Julia is star baker
What a week! Noel is now having a ball, Steven, like all Hollywood villains has proved himself more deadly now his weakness has been exposed, and Julia has established herself as a plucky Jedi with a double-sided dong for a lightsaber.
I’m fully into this series thanks to this week, the first superb episode in the new run. Many, many thanks for your scandalous additions BTL, plus insult-y lookalikes. See you again next time, and tell your friends! Much more fun when it’s a party.
Until next week, come say hello on Twitter, Instagram or Facebook, or just file charges against me in a small claims court. It’s all attention, isn’t it.
Ciao!
Updated
YES, dappy JULIA and her snowy cocks. Highly deserved and almost un-broadcastable. Don’t put your head in that oven, Steven!
As we suspected, Flo to go. In the final equation, Vera just was not Duckworthy enough. Back to her boys she goes.
Meanwhile, who’s going home? Liam has stayed bold, whereas Flo has turned her teeth to the wall. I think she’s going. How about you?
So – a lot to think about. Can cottage pornographer Julia take the crown? Please god yes. Or will Steven stay sitting pretty? If so, what does it say about the format – that the previous rounds are essentially meaningless? Prude and Paul clearly have differences of opinion on the matter...
That Miss Dior advert with Natalie Portman is the worst thing I’ve ever seen. Doesn’t she have an Oscar?
Oh no here’s the sassy cupcake to retake the crown.
Prue telling Paul to pull himself together, without a wink of humour on her face, is my new favourite thing. He’s much more lovable cast as a little boy than the cartoon Nazi. Prude Leith is a genius addition to this lineup.
Julia has created and arranged a collection of phalluses, and Paul struggles to compose himself under their one-eyed gaze. Prue looks thoroughly disapproving, like a matron clutching a stash of contraband Buntys. Amazing.
Flo’s hands over Tom Jones’ lunchbox, but has basically given up. Krake’s Caken – sorry Kate’s Kraken – is genuinely terrifying. Sophie, the great white hope, lets herself down with underdone fruit pieces. How’d you like those apples?
Enough. Show me the cock and balls.
Steven’s Savoury Clutch (headlining the Dublin Castle this Friday, tickets on the door) is a work of art, with chain link breadsticks and manchego flavouring. Paul has him replace him on the judges’ side of the table. Wow.
Judging time! Liam’s flavours are strong- saving himself?- while Yan’s are too strong. James’ brown owl is brilliantly designed, as is Stacey’s hat, but they don’t taste right. Let’s get into the Stevens and Sophies.
Glad I’m not alone in the Tracey Emin thing.
These already look amazing. This lot are an incredibly strong bunch o’ bakers.
Please
Since you’re here...we have a small favour to ask. Please stop playing those terrifying feisty cupcake promo spots.
Liam has taken his tipped over bread bolas situation quite badly. “I couldn’t boil an egg at your age,” says Noel in a genuinely lovely moment of support.
Plus Hitchcock James and his owl breastplate! I’m extraordinarily moved
Updated
Yan as Gregg Wallace! Gwrenn you have absolutely latched onto the unflattering celeb comparison theme.
“Mine’s a disgrace,” I love how viscerally Flo hates baking, even though she’s pretty good at it.
My mother just said “Flo speaks like Mrs Brown”. MumLOL
Yesterday was quite painful? Get a grip man you’ve been star baker twice.
Steven is making a handbag, just to engineer another Lady Bracknell moment from Prue. She doesn’t disappoint, though she knows not what she does. Glorious.
Noel is certain Yan’s vegetarian dragon cannot be beaten unless someone comes up with “a gluten-intolerant unicorn.” He’s arrived!
I saw Paul Hollywood following a tray of appetisers earlier, he was only following hor d'oeuvres #GBBO
— Manc Culture Bear (@mancculturebear) September 12, 2017
I’d say this is the winner
Oh.
Okay can someone please talk about what Julia’s paprika snail looks like, because … I cannot. I’m pretty sure there are guidelines about me saying it resembles a flaccid wang, namely that I can’t.
Innocent Liam’s never made a bread sculpture because he’s 19, and relatively normal. Sophie is attacking this task, and probably makes bread sculptures every month, for some ex-army reason. She definitely spies a chance now Steven has disgraced himself. Her Italian fruit basket sounds like a winner.
I’ve no idea what Flo just said. Judging by their reactions – generic laughter and “well done, Flo” – Prue and Paul didn’t either. That’s how I talk to kids. I’m terrible with kids.
They’ve probably got enough leftover footage of Berry from the previous gazillion series that they could splice together new reactions and slot them in to the new show without legally hiring her.
