OUTSTANDING BAKER OR DESSERT PROFESSIONAL: Gina Ocasio
Gina Ocasio, Mira
1081 Elmwood Avenue, Buffalo, NY 14222
Gina Ocasio runs the pastry, baking and pasta programs at Mira, a Mediterranean restaurant on Buffalo’s popular Elmwood Avenue. This triple mastery shows up across the menu in many ways: tiramisu with malted milk mascarpone, Sardinian culurgiones stuffed and braided by hand, Concord grape sorbetto, Ligurian pansotti in brown butter and burgundy truffle, and beef tartare sprinkled with colatura served on a thick slice of her housemade semolina bread layered with shredded celeriac.
The best proof of her range may be Saturday brunch: a counter-service menu of fluffy sugared bomboloni stuffed with crema diplomatica, cannoli, brown butter hazelnut raspberry croissants, thick housemade French toast, quiche and more, each dish imbued with the same care as her dinner-service desserts. In 2026, Buffalo Spree readers named Mira the Best New Restaurant and Best for Desserts, the latter a direct nod to one aspect of her extensive contribution to the restaurant’s menu.
Gina Ocasio trained under Brooks Headley, the James Beard Foundation’s Outstanding Pastry Chef in 2013, at Michelin-starred Del Posto in New York, then moved to Sqirl in Los Angeles before her pastry program at Fiore Fine Foods earned a Philadelphia Magazine award for Best Pastries in 2019. After moving to Buffalo in 2022, Ocasio took over the pastry programs at Remedy House and Flint before joining The Grange Community Kitchen. She and her husband, chef Manny Ocasio, with the support of their business partners, opened Mira in late 2025. Both she and Manny are Visit Buffalo James Beard Award Committee selections this year.
