Mm, nice baps.
They're bagels actually.
Can you not look at me like that? I'm your sister.
Oh, yeah, sorry.
Ooh! I feel Darth Baker is close by.
What do you think Prue-bacca?
Rarrrrrrrrrr.
Yeah, you could be right, yeah.
WHEEZING BREATHS
I shouldn't have taken the stairs. I'm knackered.
Too many lemon drizzles, mate.
LIGHTSABER CRACKLES
HE WHIMPERS
SIZZLING
Oh, you just burnt my pie!
It's fine. It's a little on the dark side.
BEEPING
Oh, I think my fruit sponge is ready.
Anyone?
No, I think you'll be eating that flan solo.
ALL: Welcome to The Great British Bake Off.
Noel, you look like Billie Eilish's grandmother.
You look about four.
When I came in, I could see the edges of the tent.
It's almost here! I am just a few steps away.
I feel as though I've fallen down a rabbit hole
and the Mad Hatter's going to come running round the corner.
I cannot wait to walk into that tent,
feel what it's like to be one of those people.
I've never wanted to be in a tent so bad before.
From across Britain, thousands of the best home bakers applied...
Good luck.
...but just 12 have made it.
I've always wanted to apply
but I never had the courage to actually do it.
This year, just thought I'd give it a try, and I'm here.
I work in a supermarket behind the checkouts.
This is the biggest thing that I've ever done.
Things like this don't happen to me.
You just want to cry.
Because you cannot believe this is real.
Over the next ten weeks... It is going in.
...they'll face 30 brand-new challenges...
Woohoo!
...designed to put every bit of their baking ability to the test.
I've done baking for quite a while.
I feel maybe I'm, like, sort of good at this.
We're about to find out how good, aren't we? So maybe I'm terrible.
My partner said fake it until you make it.
The stress is real.
And that's what I'm doing.
Everything they make will be judged by Prue Leith...
It is utterly delicious.
...and Paul Hollywood.
I'm intrigued to see if Paul's eyes are as blue
as people say in real life, like a White Walker or something.
INTERVIEWER: They're bluer. Are they?
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Look into your soul.
They'll start with astounding cakes...
Come on. Oh, my...
...a batch of scrumptious signature sandwiches...
Oh, my God. It's gone all crumbly.
Aah...
...a classic American cake... Yeah.
...that'll catch some red-handed...
I was going to high five you
but I've seen your palms. Good luck.
Right, can't stop, can't stop.
...and a show-stopping home bake...
Ooh, boy.
It's OK, it's OK.
It landed the right side up.
Yes.
...that'll expose any shaky foundations.
I'm so worried.
You all right? Yeah.
Boo!
LAUGHTER
After two years away in Essex, we've pitched our tent
back in the beautiful grounds of Welford Park.
And our fresh crop of bakers are about to face
three cake-based challenges
after which one of them will be crowned Star Baker
and one will have to leave the competition.
Hello, bakers, welcome to the tent.
And it's time for your first ever Signature Challenge.
Today, the judges would love you to make a batch
of 12 identical mini sandwich cakes.
Yeah, you know, like Battenburg in a panini,
Vicky sponge on sourdough, tea loaf in a tuna melt.
I think that would be a cake sandwich.
They're looking for sandwich cakes.
Oh, good, cos they sounded rank. They did sound rank.
The shape and flavours are entirely up to you
and you can use any sponge you like.
You have one hour.
What?
Sandwiched between two half-hours. Ah!
You have two hours. You've got two hours. On your marks...
Get set...
Bake! Whoo.
Right...
Little bit stressed - I'm not going to lie.
I just hope that today, it'll go OK.
Doesn't feel real yet.
Two hours - it's not a long time to make 12 sandwich cakes.
I didn't feel great this morning. Really nervous.
It's crazy, because you're just making a cake
and it's something you do all the time.
PRUE: Mini sandwich cakes.
This looks like quite a simple challenge.
But what we're really looking for is a bit of originality.
PAUL: They could choose any sponge they want,
but we want it to be small, packed with the flavour,
full of their personality.
It's the first time the bakers are going to show us what they can bake.
So this is really important.
We want to see their skills.
They need to be absolutely identical,
absolutely delicious,
the perfect sandwich cake is what we want.
Morning, Rebs. Hello, Rebs. Morning.
Right, tell us all about your mini sandwich cake.
I'm making hazelnut mocha latte mini sandwich cakes
because I used to work as a barista
and it's the drink my now boyfriend
used to come and order all the time when he was trying to chat me up.
So you're approaching this like a barista? In a way, yeah.
These two are going to be absolutely pumped.
The amount of coffee that's going in it, hopefully.
Rebs, from County Antrim in Northern Ireland
has been baking since she was three. Come on.
Studying for a Masters in Business,
when she's not buried under books,
she's getting muddy with dogs Miley, Ruby and troublesome Tiggy.
Oh, Tiggy.
To bring the hazelnut flavour to her coffee cakes,
she'll add chopped nuts
to both her caramel filling and highly caffeinated sponge.
Have you practised this? Yeah.
And what did your friends think of it?
Everyone has different tastes, I'll say that.
LAUGHTER
You can get friends anywhere, don't worry about that. Yeah, exactly.
This is a massive whisk.
Rebs isn't the only baker adding a kick to their cake.
Chilli powder is there - not to bring in the chilli -
but helps bring in the flavours of the chocolate even further.
A keen dancer, software engineer Abdul likes to lindy hop
with girlfriend Christine.
Hello!
Born in Saudi Arabia but now living in London,
he's not seen his family for over three years.
Technical difficulties.
Containing raspberry jam and mascarpone
between layers of chocolate and hazelnut sponge,
Abdul's sandwich cakes are dedicated to former friends.
I'm a huge lover of plants.
I have tons of them in my house.
I've killed a lot, unfortunately.
I'm trying to make these cakes to pay tribute to those.
You're my favourite botanical serial killer.
PRUE: You always hurt the ones you love. Come on, Abdul.
Thank you.
I call this the bite-size of love.
Sandro's bakes also come from the heart.
When I first met my partner, every time we saw each other,
I always gave a white rose.
So I'm making, like, chocolate flowerpots.
When Sandro, a fitness fanatic from East London, isn't hitting the gym,
he works as a full-time nanny.
♪ I am the champion... ♪
He'll fill his flowerpots with a chocolate and orange sponge
and a rich red wine ganache
from which delicate sugar roses will grow.
Are you a gym guy? Um...
I mean, you look like you are. Twice a day. Once is not enough?
I'll do... No, cos I'll do, like, kind of weights, isn't it?
And then I'll do cardio. Same. Can you tell?
I do weights in a graveyard. The old bones. Urgh. Oh, don't.
Yeah, forget cardio. I haven't got a heart.
And it seems love is in the air.
These are mini Persian love cakes.
We've got a large Persian community in our church
so it's a tribute to their faith and their friendship.
Kevin lives in Lanarkshire, Scotland, with his wife, Rachel,
and their dog, Judy.
A talented musician, he not only plays the clarinet,
flute and saxophone professionally - but he teaches, too.
Nice one.
Kevin's love cakes are full of Persian flavour
with rose Swiss meringue buttercream
sandwiched between layers of pistachio,
almond and cardamom sponge.
