Christmas Cookie Challenge - General Discussion

[Maverick]

 The judges were rotating in the first few seasons.    Ree was always the head judge but the other two were always rotating guests judges.  Gesnene Prado and Dan Langan were two who were on several times.  I think Aaarti was in the mix.  Maybe the cookie woman who co-hosts the Halloween Cookie show too.  It was the first Covid season when they switched to Eddie and Ree being both co-hosts and co-judges and they never returned to the old format.  I just don't remember at what point they dropped the fifth initial contestant. 

[CheshireCat]

On 11/3/2023 at 9:33 AM, Maverick said:

 I wish they would have waited a week to start this.   It was a little jarring to turn on FN and see a Christmas cookie show when I had just been watching Halloween stuff. 

I was thinking the same thing. It felt way too soon.

What was up with the requirement to make gingerbread? Why?

Do the bakers have less time for the elimination challenge than they had for the Halloween competition? It just seemed like the Halloween bakers were able to produce neater cookies.

It always bothers me when Eddie or Ree make a comment like "the flooding/icing looks rushed". Duh. The bakers are rushed, so, of course, the flooding/icing looks rushed.

The judging really bothers me in general. It seemed that besides some version of "I don't get the spices" and "the bake is perfect" they had nothing else to say. Sure, it was all gingerbread but if you ask for gingerbread and allow the bakers to bake non-traditional gingerbread, don't expect traditional gingerbread and don't judge it as if it all were traditional gingerbread. In addition to the bake, judge the composition, the dough consistency, the structure, the flavor profile.
It also bothers me that both judges always come across as if they're considering the bakers opposite them amateurs/students. Many of the bakers have bakeries, all of them are home bakers who sell those cookies. So, obviously, the recipes the bakers use are appreciated by customers. Yet, Eddie's and Ree's comments always suggest that the recipes need changing because they think this or that ingredient isn't prominent enough or too prominent as if their opinion is more valid or has more weight than that of the customers. (And the bakers always nod along as if Eddie and Ree were the ultimate authority on cookie recipes).

I don't know if it was a bad edit but Ree looked like she was enjoying the icing sheets that curled under the hot isomalt. I thought that was a really strange reaction.

Why did they criticize the size of the chicken and reindeer cookies? There were no measurements for those cookies, were there?

I had to roll my eyes when they said that the raw cookie edge was visible with the "nephew" cookie. Sometimes it feels like they don't know what else to say, so they'll say things like that.

I could have told the baker who had the butterscotch that you wouldn't be able to taste much of it. It's simple logic. If you have a lot of ingredients already (which you don't, really. German gingerbread spice is made up of a lot of spices, yes, and you can add candied lemon peel (it's the older recipes that include candied lemon peel) but that's it. The rest is butter, sugar, honey, ground almonds, flour and a leavening agent), one more will just be one more. It may add a note of something and it may be present but it will not stand out. And if she stuck to with the honey and sugar then butterscotch will just be another sweetener.

With that said, the theaters all looked amazing. The Mexican curtains looked absolutely awesome and very much like fabric, although, I think I liked the barn the best (the barn had just about as much naked dough as Jose's theater did and since a barn is rustic, I thought it gave it a rustic look, so much so that I didn't even notice it until Ree and Eddie mentioned it).
But Jose's puppets were better than the chicken and reindeer. I don't know if they took that into account but I'm okay with him winning.

[HyeChaps]

I daresay these contestants have more baking knowledge than these "Judges".

 

[CheshireCat]

Why did they have five bakers this week? I don't really get why they have more than three bakers anyway, especially now that they've introduced an advantage. So why does the first challenge need to be an elimination challenge? Why not do two challenges and judge the winner based on both?

I guess they've decided to do variations of the same cookie this year? At least, the judging was better than last week's with regards to the flavor (Eddie more so than Ree, either they've changed the editing or he's learned) and orange-cardamom snickerdoodle is a really interesting flavor combination.

