Cathy and the Eat My Blog crew!

I was fortunate enough to participate, not by baking something (left that to those with nommy knowhow), but by volunteering and working a shift. And what fun it was! I got to meet bloggers and tweeps I’ve only known via their screen names and some of my crackheads as well as hang out with old friends.

Apart from the amazing sales number and the delicious treats, here are other highlights of the sale for me:

• Both the Momofuku’s Crack Pies from the Los Angeles Times’ Daily Dish sold even before they hit the sales table.
• A girl bought Chef Ludo’s Napoleon for her birthday cake. Lucky girl and what a great idea!
• Mattatouille selling Scoops ice cream with flavors like pear gorgonzola, fig pistachio, chocolate Guinness and malted Oreos. YUM!
• Having refreshing beer (Eagle Rock Manifesto) pre-noon with H.C. to cool down from the oppressive sunshine on the Tender Greens patio.
• Snacking on the tasty “rejects” from Starry Kitchen‘s batch of pandan vanilla churros.
• Meeting the blogger who made it her goal to complete my L.A. bucket list within the year.
• Seeing friends Food GPS, Food Marathon, Estarla, ShopEatSleep, SauceLA, MyLastBite, Glutster, Sam Kim, Jonathan of Compartes Chocolatier, TallNoe, and more.
• Cozying up to that well-behaved and adorable Shiba Inu that visited the sale. I could not stop fawning over him.
• Being able to have at the hot sellers before they sold out. I learned my lesson last year when by the time I showed up at the sale all my favorites were already sold out. Not this time! My goodie box included Squashblossom‘s smoked salt toffee, Eating LA‘s chocolate Guinness cupcakes, Let Me Eat Cake/Manila Machine‘s Ube cupcakes, Domestic Divas‘ bacon brownie with caramel bourbon sauce, blueberry buckle from G-ma?s Bakery and more.

The event was so well-organized and ran so smoothly. We had ample help so there were no crazy lines and I was able to get out and mingle. I definitely want to participate in the next one. Maybe I’ll even try to bake something myself!

For a slideshow of the event check out Cathy’s Flickr featuring Steven Lam’s beautiful photos.