The sponge is going to have blitzed pistachio nuts,
but I'm not going to blitz them right down.
I still want there to be a bit of texture and a bit of crunch.
I'm using 120g of pistachios.
Maisam's also chosen to go all-out with her nutty sponge.
I want to get as much flavour
and texture in the cake as possible.
Born in Libya, this year's youngest baker,
18-year-old design student Maisam
lives in Manchester with her parents,
two brothers and younger sister, Juri.
I'm going to copy your drawing. What?!
To help balance the sweetness of her pistachio-packed sponge,
Maisam will fill her sandwich cakes with raspberry jam
and raspberry Swiss meringue buttercream.
In the practice, it went really well
so I'm hoping that it'll turn out well this time.
You're the baby here, did you realise that?
Yes, I'm the youngest one, so pressure is on.
Key to creating delicious mini sandwich cakes...
Heavy on the coffee. Whoo!
...the judges will expect beautifully flavoured soft sponge.
It's the blue-eyed one that scares me.
He's just super intense.
It's like he's looking through my soul.
So disapproving. He looks at you like, "Aah!"
Oh, I nearly forgot to put my eggs in!
Oh, my goodness! It's like something's missing here.
Swedish-born Maxy,
an architectural assistant from South East London,
is passing on her passion for baking
to daughters Tara and Talia.
That's enough now.
She's giving her Eton mess-inspired cakes
a tropical twist with mango and passion fruit coulis
and mascarpone between layers of vanilla sponge.
You're from Sweden but I can't hear the accent.
I've lived here for 21 years. It's been a long time.
You speak Swedish as well? I do speak Swedish, yeah.
Are you? I'm semi-bilingual. Oh, are you? Hmm.
What languages do you speak? Well, English.
English and...?
Well, no, I'm semi-bilingual. Semi, oh, semi. Oh, yeah.
Next time I've got a joke, I'll put it in writing
and send it to you in advance, all right? Oh...!
Looks good, it is going in.
The quicker the sponges hit the oven,
the longer they'll have to cool.
11 minutes at 180.
Is there a timer on this thing?
If the bakers attempt to cut
and fill their layers of sponge while still warm,
they'll be left with a crumbly, leaking mess.
Oh, crap. I forgot to switch it on!
It's all right, it's not done yet.
I can tell by visual clues, ie, it's not brown.
Will is a charity director who lives in London with wife Alison
and their three children, Max, Verity and Louie.
That's going well, Louie. It's quite crumbly.
To cut through the sweetness of his salty caramel swirled buttercream
and in a bid to stand out from the crowd,
Will's cakes contain no less than three different types of ginger.
Who do you think's good in here? Who are you scared of?
Uh, everybody.
I feel like the first one, you're just finding your feet, aren't you?
New equipment, Paul leering down on you.
It's not usually what happens, is it, when you're at home baking?
No, normally, normally just stood at home.
You haven't got a sort of tipsy posh woman
and a bronze man staring at you.
You don't know where I live, do you?
All right, guys, I know you're new here, so, basically,
the way things work in this tent,
if you want to know how long you've got left,
you have to give us each a fiver. LAUGHTER
Oh, well, it was worth a try. You've got an hour left.
An hour?! Is that good or bad?
It's bad for me.
I'm not feeling confident about my meringues
cos these have to go in for an hour.
Oh, that's the timer for my cakes.
Oh, they have risen very well. More than I thought.
The difference between perfectly baked moist sponge...
Oh, it's done. ...and a dry, dense disaster...
Oh, my...
...can be a matter of moments.
It should be cooked. You get the absolute fear.
These are sticky toffee pudding sponges.
Bit alarmed that one edge has sunk,
don't know how that happened, but I think it's OK.
It's like the famous last words, isn't it?
Originally from Glasgow,
James, a nuclear scientist, has been baking since he was five years old.
It's a passion matched only by his love of '80s horror films.
That's incredible.
He'll add warmth to his sticky toffee apple sandwich cakes
with ginger in his apple jam and nutmeg in his buttercream.
Explain the colour of the kilt, then, is it family?
So it's actually the kilt I wore for my graduation.
Pants or no pants?
Um, that's for you to find out, isn't it?
PRUE: That's an invitation.
While their sponges cool...
I have a wee apple jam going.
...the bakers turn their attention to fillings.
This is hazelnut caramel.
But I'm a wee bit concerned, cos it's a bit runny.
I probably put too much butter in.
I'm making Italian meringue buttercream.
The technically complicated version of buttercream.
But Will's not the only one
trying to impress with his ambitious icing.
Struggling to cut this butter.
The buttercream's flavoured with rose.
I know that rose can be a really overpowering flavour.
So it's just a whisper.
Woohoo!
While Will, Maisam and Kevin attempt to sweeten up the judges...
Nice.
♪ Dozy doats and dozy doats And liddle lamzy divey... ♪
...Carole's gone sour.
Just making my lemon curd.
I don't put that much sugar in cos I want it nice and tart.
West Country born and bred,
Carole, a supermarket cashier,
lives in Dorset with husband Michael.
A keen gardener,
she's affectionately known as Compost Carole.
Get a nice bit of root.
As well as her curd filling, she'll add lemon juice
to her buttercream
and zest to her lemon and poppy seed sponge.
I'm a little bit of a classic baker,
your carrot cakes and your lemon drizzles.
I'm not a big one for putting exotic ingredients in, you know?
But somewhere exotic is exactly where Dawn's heading.
I'm doing lime and tamarind spring cake.
Tamarind - it's a slightly earthy flavour,
but it's fruity at the same time
and this bake, it's fairly traditional,
but it's got a bit of a twist.
Dawn, a former project manager for Boris Johnson,
lives in Bedfordshire where she entertains granddaughter Emmy
with her hand-modelled sugar figurines.
Mr Froggington. Do you like him? Yes!
To complement her tamarind jelly filling, she'll add coconut
to her sponge and create a coconut marzipan topping.
You worked for Boris Johnson? Not directly.
Did you get to meet him? Yeah.
His hair was a bit like yours. I know.
Wasn't it? Yeah.
And his face was a bit like mine.
Yeah, there you go - we're like a hybrid.
How about that? Put us together and you have Boris Johnson.
How about that? Yeah.
Dawn isn't the only baker bringing a taste of the tropics.
I am making Malaysian cake
which is based on the pandan flavouring.
It is very aromatic, people call it Asian vanilla.
Malaysian-born Syabira lives in London
where she works in cardiovascular research.
Comms check.
After a hard day in the lab,
she likes to relax gaming online with boyfriend Bradley.
It's, oh, a head shot. Oh, I got head-shotted.
Syabira will flavour her sponge and coconut custard with pandan
and add caramel to both her mousse and decorations,
traditional Malaysian sweets known as onde-onde.
I'm going to make a caramel bomb.
When you bite into it, the caramel just bursts out.
Going to explode. You're going to blow the judges' heads off.
I love this. Good luck. This sounds amazing. Good luck, Syabira.
Thank you. Thank you.
Anyone who tries to bomb these two is amazing in my book.
But Syabira's caramel bombs aren't the only bake
that should probably come with a safety warning.