But someone please tell Ree that salt does not make anything less sweet. To the contrary. The opposite flavor is supposed to bring out the main flavor. Adding more salt will only make it more salty (eg, caramel will always be sweet whether you add salt or not. Salt just adds another taste to it). Reducing the sweetener is the only thing that will make something less sweet. (Or adding something sour but you'd have to add so much of the something sour that you'd ruin the dough 😛).
So, what does Ree want? Does she want it less sweet or does she want something that breaks up the sweetness and adds another taste to the cookie?

The piping of the baker who did the shoe and reindeer really was good. So smooth. Although, the piping from the first baker (the giant) was good, too. The icing was so shiny!
I was surprised that Ree was able to touch the pine cone in the way she did and not crush the icing. You can tell that it hasn't fully hardened because it never cracks when they break the cookies apart, so I didn't think it would withstand someone almost pushing into it.

I thought the advantage was unfair because it was two advantages in one. She got a head start which also meant she was guaranteed the ingredient she wanted. They should have let the bakers grab the ingredients first and then given her the five minutes.

Why would anyone choose a dough that they know is a soft cookie to build a structure and load it with so much icing on top of it? That makes no sense to me.

I'm okay with the winner even though I preferred the other clock. Yes, it was a bit rough on the sides but I thought the red color and the design with the doors and the trees inside made the winning clock look more like a clock that would stand in a town square. The design was great but I don't think it was a grandfather clock.

The detail work on both clocks was amazing!

[Madding crowd]

I like Eddie on other shows but he is too picky here and I find it hard to believe he really finds something wrong in every cookie. Ree is smug as well and she is no cookie expert. I do like seeing the decorated cookies but think the judging is too negative especially in the first round.

[Popples]

1 hour ago, Madding crowd said:

I like Eddie on other shows but he is too picky here and I find it hard to believe he really finds something wrong in every cookie. Ree is smug as well and she is no cookie expert. I do like seeing the decorated cookies but think the judging is too negative especially in the first round.

Yeah, I wish they would go back to how it was the first few seasons where Eddie was the host and Ree and two others judged the cookies.

[Salacious Kitty]

2 minutes ago, Popples said:

Yeah, I wish they would go back to how it was the first few seasons where Eddie was the host and Ree and two others judged the cookies.

They're cheaping out, and it shows.

[libgirl2]

3 hours ago, Madding crowd said:

I like Eddie on other shows but he is too picky here and I find it hard to believe he really finds something wrong in every cookie. Ree is smug as well and she is no cookie expert. I do like seeing the decorated cookies but think the judging is too negative especially in the first round.

I think Eddie probably loves just about all the cookies but of course he has to do a critique. 

[Madding crowd]

I think it’s fine to critique messy piping or over or under baking but I just don’t believe every one of these cookies has something wrong with it or that Eddie has such a palate that he can detect the tiniest defect.  And cookies aren’t like cakes or other desserts where you can add layers. It is impossible to have a cookie taste exactly like a gingerbread/snickerdoodle whatever and also taste exactly like a flavored lollipop or something else. It can have some of the ingredients added but it can’t be 100% two different things. 

[CheshireCat]

9 minutes ago, Madding crowd said:

And cookies aren’t like cakes or other desserts where you can add layers. It is impossible to have a cookie taste exactly like a gingerbread/snickerdoodle whatever and also taste exactly like a flavored lollipop or something else. It can have some of the ingredients added but it can’t be 100% two different things. 

This bothered me with the gingerbread cookies. Eddie seemed to be expecting it to taste like gingerbread with all the bells and whistles while it was supposed to have a different flavor in it. That is not possible. (Even with cakes it wouldn't be possible because flavors compliment one another, so if you have a gingerbread cake with raspberries, the gingerbread cake will not taste entirely like gingerbread because the raspberries will change the flavor and add another element to it). I thought he was a lot more reasonable with the snickerdoodles.

[mlp]

I like Eddie but I've never understood how he somehow became a baking expert when that was never his area of expertise.  At least on The Big Bake he's working with two pastry experts and his role seems to lean more to be entertaining.  When it's just Eddie and Ree (who isn't a baking expert either), I have a lot less confidence in his judgment.  And hers for that matter.