I mean Prue even sounds like Mary Berry, doesn’t she? Close your eyes.
Showstopper: coloured bread sculpture
Using natural ingredients. I like whoever’s coming up with these.
Any other look-a-like nominations? I have Will Young for Steven, and Vera Duckworth for Kate. I mean Flo.
TRACEY EMIN. That’s who Julia reminds me of, in a weird sort of way. I know celebrity look-a-likes are usually flattering, but I think I’ve invented a new genre.
We love a chancer.
It's becoming increasingly apparent that Liam has absolutely no idea what he's doing and it's great. #GBBO
— innocent drinks (@innocent) September 12, 2017
(When I say we I mean an intern-staffed, disingenuously corporate Twitter account.)
Who was talking about Selasi down below? (Apart from all women ever.)
Did I ever tell you that Selasi, the spiritual – though very much not the actual – winner of the last series came to my house for a piece and made a cake, and left me a whisk that he’d only partially broken?
He then promised we’d meet up and he’d take me for a ride on his bike, a meet up WHICH NEVER HAPPENED. I got taken for a ride, alright.
Kate and James bring up the rear with their soggy bottoms – sorry, middles, stand down – while Liam comes in fifth. Steven only manages third, Julia comes second while anxious Stacey is a heartening winner! You can see how much it means to her. I’m very moved.
Steven has quietly been working on something pretty good. He’s not out of this yet – we know what he can do with showstoppers. Yan is flat, James is wet, Sophie’s under-baked.
Judging time! Prue likes Julia’s nice rounded bottom, while, unlike the Lord, Flo is not risen. Liam needs to earn a crust, while Kate’s lopsided golem of a loaf is quickly dismissed.
James’ loaves have collapsed into cowpat, while the bottom of Kate’s crown has overthrown the top, like a revolution in yeast. “I’m crying inside,” he says, while she tops him, with the hyperbole of youth. “I’m dying inside.”
Noel and Sandi stack their heads like a cottage loaf, for their “bit”. I can live with that.
Bald banker James sitting on a stool, watching septuagenarian Flo fingering her own balls was one of the most British things I think I’ve ever seen on a screen, up there with that time the queen parachuted into the Olympic opening ceremony.
I was very moved.
“I just know how Paul does it,” whispers Stacey, fingering her bread balls and making uncomfortably unbroken eye contact with a camera operator. Surely the Mail won’t stand for this filth?
“No one had electric scales in a cottage.” I love it when Kate gets all surly and aggressive.
So this is basically a sort of snowman bread, or doughy crown jewels, where they have to balance and slash the sides, right?
Definite signs Noel is really starting to relax, and play around with the guests more. *Laurence Fishburne voice* He’s beginning to believe.
Was that the filthiest judges’ sidebar we’ve ever seen? Paul describes how to bond his tight balls, by inserting two digits. Prue asks if he flours his fingers. “I could oil them,” he ripostes. Down with (more of) this sort of thing!
Are beaks a bird’s lips?
I love how when Julia listens to challenges she wears that look of fierce purpose, like she doesn’t want to disappoint the Party Secretary. I suppose you didn’t.
Technical challenge: cottage loaves
Hand mixed bread, or something.
Noel and Sandi land the Prue-Paul Drag Race pun of the year. Still, I sense a skit coming up. Balancing a cup of tea on top of a cake, or somesuch bobbins.
Still, makes the most of having a colour telly I suppose. Not like those Scandi-noir dramas.
The clothes on this lot. When the four presenters were standing in a row just then, it was like a book of haberdasher’s swatches, opened to the nursery section. Prue’s got weird Mondrian levels going on, Sandi’s got butterflies on her tummy, and Noel is far too muumuu for meemee.
Or does it? While Steven’s underproved buns are a flop, Prue doesn’t give a tea-cake, diving straight into the vodka cocktail. It’s very nice, she judges, unconsciously channeling Yan and her special dough. Very nice.
Oh god CHILL OUT Stacey. Although milk was a mistake. Scooter-bashed Yan has provided a spicy chutney, but chutney don’t amount to a hill o’ beans.
Judging time. Noel praises Kate’s nice, even buns and gives James a meaningless handshake for his well-textured Nordic baps. Liam underperforms as he feared, while Decorative Tom’s assault on the mystery tea cake is fruitless, but he aces the consistency. Surprisingly strong.
Adults on scooters are a bit ‘the-breakdown-is-in-the-post’ aren’t they. I still like Yan though. At least she has the temerity to fall off.
Wow, McDonald’s tackling the whole Beaky McNugget mythos head on. Or beak-on.