I'm soaking my sponges with Polish cherry liqueur.
What I'm making today will be
a Polish-inspired bake which is wuzetka.
Janusz is a PA from Brighton
where he lives with boyfriend Simon and sausage dog Nigel.
He learned many of his Polish recipes from mum Elizia
who taught him and his sister to bake.
Filled with pistachio cream and cherries,
he'll top his boozy wuzetka
with a layer of rich chocolate ganache.
It's like a Polish Black Forest.
PRUE: Is that cherries soaked in booze?
Nice. Thinking of you.
Thank you. You've done your homework.
I am glad to hear that.
NOEL: This sounds absolutely delicious. This is my kind of bake.
PRUE AND NOEL: Good luck.
I want to do the time call. It's my turn. No, it's my turn to do it.
Let me do the time call. I'm doing the time call.
All right, fine, you do the time call.
Thanks. Bakers, you have half an hour left.
Ooh.
The sponge is done,
but my Italian meringue's split
for reasons I don't understand so I'm going to make it again.
But Italian meringue buttercream takes half an hour,
so it's slightly worrying.
I'm about to start cutting out the cakes.
No matter whether they've baked large trays of sponge...
I'm just going to make small circles.
...or individual portions,
the judges will expect every slice of the bakers' sandwich cakes
to be uniform and neat.
The tops will be cut off. They all will be even size.
Uh, ruler.
I mean, most people wouldn't care.
But the judges aren't most people.
The perfect slices...
It's very soft cake so I need to be careful.
...require a cool sponge.
Oh, it's gone all crumbly.
I think I cut them whilst they were still a bit warm.
Oh...!
Now they're going to need plenty of cherry vodka.
I've got my big guns here.
Drizzle some more pandan flavourings.
Oh, my God!
Hopefully, with the help of buttercream, I'll manage to hide it.
But there's a flaw in Maisam's plan.
The buttercream has curdled.
Yeah. It'll... It'll take some time to fix it.
How long have we got left?
Bakers, you have 15 minutes left.
Ah.
15 minutes, oh, my gosh, I'm going to start assembling.
We'll make it, we have to.
Ah, this caramel's starting to melt.
At home I wouldn't care if the caramel was over the edge
and now you're like, "Aah!"
Now custard.
This is red wine ganache. Proper strong.
Finally seeing some Swiss meringue buttercream.
While Maisam's filling comes together at last...
That was a nightmare. A nightmare, pulled it off.
It's done it again.
...for the second time...
BLEEP
...Will's has split.
Agh. I need to make a buttercream.
How do I make a buttercream? Butter, sugar.
Yeah. Yeah.
Decoration time. Making bees. Fiddly little buggers.
So I'm just making the caramel for the wee candles.
You're a nuclear scientist, is that right?
Yeah. This is a bit of a come-down for you, isn't it? I mean...
Haven't you got more important things to be doing?
Making cakes is vastly more exciting.
These are cocoa nibs. It's the soil.
Hello, petal. Hello, hello. I was talking to the flower.
Oh. I thought you were talking to me.
Oh.
Bakers, you have five minutes left. Tight, tight, tight.
I've got to get going, I've got to get going.
Got to decorate the top. Add my fruits on.
Terrified that I won't get this done on time.
It's looking rubbish.
Think, William. Calm yourself down, mate.
I feel like I shouldn't be this calm.
I just wonder what's gone wrong.
Argh! I'm just very carefully trying to put the coconut topping on.
I kind of wish the buttercream was a tiny bit better.
Oh, this is not good.
They're just sliding. What a frigging nightmare.
Finishing touches.
Flavour-wise, should be good,
but look-wise, 100% not happy with it.
It's not perfect,
but I hope they will like it. I don't know.
These look amazing. This is your Persian business, right?
Yes. Have you been to Persia? Uh, no. Maybe one day.
We'll go together. Yeah? Yeah.
Are you free on the 14th? 14th of what?
I've got to go, I've got to do a time call. Goodbye.
OK. Bakers, you have one minute left.
Argh!
Oh, my God.
60 seconds, kids. You can do this.
I'm going to try as many cactus as possible.
A very rushed nutmeg job.
I'm just trying to do whatever I can do right now.
Don't collapse!
Bakers... No!
Your time is up!
Oh!
Please step away from your mini sandwich cakes.
Well done, well done. High ten.
That was a good high ten, as well.
There's Margaret, there's Minnie, there's Maureen.
Carole, they're so cute. Yes!
Look at these.
Janusz, those are so neat.
It's rubbish. Oh... Boo-hoo!
For the very first time, our 12 new bakers
and their mini sandwich cakes are about to face
the judgment of Paul and Prue.
Hello, Maxy. Hiya.
In your world, mini is a curious thing.
That's huge!
Let's have a look at these monsters.
You've got it all over your fingers. I can't take him anywhere.
Do you know, I've got "mess" in the title, so...
Yeah, exactly.
The cake's quite dry. Is it dry?
Um, you probably could've done with slightly less bake on that.
Yeah. However, there's nothing wrong
with passion fruit sponge and a meringue.
The combination of flavours is beautiful. Well done.
Yeah, well done. Thank you. Thank you.
Well done. Thank you.
Oh, my goodness.
Well done.
The pipework - that's just like a blob. What is that?
Who knows, at this point?!
See what the taste is like.
Hmm, beautiful.
Absolutely sticky toffee pudding, but better because it's got ginger.
So we've figured out you can bake.
But you need to concentrate on some of the detail.
I think they look great. Love the decoration on the top.
So cute. And I love the colours.
They're absolutely classic flavours. Nicely balanced.
Yeah, there's enough lemon in there
cos you're getting it through the curd as well
which is nice and sharp. Yeah.
What's not to like? Thank you.
They look very good. Pretty consistent.
The rose is perfect. OK.
The cake itself is a bit heavy.
You've got too much in there,
which will pull all the moisture from the cake.
Yeah. So it's very, very dry.
OK.
They don't look wonderful, do they? No.
They've fallen apart. I cut it whilst it was still warm.
Oh. Started... Fatal. ...crumbling a bit.
The sponge is delicious and the Swiss meringue is lovely.
Could've been sharper.
Could've had more raspberry in there.
I don't think there's anything wrong with the flavours.
It just looks a mess.
They do look amazing. I love the colour,
I love the pot, I love the soil. Ah, thanks.
Just hope inside tastes as good as it looks.
I mean, that is really clever to get all that in there.
The flavours are really punchy.
The red wine ganache works beautifully well with the raspberry.
Oh. It's rich and indulgent. Well done.
Thank you.
At first glance, you think, "Absolutely delightful."
If you look closely, there are a few problems, aren't there?
They're a bit wibbly.
The tamarind works really well.
Coconut works beautifully well with it.
Overall, it's a really nice cake. And it's original.
Good. Well done. Thank you. Yeah, nice one.
Abdul, I think it looks absolutely delicious.
Thank you. It's almost an illusion, which I quite like.
It does look like a garden.
Hmm, it's very light.
Little kick of chilli, you get a little acidity.
I think the raspberry in there is a beautiful flavour.
I love the hazelnut as well. Yeah. Thank you. I'm impressed.
Thank you, Abdul. Thank you, guys. Lovely.