[Rammchick]

On 11/9/2023 at 10:02 PM, CheshireCat said:

But someone please tell Ree that salt does not make anything less sweet. To the contrary. The opposite flavor is supposed to bring out the main flavor. Adding more salt will only make it more salty (eg, caramel will always be sweet whether you add salt or not. Salt just adds another taste to it). Reducing the sweetener is the only thing that will make something less sweet. (Or adding something sour but you'd have to add so much of the something sour that you'd ruin the dough 😛).

It's the same principle as the difference between adding salt during cooking savory foods and after -- the salt added during cooking enhances the flavors because it helps to dehydrate. Salt added after on food just tastes salty.

[Grizzly]

This was a great episode! No wonder these people have won in the past. Such talent. And all the teams seemed to mesh well. The quilts were stunning. A friend made me a quilt from my dad's shirts so that hit home.

And then there were the stadiums. They were all well done, I couldn't pick a winner. I enjoyed that there wasn't any pieces breaking drama that we usually get when they have to build a structure.

[libgirl2]

13 hours ago, Grizzly said:

This was a great episode! No wonder these people have won in the past. Such talent. And all the teams seemed to mesh well. The quilts were stunning. A friend made me a quilt from my dad's shirts so that hit home.

And then there were the stadiums. They were all well done, I couldn't pick a winner. I enjoyed that there wasn't any pieces breaking drama that we usually get when they have to build a structure.

The blue quilt was gorgeous! And I loved the stadiums. The winner was well chosen. I did think the stadium with the ice rink should have had some "skaters" on it though. 

[CheshireCat]

I agree, this was a good episode. My only issue was that, again, the decorations on the first challenge looked kind of rushed. It is understandable given the amount of cookies they had to decorate but I still can't figure out why the Halloween bakers managed to be neater. It's weird.

Moving on (for now anyway 😉), I'm not surprised the bakers with the fondant decorations went home. I don't think the white was/should have been the issue as the cookies were still decorated. Yes, color would have been nice but it's not like they left the cookies bare and made things easier for themselves by decorating fewer cookies. But buttercream and fondant on a cookie? So, you've got a frosting made out of butter and powdered sugar on the cookie and something that you make out of melted marshmallow, water and powdered sugar when you make it yourself on top. Not only must that have had a weird mouth feel, it must also have been very sweet.
I always wonder about fondant on cookies. I peel off the fondant on cakes because fondant is just so sweet and, in my opinion, doesn't add anything to the flavor. But I could deal with the texture of fondant on cakes. On cookies, on the other hand? It's not something that I have any desire to eat.

I did not expect the stadiums to turn out as well as they did. I don't think that the one with the ice rink needed more outside decorations (maybe the trees could have been decorated) but I definitely think it needed competitors on the inside. I didn't catch it but did they plan to make any and didn't get to it or didn't they even plan to have any?
This stadium looked rushed and a bit sloppy, too. I appreciated their complex architectural structure but they must have known that the challenge wasn't just about that.

I loved both of the others and I would have been okay if either had won. The only thing I would have liked if they had dusted that bright green grass and the trees with a bit of powdered sugar. It looked a bit weird to have everything covered in snow but not the green bits. Since it was a cream cheese cream they even could have factored that in and used a bit less powdered sugar.

But other than that, both stadiums were impressive and well executed especially given the time restraints!

[libgirl2]

3 minutes ago, CheshireCat said:

I loved both of the others and I would have been okay if either had won. The only thing I would have liked if they had dusted that bright green grass and the trees with a bit of powdered sugar. It looked a bit weird to have everything covered in snow but not the green bits. Since it was a cream cheese cream they even could have factored that in and used a bit less powdered sugar.

 

I didn't even think about a bit of "snow" in the stadiums. 

[Dibs]

I didn't care for either the "returning champions" thing or the "teamwork" thing.  I also thought they were all too braggy about their success since winning and way too TV-ready.  I prefer the quaint charm of humble home or small business owner bakers with a simple format.  Don't change the formula.  If it ain't broke, don't fix it!

[mlp]

I'm sure I've watched every episode of this show but I didn't recognize any of those people.  I watched several of the reruns too and only one looked familiar.  I think I must pay a lot more attention to the cookies than the bakers.  