Ol’ Blue Eyes has had quite a week, hasn’t he? Good to see Paul adding to Downfall and Inglourious Basterds in the canon of Hollywood’s most controversial Nazis. But I don’t wanna stick Das Boot in.
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I find tea cakes quite meh. What else shall we talk about?
RUH ROH. Steven’s oven-proofed cakes have sunk. Surely that third star baker crown is now puddled on the floor too. He’s not the only unhappy baker – Liam is an another little stress-head, but way more adorable than the Stace, n’est-ce pas?
Apparently I ruined Le Gosling last week for some, so here’s a GIF to say sorry.
'I didn't even know what a tea cake was...' Tom #GBBO pic.twitter.com/Di9ULYitsC
— Chris Tallant (@CaptainTallant) September 12, 2017
Paul does one of his faces when he hears about Stressy Stacey’s patented milk wash. We’ll see how this turns out. She does make bread every week, so this should be a strong week for her?
Yes Lola, Stacey’s a stress-head, isn’t she? Infectiously so. And YES TOM. Tea cakes are mallow things with chocolate, by Tunnocks, brought from the shop. Much nicer.
Doesn’t matter that Mary’s not here, Steven is pairing a tea cake with vodka anyway. Attaboy.
Noel’s shirt watch: he appears to be wearing an acid-face etched muumuu?
Sorry Sophie! I like you and I’m fairly scared of you.
Sophie is making some sort of middle class buzzword Boggle of a dish, a tea cake inspired by a tagine she ate on a gap year.
I have to agree with James, tea cakes are the poor cousin to the hot cross bun. Come at me, why not?
I love Yan describing her own dough, orgasmically, as very nice. Very nice. She’s also excellent. Julia meanwhile looks adorable, wailing I LOVE YOU into her dough. She is properly mad.
I have to say, his stout and ginger and cinnamon buns sound delicious. Go on, son.
Liam bantering with Paul is my favourite thing about this series. It’s almost at Selasi-levels of backchat. He doesn’t know what he’s doing, so predicts the texture of his offering will be “tea cake texture.” “Which is …?” presses Paul. “Very nice.”
Kate bakes cakes for a local homeless charity! The witch. Why, she’s no better than “Professional Cake-Maker” Steven. Who I love. Oh, I’ve perplexed myself.
“I don’t think I should have a closed mind”, says Prue, who was born in South Africa. I found that very moving.
Tea cakes are made from an enriched dough, which is maybe why banker James is feeling confident. It’s likely bakers will try to get noticed this round by deviating from classic flavour profile, but it’s a risky strategy with classicist judges.
“This is my chance to show them, that I can bake … bread.” Yes Stacey, that is literally the point of bread week. She’s the Jamie Redknapp of baking commentary.
Signature challenge: tea cakes.
“What’s for tea? Cake.” A negligent parent’s manual.
Why does Sophie dread bread? Did she have a baguette-sperience?
Ah, Northernism, the last acceptable -ism. Lovely to have a bit of sepia onscreen, in the show’s introduction, and Noel and Sandi are very into their silly voices. Relatively charming.
Here we go! Everyone eat your syrup and have your psychotic break sponsored by Dr Oetker.
Even weathermen have Twitters now. What a world.
How are we all tonight?
To make things extra much hard, shall we declare this bread week a no “rising to the occasion” pun zone?
Unless the context is erectile in nature. We’re not made of stone.
- Paul being, ah … a bit less strict this week.
- Noel having an allergic reaction to containing his own madness.
- Sandi dying behind the eyes as she performs a weak skit.
- Prue describing anything as “not much fun”.
- Flo’s teeth getting a spin-off show.
(Although if anyone else is drinking on a school night you either have a problem, or are an actual teacher.)
Tinyismynewt, you have permission to gin yourself silly. In fact, shall we do a drinking bingo? Yes.
‘Allo ‘Allo.
If you’re looking for the best Great British Bake Off blog that’s live, and on the Guardian, you’ve found her. (I hope.) Each week I’m here gossiping about the contestants, making unfounded assertions about the ease of the challenges, and dusting off rye quips.
This week the contestants are all taking on bread-based tasks. It’s a week where any baker can prove themselves, but expectations can be dashed. Remember that incredible bread lion from an earlier series who didn’t win star baker? He was more impressive than Aslan, and twice as wronged.
A court of public opinion is nothing without a jury; I hope you’ll join me at 8pm and get involved. Jokes, withering dismissals and rampant hero-worship all welcomed. Plus, there are ad breaks now, so it’s nice to chat through those. Let’s get double screening!