Well done, that went well, didn't it?
That went better than I thought, actually! Well done. Thank you.
They could be neater. Yes.
Love the colours, though, they're vibrant and in your face.
Hmm. Think the flavour's in there that's coming from the pandan,
the caramel and the coconut is delicious.
It's such an interesting thing
to do a set custard on top of a cake.
Gooey and unctuous. And not too sweet.
Yeah. OK, it's bomb time.
Um, can I nick a sugar bomb? Yes, feel free.
It's amazing.
It's not too sweet, actually. I was expecting it to be,
but you do get the burst of sugar.
Look at me, I'll have you two out of a job here.
Thank you very much. Thank you.
I liked it.
I mean, that counts for nothing, but I liked it.
It looks like your caramel was a bit runny.
Did you mean the caramel to run down the sides?
No, I spent ages trying to get the caramel perfect
and then it went...
There's enough coffee in there to keep you awake at night. Yeah!
Hmm.
The other flavours coming through
are not strong enough to compete with it
and the ganache is too hard.
You're neat enough, I can see that.
Just be careful about your flavours.
It's a bit... Yeah. ..messy.
My buttercream didn't go to plan. Twice.
It's the curse of the tent. The curse of the tent.
I feel the heart rate going now. Yeah.
Will, I think it's a bit disappointing.
It's a bit bland. There's ginger, but not enough.
There's a caramel undertone - but it's got no hero in there... Yeah.
...which is what you need.
Besides that, brilliant.
Never mind, Will.
That looks amazing.
It's neat as a pin, just has to taste good now.
Oh, it's lovely sponge.
Very light.
And boozy.
Yes. That's how I like them.
For me, that's perfect. It is very boozy.
I think you've got too much booze.
That's the overwhelming flavour.
Texturally, it's perfect, it really is.
He's got a problem here, hasn't he? Cos I think the booze is perfect.
Well done. Thank you very much. Thank you.
They're now stumbling back to their... I know.
Out the tent.
I'm happy that it went well.
There was a lot of booze in my cake
because even when I'm eating it I'm thinking, "Oh, that's strong."
They like it, they like my onde-onde.
It is very nice when people say your food is good.
It's interesting to have a disaster in your first challenge.
Not my finest moment I think it's fair to say.
Each week, the bakers will face a mystery second challenge
veiled by gingham.
Hello, bakers, welcome back to the tent.
It's time for your first ever Technical Challenge -
and your Technical Challenge today has been set for you by baby Paul.
Aww. Sweet. Paul, any words of advice?
It's a classic. Concentrate on your sponge.
Well, as ever, this task is judged blind
so we ask Paul and Prue to leave the tent
where they are going to be cryogenically frozen.
Wrap up warm, kids.
So, Paul would like you to produce a red velvet cake.
Oh!
Your all-American layered cake
should make a big impression on both the eyes and the palate.
I love impressions. Matt's good at impressions. Mm.
In fact, he does an amazing Paul. Go on do your Paul.
You're a good baker, you're a good baker.
You're a good baker, too. All right!
LAUGHTER
I mean, if you cover your eyes, it's like he's back in the tent.
Uncanny.
Your classic cake
should consist of six tender, moist crimson-red sponges
sandwiching a smooth, fluffy cream-cheese icing.
Sprinkled with red crumbs to give it that red-velvet finish.
You have two hours until we defrost Paul and Prue.
On your marks...
Get set.
Bake!
Obviously, my first challenge was a disaster, so I'm stressed.
It's like anxiety!
In the Technical Challenge, the bakers are all given
the same basic recipe.
So this is very sentimental.
This is the first cake I ever made.
I normally do a red velvet cake, but that's the curse, innit?
You're like, "Yeah, I know how to do that,"
and then, uh, this is the one day you don't.
I've never made one before.
Paul, red velvet cake for our first technical.
Why have you gone for that?
The advantage is everybody'll know it.
It's quite a light chocolaty cake.
Hmm. With the use of vinegar and buttermilk,
blended with bicarb, there's your rising agent.
And, actually, there's the flavour.
It has a very distinctive tang to it.
Obviously, there's colouring
to give it that beautiful vibrant red inside.
Wow.
Now, we haven't told the bakers how much food colouring.
Adding too much will make the cake far too dark.
And the proportion of cream cheese
is much higher than you'd have in most sponges.
Yeah. It's a big cake.
We want height, so the thickness of cream cheese is critical.
It's lovely.
I can't wait to see what they're going to turn out like.
What I'm not looking forward to is trying 12 red velvet cakes.
You're going to have to stretcher me out of there.
The first instruction is "make the red velvet batter."
No hints as to how.
God. What do we do?
Luckily, I've got it all in here.
I'm mixing my butter and sugar.
It's creaming up - that's what I want.
Now I'm going to add the eggs, the buttermilk,
flour, cocoa and vinegar.
Why are you putting vinegar in it? Like, what's that about?
Why would you ever put vinegar in a cake?
It's a bit of a chemical reaction. Think Diana Ross sang that.
Combining vinegar, buttermilk and bicarbonate of soda
creates the bubbles crucial to producing a light sponge...
I'll chuck in a bunch now.
...but timing is everything.
You've got to add the bicarb just before
you put it in the oven cos it doesn't last very long.
I'm just going to wing it. There's not really a method.
How red to make it is the question.
Crimson is the directive.
Crimson. What does crimson mean? Does it mean, like, light red?
Hers is a bit redder than yours - look.
You could add a bit more. I mean, I don't ask me.
I've got no clue what I'm doing. But then I'll blame you.
Paul won't care. You know that. Right, come on, then, babies.
It just says "bake", at your leisure.
However long you want.
Ah, sugar.
Those are being baked for as long as it takes.
I think 25 minutes?
They're not very big, so I might give them, like, 13 minutes
and then I'll see how they're doing.
Dawn, what are you doing? Who knows? Sort of clattering stuff.
It's an adventure.
I'm just flinging stuff.
You've made a red velvet cake before.
I have, but not for about... 30 years. Whew!
When my kids were little.
You're going to have to go back into the archives. Yeah.
Trouble is, I was probably under the influence of alcohol.
NOEL LAUGHS
The red velvet cake.
It's very personal for me.
Before I left Malaysia, my friends, we all sat down together,
the four of us, having a very nice red velvet cake.
So I just made the last cake that I had with my friends.
Without them, I will never discover my hidden talent to bake.
Bakers, you are halfway through. Whoa!
I don't want to put any pressure on you guys,
but we're going to take the best red velvet cake
and with the aid of a sewing machine,
I'm going to turn it into skimpy briefs for me and Matt.
HE CHUCKLES
I fail to see why that's funny.
Make the cream cheese frosting.
There's no recipe. Just making it.
Hmm. I'm just going to mix my cream cheese and mascarpone together.
Then add the double cream and then whip it.
It should be fluffy. Yeah.
But the bakers must whip with caution. OK.
Overwhip, and their frosting will become a runny mess.
How do you get this thick, man? Because it's not going to settle.
Oh, boy. That is liquid.
It's got to be like this where it can lift.
And it's made it gloss.
Yeah, this is, like, perfect, cream cheese here.
Argh.
Take a little bit longer.