The blue quilt was very nicely done and I liked two of the three stadiums.  I was impresed by how much detail the bakers were able to add in a short time period.

[lavenderblue]

I didn't pay a ton of attention to the last episode, Elf not being my thing, but the entirety of first round cookies were the sloppiest I've ever seen produced on this show. It was bizarre because nothing about the requirements seemed like it should've resulted in more disaster than usual.

[CrazyInAlabama]

I recognized one on the returning champions episode, Julisa, or something like that.   She was also on one of the baking championship season, maybe the Holiday edition?  

[Dibs]

You'd be at a disadvantage if you'd never seen "Elf" (I haven't).  Was this all to promote a movie?  CCC seems to have jumped the shark.  Still love Eddie and even Ree, but I enjoy watching the reruns more.

[mlp]

2 hours ago, Dibs said:

You'd be at a disadvantage if you'd never seen "Elf" (I haven't). 

I've never seen it either so the references were lost on me but that didn't really affect my opinion of the cookies.  I wish they'd give them more time or let them make their doughs the night before so they can use show time to decorate.  That's a lot more interesting to viewers I think.  Most of the bakers make beautiful cookies at home or in their shops when they're not rushed so I blame the less impressive results on the show on lack of time and, probably, nerves.

[libgirl2]

I'm not sure I ever saw Elf in it's entirety but I really don't think I would watch it anyway. The theme was okay but I hope this isn't a trend. I don't like movie tie-ins. 

Edited November 26, 2023 by libgirl2

[Maverick]

 I'm glad I'm not the only one who thought the cookies from the Elf episode looked sloppy and amateurish.   The airbrushing was shockingly bad and the piping wasn't much better.  I've not seen that movie either so I was already predisposed to be bored with the episode.   Almost all of these competition shows do a tie in episode at some point.   Halloween Wars even had one this year for The Exorcist. 

[Grizzly]

I'm sorry but his space "ship" looked like a toilet.

[MerBearHou]

37 minutes ago, Grizzly said:

I'm sorry but his space "ship" looked like a toilet.

I literally said the exact same thing out loud!  

[CheshireCat]

Comments like Ree's "a cookie isn't supposed to fall apart" always make me mad. And it shows how little she knows. When I taste a cookie that's cool but out of the oven for only an hour or so, the structure is completely different and still softer in the middle than what it's like several hours later. So, unless the bakers have a lot more time than the show says they have, there is no way that the cookie can already be properly cooled and structurally as sound as it can be eventually.

The same goes for the icing. Even though the bakers put the cookies in a dehydrator, only the top of the icing is hardened but the icing is not hardened all the way through. It takes hours for that to happen. So, it's not only heavier in its wet state, it also gives off moisture and does not aide the cookie's stability as it normally would.

Additionally, a cookie isn't meant to be waved around either. I've never seen anyone handle my cookies the way Ree and Eddie handle them. Not even kids.

Lastly, a cookie is supposed to be what the customer wants it to be. If they want a particular dough then all I can do is inform them that it might not hold up as well. If they insist then I'll make it. So far, all of my cookies have been fine, again, because the icing makes it structurally more sound. Plus, the cookie broke apart as Eddie was about to eat it. I don't think anyone who's about to eat a cookie minds if it breaks at that point.

But I think the cookie breaking is more Eddie's and Ree's fault than the baker's as they don't handle the cookies as they should handle them at that point in the cooling and drying stage of the cookie and icing.

The winner had the cleanest first challenge cookies I've seen in this competition. That was impressive! I also thought that she had the best rocket even if it was leaning a bit.

The Christmas mail delivering robot was right up there, too. Too bad the other cookie wasn't as neat.

I really loved the idea of a Christmas PJ picture that the teacher made. I would have loved to see how the cookie would look like if she had had the time she needed to decorate it. That technique she used to create the background worked so well. You could tell that even Ree was impressed.
I liked her gingerbread house rocket but I did like the rocket that won a bit better and I think the right baker won.

 

1 hour ago, MerBearHou said:

I literally said the exact same thing out loud!  

