Athena September 15, 2014 Share September 15, 2014 It's the quarter-finals of the Bake Off and only five bakers remain. They were tested on cake and then specialised European cakes, they proved what they could do with dough and now face an even tougher dough week with three kinds of enriched dough. Mary and Paul have upped the ante to see which baker will rise to the challenge. Asked to make enriched sweet fruit loaves for their signature challenge, the bakers must work with soft dough to create works of art for Paul and Mary to critique. The technical challenge stretches them to the limit in the beautiful eastern European cross between a bread and a pastry filled with a hidden design of swirls of cinnamon and walnuts. And finally, a show-stopper that takes the ordinary into the extraordinary. The bakers must make 36 show-stopping doughnuts, of two different types, demonstrating skills and ideas that take their baking to a whole new level. Paul and Mary have their work cut out to decide between the final five bakers. 1 Link to comment
Athena September 26, 2014 Author Share September 26, 2014 Yay Bob the builder! It'll be a bit disappointing for me if he doesn't win now that he's broken the Star Baker record. Chetna really lucked out but I adore her so I'm glad she did well this week. I'm slowly warming up to Luis, but it's still Bob for me. I love Mel's "We like big nuts here on Bake Off," and her randomly spraying oil into her mouth. Aww bless. 7 Link to comment
Meredith Quill September 26, 2014 Share September 26, 2014 Yep glad Richard broke the star baker record. I still have no affection for Luis but I grudgingly admit his cherry tree tear & share looked good and was clever. Sad to see Martha go; I think it's anybody's game from here on out! SquirrelWatch: 0 (again) *sob* 6 Link to comment
Lilit September 26, 2014 Share September 26, 2014 My weird crush on Richard is getting out of hand. He's so ruddy-cheeked and modest and he makes heart-shaped doughnuts. I like the remaining contestants but if he doesn't win I'll be sad. 11 Link to comment
ElectricBoogaloo September 28, 2014 Share September 28, 2014 Luis' black forest cherry tree sounded yummy! Heh, I love that he HAD to use some cherry brandy. It's a liquid carrier! I want to tell him that the green cherries are made the same way as the red ones. Loved seeing Nancy help him move it for his final display. It looked nice, much cheerier than a regular loaf of bread. Martha's spiced plum iced bread swirl with figs looked so big! I was worried it wouldn't cook all the way through in the middle. When they cut it open, I liked how nice the jam looked inside. Chetna's date and walnut swirl bread looked like a bunch of taquitos piled together. It did look very nice when they sliced it open. Heh, Paul really did not like how much cinnamon was in that loaf, but Mary seemed totally fine with it. Nancy's Lincolnshire plum braid with apricots and orange zest definitely sounded very fruity, but I wasn't sure about the microwave. There are definitely some things you can microwave to help precook without any issues, but I've never tried that with bread dough. I hope she tried it at home first to make sure it didn't affect the taste or texture. Like Martha's, Nancy's loaf was so big that I was worried it wouldn't be cooked all the way through in the middle. Richard's fruit Swedish tea ring with pecans, apricot glaze, and lemon icing looked great. I liked the rings - they made the loaf look so intricate. What good luck for Chetna that the technical challenge was a povitica! I wasn't sure if she would be able to get all the swirls inside because the one she made for the signature bake was eight individual rolls stuck together. No wonder Sue knew how to pronounce the name of that bread when Chetna told her what she was making earlier. Why was Richard copying everything Nancy did? If he was going to copy one person for the technical challenge, it should have been Chetna since he knew that she had just baked the same thing! Oh, Nancy, quit with the microwaving! I did laugh when she said that she decided if they put her technical in fifth place, she wasn't going to raise her hand. No big surprise that Chetna came in first and everyone else was a distant second, third, fourth, and fifth. Luis' cocktail donuts sounded delicious. Mudslide donuts with Irish liqueur and mojita donuts with raspberry and mint jam? HELL YEAH. His display was the only that I thought really qualified as a showstopper. Loved the mudslide donuts in the martini glasses and the straws filled with Baileys. Ha and I loved Mary's reaction to them! Paul's assessment was hilarious: coffee bombs with alcohol. The raspberry donuts looked great too. The cocktail spears with raspberries and mint added some height and looked really nice. When he said that donuts should have jam, he reminded me of Norman. Chetna's chocolate mousse donuts sounded great. I wasn't as enthusiastic about the braided cinnamon and ginger donuts, but those looked very nice and they were different looking from everyone else's. Neither Martha's lemon and poppyseed donuts nor her chocolate & passionfruit donuts excited me because I don't like either flavor combination. I felt bad that she overproofed her dough. Oh, Richard. Carnival themed donuts? Awesome. Both the toffee apple donuts with salted caramel and cinnamon sugar and the custard rhubarb donuts sounded delicious and they all looked great. And really sweet that his wife loves them. I liked that he used orange boxes to display them. Nancy's lemoncello donuts with flaked almonds sounded good, and I thought the chocolate donuts with royal icing were cute. The ones with the frowns were hilarious. The family tree display was a fun idea, and I'm sure that kids would love it. Congratulations to Richard for winning star baker for the fourth time - wow! As sad as it was to see Martha go, she had a terrible week. She didn't do well in the signature bake, the technical challenge, or the showstopper. 5 Link to comment