So it's a waiting game.
They're taking forever to bake. They're taking so long.
Giving me anxiety just waiting.
Kevin, does it annoy you
that there's another Scottish person here?
Cos it annoys me, and I'm not even Scottish!
He is wearing a kilt and he kind of out-Scottished me a bit.
He has out-scotched you, hasn't he? Yeah, yeah.
Do you know him? I assume everyone in Scotland knows each other.
We do come from the same county. Do you?
We did actually have the same saxophone and clarinet teacher.
There you go. Hi, Andy.
Hi, Andy, how are you doing? Haven't they done well?
You've taught them so well, they're baking cakes instead.
Oh, I don't know.
No. He ain't ready.
This cake isn't ready yet.
I'm worried if I open the oven, they'll go...
Right, mine have to be done now.
Oh, someone's ready.
Oh, this is not good. They've pure sunk.
Argh! Nightmare.
The cake just wasn't cooked long enough.
The change of temperature from the oven to the cold here.
I'm just going to have to go with it.
Bakers, you have half an hour left!
Also, bakers, remember,
as hard as it is to make a red velvet cake,
I've actually made a red velvet coat.
Come on, then, babies.
My sponges are ready.
Smooth.
I'm very pleased.
Oh, yeah, I'm happy with that. It's calmed down my nerves.
Maisam is slowly coming back.
That looks weird. I don't know whether it's moist or undercooked.
Janusz, I was going to high five you
but I've seen your palms - they're too red. Good luck.
"Slice each sponge in half horizontally,
"remove the bowl of icing from the fridge and put it together."
To achieve the height the judges expect,
their frosting must be the perfect consistency...
It's a bit liquidy, I think.
...and generously applied.
I'm trying to make proper even layers.
I just want to try to get the height. Like, a proper big one.
"To decorate, neatly coat the cake."
I would rather do something different.
I'm going for a semi-naked look, definitely, for this one.
You know, you can go for that distressed look.
"Sprinkle the leftover crumbs around the bottom edge."
They're going to be fairly scant crumbs.
"Pipe eight rosettes." Nearly there.
My icing is melting! Oh, man! It'll be a blob, not a rosette.
Going mad with piping. Try and just show off.
I want this presentation to be, like...
...you know, like, up there.
Bakers, you have one minute left.
Aah!
Crumbs, crumbs, crumbs! Ooh, blimey!
Please, please, please, please! Aah!
It is scary. Aah!
Focus.
Bakers, your time is up.
Ooh, this is not good. It's not good. Breathe.
This is the height that I want. Done!
Well, I can see that everyone
is going for a completely different style.
You cannot tell at the moment who has the right idea.
That distressed look is a decision I may well regret.
Oh! This is scaring me. Like, Sandro's decoration's immaculate.
It's really sunk. Oh, I'm so annoyed.
Bakers, please bring your
velvet cakes down to the tablecloth,
put them behind your photograph.
The gingham altar of doom.
Oh, man! My icing is melting. Oh! I don't know.
Do you know what I'm really intrigued by?
The different heights. Yeah, Syabira, yours is well tall.
Paul and Prue are expecting 12 tall red velvet cakes
coated in fluffy cream cheese frosting
and decorated with a sprinkling of crumbs.
They have no idea whose is whose.
Oh, God! OK, starting over here.
It is smooth, but it's not that tall, is it?
Cuts nicely. Not much cream cheese filling in there, is there?
Cream cheese should be almost equal to the cake to keep that height.
Tastes good. It's soft with a little bit of tartness.
Moving on to number two. Piping's good.
But the crumb on the outside is too thick.
The flavour's all right. Certainly got the tang to it.
Right, over here. This one's really attractive. Mm.
But I think the cake is... It's a bit dense. ..slightly undercooked.
And I also think there's quite a lot of red in this one. Yeah.
It's very red. You asked for crimson.
It's the wrong shade of crimson, Matt, all right? Back off.
LAUGHTER
OK, moving on. Not much height to it.
No. Needs to be a bit higher.
And it's not very light. It's solid.
That's a little bit claggy. Feels slightly underdone.
Right. Now, this one's almost a naked cake round the outside,
isn't it? Yes, it is. Very little cream cheese.
But the sponge is nicely risen. Yeah.
The sponge is light and tangy.
So, we have this one. It's quite original.
Decoration looks like a wedding hat. I don't like that.
Cream cheese should have been put in the layers.
It's probably lost quite a bit of height through that.
The sponge is all right.
Mm. The sponge is all right. It's just not what we wanted.
Right, this one over here.
It's lost its definition. Rather flat rosettes.
But certainly got the tang to it. Mm. Nice flavour.
OK, moving on. Could be a bit straighter.
Yes, it's a bit on the lean.
But the sponge is all right. You get that lightness. Mm.
This is a good cake.
This one's got much too much crumb on the bottom. It has.
Decoration doesn't look great.
The sponge, it's actually not that bad. I just think...
I'd like to have seen that a little bit neater throughout.
Right, this one.
Big layers of sponge. The sponge is light.
But the rosettes sag all over the place.
I do hope that's as good on the inside
as it looks on the outside.
Height of the cake is good. The definition is perfect.
This is what we were looking for when it came to the crumb,
that light dusting.
It's got to be good inside. This better be good inside.
Nice layers. There is a lot of cream cheese there.
That is very nice. That's it. Shall we go home now?
LAUGHTER
OK, moving on to this one.
A little bit too much on the crumb. It's neat, though.
And I do like those sponges. Mm. And got a nice zing.
Mm, absolutely.
NOEL: Paul and Prue will now rank
the red velvet cakes from 12th to first place.
In 12th place, this one.
Who was that? James.
We didn't like the decoration much
and there's not quite enough cream in the middle.
In 11th, we have Rebs.
Basically, very claggy.
In 10th place, this one.
Maxy. It was undercooked.
In ninth, we have this one.
Will, it's all over the place. Fair enough.
Carole is eighth, Janusz seventh,
sixth - Abdul, Maisam fifth,
Kevin is fourth, and Dawn third.
We're getting close now. In second place...
Who is this?
Sandro. Could be a tiny bit higher, but it's a really good cake.
Thank you. So, in first place, we have...
APPLAUSE
Syabira, that's fantastic. Thank you.
My heart just melts. SHE LAUGHS
Thank you so much. Nicely done.
Well done, Syabira.
If I'm upset, I'll cry. If I'm happy, I'll cry!
I'm happy with second. Yeah.
Second is kind of first, innit? HE LAUGHS
It wasn't the worst, but I know I've got a lot to do tomorrow.
It was a disaster. Like, I'm just lucky I wasn't 12th.
But there's still another bake.
I will pick myself back up
and make sure my cake's flipping well-cooked this time.
Just one challenge remains before this year's
first Star Baker is crowned
and the first person to leave the tent is revealed.
So, what do we think of these new bakers?
Overall, the standard's been pretty good. Yeah.
But I think, a few people, it got to them.
Rebs, Will is in trouble. Yeah.
Maisam. She had a tough signature, didn't she? Yeah.
So, who's in line for Star Baker? I think the likes of Abdul, Janusz.
You know who else? Sandro. Sandro's amazing.
Sandro's technically tremendously good. He's really calm, as well.