Me too. The end product didn't look as much like a toilet as the picture did but still.

[Grizzly]

Go away, Ree! My goodness, the poor bakers kept messing up when she talked to them. Joseph has a bright future ahead of him! His work was so clean! Very impressive.

[CheshireCat]

I liked the idea of the postcard challenge but why did they have to glue those cards together and make them stand up? They only have 90 minutes and the cards would have looked just as nice if they had been placed side by side.

Joseph's Nessie with a Christmas hat was adorable. It's such a pity that his icing broke but it's not surprising either. The icing was nowhere near dry. But I really appreciated that he was honest about it and didn't act like he wasn't aware of it like other bakers sometimes do.

I'm not sure what the judges want. Yes, Joseph won the pre-heat, still, they held it against him that the card was so simple. At the same time, they praised his clean work.

Other cards had more detail but were messier. Well, duh, of course, they were messier. The bakers have 90 minutes. They have to choose. Would they like messier decorating and more details or simpler cards and cleaner work but they can't have both.

When Joseph said he had been decorating cookies for three years, I thought, hey, he's more experienced than Eddie and Ree. 😅

I thought the card from Hawaii with the beach and the hut (not the snowman) was a little confusing. The palm leaves were far too massive for palm leaves and were the wrong shade of green and in addition to that, the hut was also the same green. It did not look like a Hawaiian beach to me.
Wasn't she also the baker who had the messy second side of the card? I think I would have sent her home. Both cards weren't entirely clean but I think the beach was instantly recognizable with the snowman card and the text was adorable. The whole card was also more original.

I was surprised that Joseph got to stay and even more so that he won. When Eddie pointed out the simplicity, I thought Joseph would have to leave because his icing was also cracked. Other bakers have been sent home for that.

I'm okay with Joseph winning the competition. I would have been okay with either him winning or the baker who didn't manage to get the side panels on. The other baker had really cute ideas but that camper was a hot mess.

About the roof not being attached to the side panels with Joseph's camper, I guess, he made more of a tiny house than a camper but people use that as campers, too 😉

 

[libgirl2]

Joseph is mad talented for his age! 

[mojoween]

His piping skills were amazing.  He was too young to be nervous and shaky, apparently.

This was like the fourth week in a row where the winner of the first heat won the whole shebang.  Arika *really* could have used those five extra minutes.

[mlp]

I think Ree and Eddie have to find something negative to say about everyone's cookies to keep a little suspense about the final decision.  I thought Joseph was the clear winner.  The woman with the camper that was missing its front and back had great side panels.  She would have been a serious contender if she had finished.  The third camper was kind of a mess.

[libgirl2]

45 minutes ago, mlp said:

I think Ree and Eddie have to find something negative to say about everyone's cookies to keep a little suspense about the final decision.  I thought Joseph was the clear winner.  The woman with the camper that was missing its front and back had great side panels.  She would have been a serious contender if she had finished.  The third camper was kind of a mess.

I agree, I notice that on several of these kind of shows. 

[lavenderblue]

Yeah, I thought in terms of who actually had the potential to be the clear winner, it was Mariana, who had theoretically the best balance of design/decorating ability and concept, and whose stuff I liked best; she fell down on time management, especially not getting the side panels on her camper. Though I expected her to take the first round -- I guess I wasn't paying close enough attention to note where she let them down, besides misspelling "Leavenworth." But Joseph came through in the second round. He was cleaner than a lot of the pros have been in recent weeks (and last night)!

[CheshireCat]

On 12/8/2023 at 7:12 PM, lavenderblue said:

Yeah, I thought in terms of who actually had the potential to be the clear winner, it was Mariana, who had theoretically the best balance of design/decorating ability and concept, and whose stuff I liked best; she fell down on time management, especially not getting the side panels on her camper.

She had the side panels on the camper but for some reason they didn't stick, so she removed them. I don't know why she didn't put them back on but it's possible they weren't usable anymore.

As for last night's episode, this is the first episode where the elimination and display challenge didn't match theme wise, is it? How do you get from country to cookie jars? That was weird.