Primetimer February 16, 2015 Share February 16, 2015 A Futurama reference in a Great British Baking Show headline? Seems only fitting when Advanced Dough week felt more like 'advanced d'oh!' for the semifinalists. Read the story Link to comment
LaChavalina February 16, 2015 Share February 16, 2015 I'll openly admit that Chetna is my favorite, but after weeks of seeing comments to the effect of "she only knows how to bake Indian flavors," it was rewarding to see her do a European sweet bread--and beat everyone else at it. It may be luck that it came up in the technical, but it's skill that allowed her to do it right in two loaves with different structures. Also, booze donuts--yes, please. Let's get on it, Dunkin. 6 Link to comment
LittleIggy February 16, 2015 Share February 16, 2015 I hated seeing Martha go. She is so cute, a true English Rose. I would love to taste the apple and salted caramel donuts Richard made. Those sound magical! Or "crackin'" as Paul said (reminded me of "Wallace and Gromit" :-)). I love Paul's accent, especially the way he pronounces "butter." 6 Link to comment
mlp February 16, 2015 Share February 16, 2015 It was clear that Martha would be leaving but I was sorry to see her go. What a lovely, nice girl and so talented. After a few more years' experience, she is going to be formidable. I'm rooting for Richard, Chetna, Luis and Nancy - in that order. But I like them all and hate to see any of them lose. Those two hosts are supremely annoying, IMO of course. Love Mary and Paul. 2 Link to comment
GaT February 16, 2015 Share February 16, 2015 I knew Martha wasn't going to make it to the very end, but she's done a great job up to now, & I'll miss her. All the breads looked delicious to me, I had no idea what a "sweet loaf" was when they started, but once they started making them, I realized they were babkas ::-) Mary & the cocktail donut really made me laugh, & I snorted my drink when Paul & Mary said they knew who was leaving & Sue said something about how she hoped that after Luis' donut she hoped they remembered their name. 6 Link to comment
Kohola3 February 16, 2015 Share February 16, 2015 I will miss little Martha. She certainly held her own against experienced bakers very well. I bet she goes far if she continues to follow her passion. 10 Link to comment
wlk68 February 16, 2015 Share February 16, 2015 It was clear that Martha would be leaving but I was sorry to see her go. What a lovely, nice girl and so talented. After a few more years' experience, she is going to be formidable. Agree with this 100%. She is just cute as a button and obviously talented. I'm sure she'll go on to do great things. Richard is on a serious roll right now. I can totally see him winning this thing. That being said, I like everybody and will be happy for whoever does end up winning. 8 Link to comment
stillshimpy February 16, 2015 Share February 16, 2015 It just gets harder to see a baker leave now. It really does and whereas I'll really miss Martha, because what a great young woman she is, I was comfortable with her being the person to leave at this juncture. She did so incredibly well for someone her age (or any age actually) , so it seems fitting that people who have been doing this a lot longer are going the distance. I have a feeling Martha is just genuinely talented at almost anything she tries, so I'm not even sure baking is a huge passion for her in the same way it is for the others. One thing I really liked was that Paul always seem to dial it back just a notch for her, when it came to criticism, at least in what he said. I really appreciated that. She's very young and it takes some time in life to put that sort of thing in the proper perspective. I just liked that Paul was ever-so-slightly conscious of the fact that he was talking to a still developing person. I know Martha cried on at least one occasion, but particularly since so many teenagers can be tough to take, she was an absolute delight to watch. Most of the time I am so incredibly glad that my late teens and very early twenties aren't recorded forever anywhere. It was not one of my lovelier ages in terms of conducting myself kindly. Martha, on the other hand, will never have any reason to cringe away from a permanent record of herself at seventeen. I think that's a very rare thing to be able to say about almost anyone. Her parents must be so incredibly proud. But that's part of the reason it felt okay to see her go. Whenever she was on, that's what my husband and I would say, "Wow, she's amazingly poised and sunny. Clearly so talented. Her parents must be so proud!" and it kind of struck me that everyone else there, it's just a case of "Wow, they must be so proud of themselves!" Martha is still young enough that I assign credit to her parents as much as to her. I think that's fitting, but it's also part of why watching her go felt like, "I'll miss her, but this feels like about the right exit point for her." I also really like Chetna and I don't begrudge her not sharing her knowledge about the technical bake, but by the same token, I was glad she didn't win the week. I know that it was just a freakish stroke of good luck, but it also wouldn't have felt quite as earned...because everyone else struggled mightily with that technical. 15 Link to comment
