S07.E05: Pastry Week

[Mabinogia]

3 minutes ago, illdoc said:

That's unfortunate." ("that's unfortunate"--how terribly understatedly British that is.)

I know. I feel in love with him in that moment. So very British.

[mlp]

I don't understand how anyone could reach into an oven, even with an oven mitt on, and not realize it wasn't hot in there.  Maybe Andrew was just distracted by every else going on and it didn't register.

I liked Val a lot.  I was surprised she lasted as long as she did but I was sorry to see her go.  I like everyone except Candice and her "LOOK AT ME!" lips and lipstick.  My favorites are Jane who seems very good and Rav who is a darling but probably won't last much longer.

Has the BBC ever done any follow ups on contestants?  I'd love to know what Ian, Tamal and Flora are doing now.

[Athena]

1 minute ago, mlp said:

Has the BBC ever done any follow ups on contestants?  I'd love to know what Ian, Tamal and Flora are doing now.

Every season the BBC does a follow up episode before the finale of last year's contestants. PBS does not show these. A lot of the contestants have written books, changed careers, or become more prominent in the media. Most of them have social media accounts too. Tamal hosted a medical show for Channel 4 recently. I think Ian had a book out but unsure if it's a baking one. Flora I'm not sure.

Occasionally, news media will write an article about where contestants are now.  

[andromeda331]

29 minutes ago, Athena said:

Every season the BBC does a follow up episode before the finale of last year's contestants. PBS does not show these. A lot of the contestants have written books, changed careers, or become more prominent in the media. Most of them have social media accounts too. Tamal hosted a medical show for Channel 4 recently. I think Ian had a book out but unsure if it's a baking one. Flora I'm not sure.

Occasionally, news media will write an article about where contestants are now.  

I wish PBS would show this it  would be really nice to see what their up too.

[Florinaldo]

Thanks to all who clarified exactly what contestants are told in advance and what they know they shoud prepare for. It does not diminish their accomplishments, but it helps understand how it's humanly possible to tackle all these challenges.

 

8 hours ago, illdoc said:

Actually, it was 15 minutes! I believe his quote was something like "I forgot to turn the oven on. It's been sitting there for 15 minutes doing nothing.

I missed that. How can you not notice it for a whole 15 minutes? The PBS station in our area is repeating that episode tomorrow afternoon; I may give it a listen to watch this oven near-fiasco in its entirety.

Andrew is very endearing, but I think he lacks a certain level of technical polish that would put him in the running for a top spot.

Edited July 15, 2017 by Florinaldo

[jenh526]

20 hours ago, mlp said:

I don't understand how anyone could reach into an oven, even with an oven mitt on, and not realize it wasn't hot in there.  Maybe Andrew was just distracted by every else going on and it didn't register.

I liked Val a lot.  I was surprised she lasted as long as she did but I was sorry to see her go.  I like everyone except Candice and her "LOOK AT ME!" lips and lipstick.  My favorites are Jane who seems very good and Rav who is a darling but probably won't last much longer.

Has the BBC ever done any follow ups on contestants?  I'd love to know what Ian, Tamal and Flora are doing now.

The lips... she reminds me of Helena Bonham Carter's Queen of Hearts.

[DHDancer]

8 hours ago, jenh526 said:

I don't understand how anyone could reach into an oven, even with an oven mitt on, and not realize it wasn't hot in there.  Maybe Andrew was just distracted by every else going on and it didn't register.

The thing is that he had already pre-baked his crust so my first thought was why would he have turned off the oven -- most of us would just leave it on ready for the final bake.  There was obviously a reason the oven turned off (either Andrew did it, or it was an automatic feature of the oven, like my little Breville Smart Oven).   Whatever the reason, I suspect when he put the tart in the oven for the final bake, the oven was still quite hot from the pre-bake and that's why he didn't immediately notice the oven was off.

[Florinaldo]

Watching the episode again, Andrew does say that his tart spent 15 minutes in an oven that was turned off. Even accounting for a little dramatic hyperbole and assuming it might be closer to 10 minutes, that is still a long time not to notice it. Aren't there lights or displays that turn off when the oven is not heating? It's too bad he did not expand on how he made that mistake because I have yet to read a satisfactory explanation as to how this could have happened and the sequence of events that led to it (besides nerves and the pressure of being rushed by the clock).

Edited July 16, 2017 by Florinaldo

[dubbel zout]

Have we seen the bakers eat their finished products before? A couple of them snacked on their breakfast danishes. 

I'm not generally a giant fan of classic British baked goods, but the bakewell tart is definitely up my alley. I love frangipane. Paul calling Mary "Bezzer" was hilarious. I thought the comments that the older bakers would know how to make it were a little rude, tbh.

Homemade phyllo dough? That's why the freezer case in the supermarket exists! Ha.

Candice using a pasta machine to roll out her phyllo dough was so clever. I loved seeing everyone try to read something under the dough to make sure it was thin enough.

I think sending Val home was the right choice, though Tom was right there with her in this episode. But she was a bit worse.

[Rinaldo]

12 minutes ago, dubbel zout said:

I thought the comments that the older bakers would know how to make it were a little rude, tbh.

Why? Mary's older than any of them, and Paul's older than most. Age isn't an insult.

[dubbel zout]

Because there was no reason to bring it up. A bakewell tart isn't so unusual that only someone above a certain age would have any idea of what it was. 

[rereader2]

On 7/13/2017 at 8:51 PM, Florinaldo said:

I can only imagine the amount of ribbing he must have taken from his fellow engineers (or is he still a student?). I suppose he noticed the mistake early enough to correct it, perhaps just a few seconds after putting his pastry in the oven (editing can be deceving after all). Since operation of electronic controls can vary subtly from oven to oven, he may have a relatively valid excuse.

In the episode he made a comment about how it was sitting in the oven for 15 minutes and not baking, and losing 15 minutes was the time he needed to have the tart cool off enough to frost. A real pity, considering how good the design in the bit of frosting he did put on looked.