What’s been happining in the world of The Great British Bake off?
Since I last reported our GBBO goings on, much has happened. We’ve had pastry week, where the contestants had to produce chouxnuts – yep, you guessed it, yet another delicacy nobody here on planet earth has ever heard of. Baklava was the technical challenge (why bother – nobody likes it anyway) and a multi-layered terrine pie. Yawn….
The most exciting thing about this week’s shenanegans was when Amanda’s carefully crafted pie lost it’s lid, as she tried gingerly to take off it’s metal casing. Everyone in the tent watched open-mouthed, holding their breath, as the pie wall crumbled and Amanda’s efforts all lead, inevitably, to her timely demise.
We did, however, see Crystelle get her first PHH (Paul Hollywood handshake), when he duped her into believing there was something amiss with her exquisite curry pie house (decorated to perfection with painted leaves) by saying “Crystelle what’s this?” and pointing to some imaginary faux-pas. She trembled as she inched towards him, only to have his hand shoved in her direction for her to eagerly accept, while almost fainting from the shock. Crystelle, deservedly, went on to receive her first Star Baker award for this masterpiece of pie-perfection.
Fortunately for George, he escaped the chop in pastry week, despite his terrine pie containing a frozen sausage snake in the centre, caused by his boo-boo of leaving it in the freezer for too long. Hmmm tasty!
We then had the first ever caramel week, which was almost as successful as german week. I wonder why the GBBO creators feel it’s necessary to bring in new ‘weeks’ when the ‘weeks’ in the past always worked well enough.
Once again, it seems to me more like the opposite of a good idea to expect the contestants to attempt to make concoctions of the super-heated-sugary variety that is caramel, in the middle of the summer, in a hot tent. THEN be surprised when they haven’t cooled sufficiently for the creation to reach its intended cooled conclusion. Recipe for disaster in my opinion. Not that I’m a scientist or anything of course….
The opening caramel tart challenge, appeared to be a challenge too far for some of the bakers, when their caramel was not sufficiently cooled enough for the decorations to sit on top, without instantly melting into a sticky, gooey puddle. How very surprising.
Then the technical this week must surely be one of the most unrealistic challenges so far – basically they were asked to make a Twix – or a chocolate covered shortcake biscuit, with a layer of toffee, sat perfectly on top. (FYI Twixes are made in a factory, by machines to ensure they’re perfectly matching in size, texture, proportions – not hand made by amateurs). Guiseppe won this week’s Twix challenge, but Paul made it clear that his were the best of the worst. Full of compliments isn’t he?
Finally, the showstopper was a caramel dessert, topped with a sugar dome.Why? Who in the history of puddings anywhere in the universe has ever spent ages, painstakingly and meticulously creating a delicious dessert, then said “I know exactly what this needs – a sugar dome on top.” Precisely nobody is the answer!
So we left caramel week with a huge sigh of relief from everyone involved, and a tear in the eye of George. Despite his successful Salted Caramel Almond & Hazelnut Dacquoise dessert with the most perfect of domes, he was still voted out, as he had, in Paul’s words “made more mistakes than Lizzie”. So, watch out Lizzie – your turn will be next, unless you can pull something truly miraculous out from under your pinny.
Roll on Week 8 – Free From Week. Really? Good grief……….