What was also weird were the exaggerations. There is no way that a single person is able to decorate thousands of the cookies that were shown as a sample during the holiday season. The cookies were far too elaborate for that to work.

Likewise, didn't the baker who was eliminated say she's making 17 dozen per week? Yeah, no. You don't do that and certainly not when you have small kids at home.

Also, did the show really want us to believe that Madison gathered her ingredients, mixed them together, rolled out the dough, cut out the dough, transferred it to a baking sheet and put it into the oven before the 5 minutes were up?

I'm glad I didn't have to pick the winner. I liked all three cookies jars. They were all different and they all looked cute and well executed. I would have been fine if either of them had won. (Although, come to think of it, I think they should have given the win to the male baker as the irregular shape of his cookie jar was a higher degree of difficulty than the other two straight jars. He also had a larger dome for the lid, so he took a lot more risks and it paid off. The cookie jar didn't collapse and he managed to ice and decorate it well, too).

 

[mlp]

6 hours ago, CheshireCat said:

Also, did the show really want us to believe that Madison gathered her ingredients, mixed them together, rolled out the dough, cut out the dough, transferred it to a baking sheet and put it into the oven before the 5 minutes were up?

I've often wondered about the timing - what we see vs. what really happened.  One thing I've noticed many times going all the way back to Cake Wars is someone taking something out of the oven and then, apparently a minute later, handling the hot pan or the cake layer or whatever with bare hands.  No way.  

I've also wondered about the sheer number of cookies some of these people claim to make.   Many of the displays of what they've made at home are beautiful and must have taken hours.  I don't think you can crank out elaborate designs by the dozen in a short time.

[CheshireCat]

3 hours ago, mlp said:

I've often wondered about the timing - what we see vs. what really happened.  One thing I've noticed many times going all the way back to Cake Wars is someone taking something out of the oven and then, apparently a minute later, handling the hot pan or the cake layer or whatever with bare hands.  No way. 

Likewise, like last night with the baker who started on the second cookie dough rather late, you sometimes don't think that the time the host calls out is enough time for them to finish but they almost always do. So, the question is how that is edited.

 

Quote

I've also wondered about the sheer number of cookies some of these people claim to make.   Many of the displays of what they've made at home are beautiful and must have taken hours.  I don't think you can crank out elaborate designs by the dozen in a short time.

My guess would be that the cookies they showed last night take between 10 and 20 minutes per cookie. That doesn't include mixing the icing, getting the consistency right and mixing the colors. That can sometimes take longer than the actual cookie. Plus, ideally, the icing needs to sit for a moment so the air bubbles can rise to the top.

There's also drying time involved. Of course, you can cut that time short with a fan or dehydrator but they still have to dry. If you do a snowman, you can probably ice one snowball and by the time you're finished with all of the cookies, you can add the next one. However, I'd always try to let white icing dry overnight before adding dark colors like black, red and blue (which are the colors used in a snowman they showed yesterday) to keep the risk of color bleeding as low as possible. If you don't have the time, four hours is the minimum.

Sure, while they are drying you can start with a next set but you need to put them somewhere, too. (And once they're done, you need to package them, too).

But that's why the cookies look the way they do on the show and why I said last week that Eddie can either have a lot of details and accept that the cookies look a bit messier or he can have a simpler design that is neater but he can't have both. There just isn't enough time to make a lot of different icing consistencies and allow for enough drying time. The icing on Joseph's cookie broke because it didn't have enough time to dry. (Which is why I think the bakers should not have been made to stand up those postcards. It was bound to happen. Even such a large cookie could have broken because it didn't have enough time to fully cool (I tasted a cookie I recently made three times. The first time when it was still a bit warm and it tasted bland, the second time after it had cooled for about two hours or so and it was better taste-wise but still softer than the next day. Interestingly enough, it seemed sweeter but I tasted less of the spices after two hours compared to the next day. But if Eddie and Ree really taste the cookies after 90 minutes or 2/2:30 hours then chances are, they are not getting the full flavor profile of the cookie because it hasn't had enough time to cool/sit. So, basically, the bakers can ignore whatever they say about taste (I mean, I would anyway, especially Ree, at times 😛))).