Guest February 16, 2015 Share February 16, 2015 It just gets harder to see a baker leave now.I shocked myself when tears welled up in my eyes when they told Martha she was the one leaving. Guess I will have tissues at the ready during the next bunch of shows. Louis' level of meticulousness never ceases to amaze me. He doesn't always make things I would want to eat but he does make things I love to look at. And for as much as Paul Hollywood claims to not own a microwave, it appears his crispy, fried face seemed to have found a way inside one. Link to comment
QuinnM February 16, 2015 Share February 16, 2015 I just want to taste things that Richard, Chetna and Martha bake. I will miss Martha so much. She was just so good for 17. I marvel at all them rolling that dough out to that huge paper thin size for the technical bake. I can't even manage a small pizza dough to a circle. Martha's solution on the filling for the technical was genius. I did wonder why more of the baker's weren't watching Chetna's decision on proofing and baking that one. If it was me and those two comedians where picking things up while I was baking and moving them and tasting them I would smack one of them. All that stress and you've got people rearranging spices? Yeah, I wouldn't like it one bit. 5 Link to comment
shandy February 16, 2015 Share February 16, 2015 (edited) Poor Martha. Attempting a laminated dough / donut hybrid was always risky. I still think Richard gets over-marked - he made two variations of Berliner for the Show Stopper, the others had to show a different technique for rings or plait. I also wish Mary would fight her corner better - I thought Luis' mudslide donuts were such an amazing idea. They weren't buns Paul, they had been in the fryer, but he just shouts her down. Cinnamon is pretty hard to OD as well, but not for La Hollywood. Like Anthony Bourdain he's a food conservative hiding behind a bad boy act. I find him progressively more irritating as I find Mel and Sue less so. I was surprised he has not heard of koeksisters as I've seen numerous travel and cooking shows where they have been showcased. Nancy showed wisdom in her donuts - I loved the tree, and as a child would have been thrilled with that as a centerpiece for my birthday party. The oil may have been too high, but the fryers seem very cheap, just like the freezers. Still impressed with Chetna's skillet technique. I would burn down the block. Edited February 16, 2015 by shandy 2 Link to comment
ennui February 17, 2015 Share February 17, 2015 I learn a lot from watching this show. Now I have the knowledge to properly criticize a donut. :) I was a bit puzzled by the microwave technique. I baked bread for years, and I don't think you can "force" a rise. If Nancy were working with true sourdough starter, she would kill it. I realize the bakers are pressed for time, but yeast needs time, and I think that's the point of the challenge. 3 Link to comment
Texasmom1970 February 17, 2015 Share February 17, 2015 I agree with this week's performance Martha was the correct contestant to go. She is so dang sweet and talented she will be missed. A couple years if experience and confidence she will be unstoppable, she is talented. I really wanted one of those heart shaped donuts. Which my husband was a baker! 2 Link to comment
Qoass February 17, 2015 Share February 17, 2015 I adore each and every contestant so while it's sad that one has to leave at the end of each episode, I'm equally happy for all who remain. I would love to do better with yeast doughs in my cold and drafty kitchen so I'm intrigued with using my microwave. If anybody can point me to more information, I'd appreciate it. I'm just baking for myself so it's okay if things get poufy. 2 Link to comment
meep.meep February 17, 2015 Share February 17, 2015 All the breads looked delicious to me, I had no idea what a "sweet loaf" was when they started, but once they started making them, I realized they were babkas ::-) Mary & the cocktail donut really made me laugh, & I snorted my drink when Paul & Mary said they knew who was leaving & Sue said something about how she hoped that after Luis' donut she hoped they remembered their name. I know! I kept thinking, Kate could have made her babka! Which, she actually made in a tin and it didn't work well. Mary has the best positive reactions of anyone I've ever encountered. She's not always a cheerleader, but when she likes something, she gets that across magnificently. Richard's custard-filled donut and Luis' Bailey filled straw - her reaction was so funny. 5 Link to comment
PaulaO February 17, 2015 Share February 17, 2015 As much as I love this show ( and the people) it's starting to annoy me in a Project Runway way. TIME. Give the bakers enough time to produce a great product. Don't force them to use a microwave to proof (prove?) their dough. It's not a test of talent if there isn't enough time. It's just a matter of whose is least bad. 14 Link to comment
shandy February 17, 2015 Share February 17, 2015 And Nancy's use of the microwave had a less than great result, which is probably why the rest did not emulate her. For all the build up it was by no means a disaster - Mary loved it, and Paul was thumbing the dough to prove a point and he couldn't. Hilarious! 5 Link to comment