He's calming me down. I'm not even in the competition.
And Syabira's incredible.
That Technical Challenge was actually better than mine.
I mean, it's not that hard to believe, is it? Unbelievable.
When's the last time you baked, Paul? In the '70s? Last week.
What did you bake? Blueberry muffins. Ooh, lovely.
Nice? Of course. As good as Syabira's? I was like this.
"Well done."
THEY LAUGH
Hello, bakers. It's time for your first ever Showstopper Challenge,
and today the judges would love you to make a stunning 3D replica
of your own home entirely out of cake.
Your Showstopper should look like somewhere you have lived,
which has special meaning to you.
It needs to be so good
that Paul can live inside it for a week.
He's basically having his bathroom renovated.
He needs somewhere to crash. LAUGHTER
You have four hours. On you marks... Get set... Bake!
Oh, it's so quiet in here. Concentration.
HE HUMS
Yesterday wasn't my day, but today's going to be my day.
I want to just show them that I am a better baker than claggy cake.
This is their first Showstopper and it's a home bake -
a bake of their home.
It could be anything - a cottage, a block of flats, a bungalow -
but I want detail. You know, we want the pebbledashing,
we want the ivy floating up the sides,
we want the window frames. And, of course,
the most important thing is that it's solid.
We don't want the roof blowing off.
We don't want the walls falling down.
We want to see 12 fabulous homes looking amazing
and tasting even better.
Morning, Dawn. Hello, Dawn. Good morning. Morning. Good morning.
Tell us all about your home bake.
So, my home bake is my nan's house. Did you live in it?
I was born in it, actually. So was my mum.
It's a three-bed semi and it's pebbledashed.
NOEL: Dawn will recreate her nan's pebbledash from praline,
while, inside, apricot puree and German buttercream
will be sandwiched between layers of delicate genoise sponge.
So, it's 12 layers, free-standing. Wow.
Interesting that you're using genoise,
which is notoriously quite a soft thing,
with 12 layers with heavy cake.
Yeah. Interesting. Good luck. Thank you. Thank you.
Dawn's not the only baker inspired by memories of their nan.
When we were younger, we'd go there for Christmas.
There'd be, like, about 70 of us.
It was like my best childhood memories.
Sandro will build his grandparents' home
from strawberry sponge,
which he'll soak in strawberry liqueur
for some extra Christmas spirit.
We used to leave, like, our Christmas parties
with beanbags full of presents when we were younger.
Now I can barely get socks. HE LAUGHS
Just socks? Grandparents, if you're listening to this... I know!
Presents get worse as you get older. Yeah, they do get worse.
Socks! I can't afford socks -
is that what you're trying to say to me?
And it seems the festive cheer is spreading.
I'm using Polish ginger spices and oranges in my chocolate cake
because what is the better time
to go and visit your mum than Christmas?
Janusz spent many a happy Christmas in Poland,
and it's his mum's flat he'll recreate
from rich chocolate sponge
and spiced orange buttercream,
colourfully decorated to bring her garden balcony to life.
It was a very sad block of flats,
but I could always tell where my mum is
because it was the only balcony
where you could actually see flowers.
So, this is the final cake mix.
I couldn't actually get a bowl big enough.
I think it's a two-spoon job.
Building a Showstopper this big...
In total, there is 5kg of batter. I mean, I'm making a house, right?
...requires a sponge that not only tastes great...
I'm adding soy sauce instead of salt.
It makes a more rich, umami flavour.
...but is sturdy enough to support the weight of their construction.
Come on. This is a madeira cake, which is a proper structural cake.
I'm not particularly concerned about the sponge.
It's pretty stable. It's a banana cake.
It's my mum's recipe that I've tweaked a little.
With a roof and windows built from biscuit,
Kevin's childhood home will contain fresh banana and maple buttercream
between layers of his mum's pecan-packed banana bread.
I haven't chopped them too finely
because I reckon that would actually dry out the sponge,
and I do like a bit of texture.
I do like... Nice, big nuts.
This is coffee and walnut.
Who doesn't like coffee and walnut,
unless you don't like coffee or are allergic to nuts?
I am making a replica of my little bungalow.
Carole will build her beloved bungalow
from another of her favourite classic cake recipes,
coffee and walnut.
But instead of adding real coffee to her buttercream
and sponge, she's opted for a retro replacement.
It's chicory.
It's when you couldn't get coffee, I think.
Maybe when the war was on. I'm not sure.
You can smell it, can't you? That'll put hairs on your chest.
OK, it's going in.
With so much cake to bake...
All done, and the sponges are ready to go to the oven.
...the quicker their sponges hit the heat... Off you go.
...the more time they'll have to cool and cut them.
I'm trying to make them not too thick
because then they cook quicker and cool quicker.
Any attempt to build their homes from warm sponge
will result in a subsidence nightmare...
I remembered to set the timer today.
...but Will's making life doubly difficult for himself.
I'm also making a chocolate cake.
It's slightly drier, which I think is good for the structure.
After a disappointing first day, Will's looking to impress
by constructing his old North London flat from two sponges -
one chocolate and one orange -
with architectural details made from gingerbread.
So, you've got gingerbread, you've got sponge,
you've got orange.
A lot to do. Hopefully, you get away with it in the time.
Thank you, Will. I know! I know!
Just a stone's throw away, in South East London,
is the flat where Maxy grew up.
It's my mum's block where I started baking.
Flavours are inspired by a family favourite,
which is my mum's apple and berry crumble.
Maxy will spread her mum's famous apple and berry compote,
along with a crumble topping, between layers of cinnamon sponge.
Are you enjoying your time here?
I am, but I just, you know, get a bit stressed sometimes.
Who are you scared of more - Prue or Paul? Paul.
He's got a tough exterior, like a crusty roll.
THEY LAUGH
He's like a crusty bap, but when you break him open,
he's all soft inside. You see...
And he's good, you know, with a little bit of butter, toasted.
So...
This has gone weird, hasn't it? This?
No, this conversation. The conversation!
How are you looking, cakes?
Just want to double-check if it's cooked.
Yeah. Shouldn't be too dry.
So, I'm going to take my small sponges out of the oven.
They seem to be all ready. Oh, I hope it's cooked. God!
I don't want to overbake it.
I just want it to be perfect.
So, I'm going to let the sponges cool for as long as I can.
Oh, no! My oven wasn't on. Oh, flipping hell!
My oven wasn't on for the past 40 minutes.
If Abdul can bake his sponges in time,
he'll build his grandparents' home in Pakistan
with mango and saffron jam
sandwiched between layers of masala chai spiced sponge.
Cooling time and everything is now challenging
because I've lost about 40 minutes.
But keep going. Keep going and trying, right?
Syabira's also hoping to tempt the judges with a cuppa.
Milk tea is something we drink all the time in Malaysia.
And in a bid for top spot...
Cushty.
...her cake contains not just one but two types of tea.
Milk tea is the main flavour that I want to bring in,
and matcha complements milk tea.
Filled with strawberry and cinnamon jam
and matcha buttercream,
Syabira's milk tea sponges
will form the childhood home
and tropical garden
she loved to play in growing up.
Can't imagine where you live. So, I live...