Kohola3 February 17, 2015 Share February 17, 2015 I would love to do better with yeast doughs in my cold and drafty kitchen so I'm intrigued with using my microwave. If anybody can point me to more information, I'd appreciate it. If you google "proof dough with a microwave" you'll get umpteen versions of how to do it. I've never tried it so I can't vouch for any of them. Link to comment
stillshimpy February 18, 2015 Share February 18, 2015 Qoass, after you asked I spent some time googling and looking for an answer. I've baked bread in the past and used enriched dough for a couple of projects including Challah and sweet rolls. I have a "bread proof" setting on my ovens that keeps the temp at 100 degrees ,so I haven't really struggled with the dough because of temp, but I pretty righteously ruined some pita bread dough a couple of weeks ago (and just went with grilled pitas) when I didn't realize the oven was too warm. I think the theory runs that by forcing heat into the dough, you don't develop the right flavors. You can do a cold fermentation overnight, like for no-knead doughs and those are great. But proofing in the microwave should only work if you have a power-setting that goes down to ten percent and it should only work on dough where the yeast flavor isn't something you want developed, like sweet dough for a coffee cake, etc. Anyway, what I read yesterday was a bunch of people talking about their experience with that, but I didn't grab the link because the blog I found that basically confirmed that for me....was in Japanese and even though I read the translation, it was still pretty scattered and mostly what I gleaned was from a discussion on a forum ,discussing that post. Only worth mentioning that because it did bear out what I thought it would....in something like baguettes, where they flavor of the dough should really matter (and in fact the baguettes I make are a cold fermentation recipe) , it seems like it shouldn't work because flavors take time to develop. If the dough is sweet, you just need the sweetness, which doesn't actually need to develop. Hope that helps, then if you Google proofing in the microwave there are a ton of instructions on how to for your volume of dough. 2 Link to comment
Qoass February 18, 2015 Share February 18, 2015 Thanks so much. I don't think my microwave goes down to 10% so I guess I'll stick to my overnight/fermented dough until the weather gets warmer and the chill leaves my kitchen. I'm just not great at yeast breads so I was hoping for some sooper-sekrit trick... Link to comment
goodbyeglittergirl February 18, 2015 Share February 18, 2015 I was so sorry to say goodbye to Martha - what a joy! I hope she goes on to a life of great happiness. 5 Link to comment
meep.meep February 18, 2015 Share February 18, 2015 But proofing in the microwave should only work if you have a power-setting that goes down to ten percent and it should only work on dough where the yeast flavor isn't something you want developed, like sweet dough for a coffee cake, etc. Which is what Nancy said she did - used 10% setting and was making something pretty sweet. 1 Link to comment
shandy February 18, 2015 Share February 18, 2015 I'm quite surprised by the love of candied fruit on this show, as the hardcore bleaching and preservatives make a lot of people think twice. Maybe there are different techniques in Europe. The big love for marzipan is also something new for me tho I do like the almond paste in french croissants. Nancy chunking it into her plum braid made me think of German Christmas Stollen. 1 Link to comment
Athena February 18, 2015 Author Share February 18, 2015 I'm quite surprised by the love of candied fruit on this show, as the hardcore bleaching and preservatives make a lot of people think twice. Maybe there are different techniques in Europe. The big love for marzipan is also something new for me tho I do like the almond paste in french croissants. Nancy chunking it into her plum braid made me think of German Christmas Stollen. Dried and candied fruit is prominent in European and British baking especially at Christmas time. I actually have to substitute for some of my European/British recipes because I can't get as easily in NA e.g. stem ginger. The traditions and use of these dried and candied fruit go back centuries. There are probably more preservatives now, but I think if you read the packaging, most of it is just a lot of sugar on the fruit for the European/British products. 1 Link to comment
shandy February 18, 2015 Share February 18, 2015 It's the sulfites in the cherries really, but I suppose it only matters if people are sensitive to them. When I waited tables the bar was told to stop using maraschino cherries. I generally love dried fruit. When I had my London semester I lived on Eccles Cake! I would love the show to have that as a technical challenge. Link to comment
fourPLUSseven February 20, 2015 Share February 20, 2015 Chetna showed her stuff in this episode. I'm rooting for her to win the whole thing. Haven't looked up the spoilers for the winner, and I'm not gonna! 3 Link to comment
kirklandia November 6, 2018 Share November 6, 2018 Love "Read the Story". Particularly enjoyed the photo of Richard, with his cup of what must be the famous "Builder's Tea". Link to comment
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