Somewhere fantastical.
No. In a shoe? A golden shoe? I live in a village,
a very small little house with a coconut tree around it.
Wow. So, we usually tried to climb the coconut
because we thought, if a monkey could do it, we also could do it.
THEY LAUGH Yes, I can tell this is going to be
my favourite chat of the day already.
In theory, this is done.
As Will's final sponge exits the oven...
There we go. Ooh, boy!
...closely followed by Abdul's...
It's OK. It's OK. It landed the right side up.
Yes! Today is not my day, is it?
Cold, cold, cold, cold.
...the rest of the bakers are ready to begin building...
They're cool enough to start stacking.
And, of course, the soak.
I'm going to be fairly generous with this.
I want it to be perfection.
This is strawberries and cream liqueur.
I'm going to add all of it. Grown-up cake.
...but Sandro's grown-up cake won't be drinking alone.
Plenty of coconut rum.
Wow! That was hot.
During lockdown, because obviously we couldn't go anywhere,
me and my parents, we just had, like, a cocktail night,
so this is one of the ones that went down a treat,
was a pina colada.
Rebs plans to bring party vibes to her house
with flambeed pineapple rings and rum buttercream
sandwiched between layers of a rum-soaked coconut sponge.
It's really important for me to get the sponge right today
because I didn't cook my sponge properly yesterday.
Oh, my goodness! You're joking!
My cake's not fully done.
But Reb's party... They're not fully cooked.
...might be off.
Erm, I don't know what I'm going to do.
Erm, I just need a minute to myself.
I feel like I'm going to be sick.
You know it was your turn to do the time call
and then I just spoke over you?
It was really out of order, so I won't ever do that again.
So, go on, you do the time call. Really? Yeah.
This is your time call, though. No, no, no. This one's yours.
You're giving me your time call? I am. I love you.
Bakers, you are halfway through!
Sorry, I forgot. I forgot!
I would like to be carving cakes by now,
but I've still got gingerbread to make.
I think I'm going to struggle with time.
And Will's not the only one struggling.
My sponge, they've just not really fully cooked. I don't know why.
But Rebs has a cunning plan to get back on track.
This one's OK.
I'm just going to take a ring of cake from here and put it in.
Look, you'd never know. It's fine. It's fine. I'm not going to panic.
Why would I panic? Panicking's for losers.
Constructing now, so we're layering up.
This is going in now, my crumble.
Everyone's just bashing stuff.
Yeah, this wasn't even part of the recipe.
Who are you imagining that is - Paul or Prue?
Well, what one is it the same colour as?
It's Paul, isn't it? What is that? It's butterscotch lattice.
That's what he takes to the tanning salon
and goes, "I want to look like this."
Carole, look at this colour... Oh! ...without any food colouring.
This is my childhood house back home in Libya.
Taking inspiration from her favourite lemon tree growing up,
Maisam will fill her lemon sponge with blueberry jam
and add colourful decoration
to give the house the finish Paul and Prue expect.
But if I just speed up a little bit,
then I can give them that finesse that they want.
Oh, no! LAUGHTER
Small explosion.
James, too, has been inspired by a childhood memory.
My dad used to have a cottage up in Loch Fyne.
It's the first place I remember getting terrified.
We watched Dracula, and while we were watching it,
my dad wandered by with an axe outside of the door.
It was like a 4D experience.
James's frightfully tasty cottage will contain orange curd
and orange blossom buttercream
spread between six thick layers of orange and cardamom sponge.
It's oozing a tiny bit, but surprisingly OK
cos it is quite a lot of weight on top.
But we'll find out, I guess.
Bakers, you have 30 minutes.
Oh, BLEEP!
Definitely behind.
While Will and Abdul are still constructing their homes...
My plan is just to assemble this
and then as much I can decor, I'll try.
...for the rest of the bakers,
it's a nail-biting race to the finish.
I'm trying to be neat.
I was over-generous with the fillings
so I've skipped a layer.
The only person that will notice is Paul.
I'm sure he'll count them all.
This is sugar fondant.
If only it was this easy to brick a house.
Roof under construction.
My dad was a roofer, as well. Irony!
What can I smell?
Yeah, I smell burning.
It's not me, is it? HE GASPS
A little bit overdone. Oh!
I love a bit of pebbledashing. Pebbledash.
I used to get told off when I was a little girl cos...
Picking the stones off? Yes.
I feel like this is going to tap into Paul's childhood, as well.
I'm not sure Prue will identify with pebbledash.
She won't. She won't have a clue. She won't know what it is.
If you haven't got a maze around your house, she won't understand.
Or a moat! Got a gate.
The brickwork around the cottage,
I wanted to show the sort of higgledy-piggledyness of it.
Time is the limiting factor right now.
I'm going to have to leave out a lot of things, I think.
What are you going to do with that?
I'll probably eat it later. Will you? Yeah.
And what are you going to do with these?
One of the main issues is the misuse of disused tissues.
Embarrassing!
Bakers, you have five minutes left!
The stress is real. Come on!
I have to give Christmas now. The more detail, the better.
Nearly there.
I'm piping clouds out of Italian meringue.
What is happening here?
Agh, it looks terrible!
Maxy, you're not on your own. HE SIGHS
Going to need another couple of windows on it.
My hands are shaking!
Right, I can't stop, I can't stop.
Wow! It's not what you think it is. No. What is it?
Coconut tree. Right. So, I'm making the trunk...
Oh, right. OK, yeah.
I'm trying to use this barfi to make sheep.
I can't watch you do that. Sorry, it brings back too many memories.
SHE LAUGHS I hope it's a good one.
Bakers, you have one minute left! Argh!
This buttercream has split.
They don't even look like squares.
This is better than the red velvet cake.
It's a step in the right direction. Just some shimmer.
Bakers, your time is up!
Please step away from your bakes. I feel so mean.
What kind of Showstopper is this?!
It's not as I pictured it.
That is so, so good. It looks incredible.
It's not as neat as I'd like,
but it looks like my house, which is a bonus.
I just don't want to go home.
It's time to judge the show stopping home bakes.
Rebs, would you like to bring your Showstopper up, please?
It's heavy.
One wee thing I need to get.
I don't know if you've ever been to Northern Ireland
but it's constantly raining.
You have to have a bit of coconut rum rain.
I like the idea of coconut rum rain. Nice.
It does remind me of a very rural cottage. It's very good.
PRUE: The detail is lovely.
PAUL: This is basically a pina colada cake, isn't it?
Yeah. Coconut and vanilla sponge, pineapple curd,
and flambeed pineapple slices with coconut and rum butter cream.
I love the flavour.
PAUL: The pineapple comes through, coconut comes through.
It is over-baked, the sponge. Not by much.
Overall, A, it looks great, B, the flavours came through beautifully.
Well done. Do you want me to take it away? Yes.
Thank you. Quit while you're ahead.
Thank you so much.
Oh, I'm going to take your tablecloth with me... Well done.
Thank you. I'm going to cry.
PRUE: What are the windows?
Sugar cookie filled with butterscotch.
Did you mean to burn them?
I didn't mean to.
The banana cake itself is delicious.
My only thing is, cut your pecans up more.
They're too big.
PRUE: It's a really good cake. Well done.
PRUE: It's beautifully neat.
The piping is beautiful. Look at that.
PAUL: I love the pots all around the outside.
It's coffee and walnut with coffee buttercream.
It's quite powerful, that coffee. It had a good glug.
It's really powerful. I've never had a coffee cake that strong before.
The coffee is actually burning. It's fascinating. Wow.
You've blown Paul's mind!
PRUE: Lots of skills showing off here.
You're obviously very good at piping.
Thank you.
PAUL: So much buttercream!
It's very claggy.
PRUE: Especially that middle layer which is really compressed.
PAUL: I think it's the weight.
There's so much buttercream on there.
The sponge just can't hold it. It glues your mouth together,
which at the moment might be a good thing for you.
But the flavours, fantastic.
PRUE: You obviously ran out of time.
The piping is a bit clumsy. PAUL: Let's have a look.
PRUE: Oh, wow.
PAUL: I've never had a crumble in a cake before.
I think you've done a really good job.
The crumble with a compote is fantastic. It works really well.
PRUE: Well done.
Thank you. I was so worried.
Are you all right? Yes.
PAUL: Boo!
LAUGHTER
PAUL: You've lost a lot of the detail on the house. Yes.
Did you run out of time?
Unfortunately my oven wasn't hot which meant my cakes were delayed.
That basically pushed everything. My sponge is masala chai.
In between I have mascarpone frosting and mango jam.
The chai is delicious, carries really well inside the cake.
The bake is good as well.
It is absolutely delicious.
But I would have liked more mango.
OK. I'd like to have seen more detail. I think inside tastes great.
PRUE: It looks absently charming.
I love it. I like the pebble dash.
It's gone a bit wonky, but I'm thinking the house was wonky.
Subsidence, terrible subsidence.
PAUL: Wow. PRUE: Look at that.
It's genoise sponge with apricot, praline and vanilla jam
and buttercream inside.
PRUE: How many layers? It was supposed to be 12.
I'm going to be really honest and admit that there are 11.
PRUE: It's really brave to make genoise.
It's so airy that it could get squashed easily.
But it hasn't squashed at all.
PAUL: That is a fantastic cake.
You've get texture coming from the praline, the apricot is lovely
and it's got a bit of tartness to that, as well, which really works.
The sponge is well baked. Buttercream works well.
PRUE: Well done.
PRUE: I like the look of it. I think it's charming.
PAUL: The detail in there is lovely.
This has a lot of interesting flavours in this.
It is milk tea sponge
with strawberry jam and matcha buttercream.
PAUL: Cook's nice.
I think your textures are beautiful.
The baking element is perfect. The sponges are delicious.
My issue is, there is no hero flavour.
There are so many little things going on in there,
there's matcha, there's strawberry.
The tea flavour is not strong enough.
Oh, my God.
I recognise that block now!
Really? Yeah, we live near each other!
That's brilliant.
You've over-baked every one. Agh!
I think the chocolate could have been a bit more punchy.
I love the orange.
But it comes down to the bake for me.
PRUE: It's not perfectly decorated, is it?
It's a little bit clumsy.
PAUL: Let's have a look, shall we?
It's lemon, which is inspired by the lemon trees in that house.
It's quite dense.
That doesn't take away the fact that I actually love the flavour.
PRUE: It is just a bit puddingy.
If I had that in a bowl with custard I'd be in heaven.
But this is supposed to be cake!
Yeah! I like the flavours. Texture is all wrong.
Bit simple on the decoration.
Yes.
PAUL: The decorations look quite sweet
but I expected that to be a lot more detailed than it is.
It's just a little bit simplistic.
What you don't know is his grandparents
actually lived in a cake.
So it's actually very accurate.
Wow. Look at that.
PRUE: There's lots of strawberries and cream.
Doesn't bowl me over, that.
There's too much alcohol in there.
Too much alcohol?
PRUE: I thought I'd never hear me say this, but he's right.
Sponge is lovely and soft.
But somehow if you put booze in a filling, it's modified by the cake,
but if it's in the cake it's everywhere.
I love it for the colour and the vibrancy.
PAUL: The decoration and the pipework,
you've done an amazing job.
This looks beautiful, this area here.
I can see coming home to your mum's flat must have been really good.
It is chocolate cake. It contains soy sauce.
PRUE: For the umami, presumably. That is correct.
Inside, Christmas-inspired buttercream.
It is utterly delicious.
Just the right amount of spice.
Very chocolaty.
PAUL: The textures in the bakes all the way through are delicious.
PRUE: I can't fault it. It's excellent. Thank you.
Well done. It's a work of art.
Janusz, well done!
Yeah, that's amazing feedback.
If I was named Star Baker, that, in my heart,
would actually be like winning the competition for me.
Because cake is my favourite.
They said the cake looked lovely but it doesn't have a punchy flavour.
Yes, it's fair, I know I made a boo-boo that way.
Could have been worse.
I still feel like I'm languishing a little bit along the bottom.
I am in danger. To be honest,
I don't know whether I've done enough to stay.
I'm very happy. It went as well as it possibly could have done.
I just hope it's enough to be not bottom any more.
Prue and Paul have made their decision.
It's going to be OK.
It is going to be OK. I hope so.
I've got the great job this week of announcing the Star Baker.
And this week's Star Baker is...
...Janusz.
APPLAUSE
Well, if it was up to me, I'd keep you all here
and send one of the judges home.
Sadly it isn't up to me and we do have to say goodbye to one of you.
Which feels very early. But the person who is leaving us is...
...Will.
ALL: Aw!
Well, guys, you go and all knock it out of the park.
Honestly, Will, you should just feel proud of yourself.
PAUL: Well done, Will. Thank you.
APPLAUSE Well done.
You know, somebody's got to go first, and...
Obviously I'm disappointed but I'm proud to have made it.
Yeah, I'm all right. I knew it was going to happen.
I'm going to miss our conversations!
You know, there's obviously a lovely bunch of people I've met.
I've got an experience that I can definitely talk about and share.
Yeah, I'm proud of that.
PAUL: Bit better next week, please.
I need to be a lot neater. You do. A lot neater.
Oh... I'm still here!
I literally... I can't believe it.
I was constantly hearing my name.
Next week I really want to impress the judges
and also make myself proud as well.
PAUL: Well done, Janusz. You absolute rock star.
Winning Star Baker on the cake week means everything to me.
Congratulations. Thank you.
Are you crying?!
I've cried so many times.
Is he crying? Oh, babe! Babe!
I think my boyfriend will be really proud.
He will say, "You can make cake and I told you you can make cake."
Aw! Well done. Well done.
First Star Baker. Thank you.
Hey, hun-bun.
I just wanted to tell you that I win Star Caker in the bake week.
No! I win... No.
LAUGHTER
Next time...
Goodbye. ..it's biscuit week.
Say a little prayer.
A Signature illusion... What could go wrong with the macarons?
Everything could go wrong with the macarons.
...a classical Technical... I don't know what that is.
...that creates a buzz in the tent...
Scottish fly biscuits, that's what my mum called them.
Where's your gob?
...and the bakers face-off...
...as they make show stopping masks.
GASPS
Oh, I might cry. I might cry.
Subtitles by Red Bee Media