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The Great British Bake Off: Tudor week's surprise ending

BY Holly Wade

1st Jan 2015 Film & TV

The Great British Bake Off: Tudor week's surprise ending

This year has proved the most dramatic yet with the public left outraged as the BBC lost the rights to the show to Channel 4, who subsequently lost its key stars. Let's savour the time we have left with The Great British Bake Off.

Four out of the final five bakers—Candice, Benjamina, Jane, Andrew and Selasi—have so far been awarded the ‘Star Baker’ title. Selasi being the only contestant so far to not receive this baking accolade—although he was robbed of this in the opening week of the series.

There have been some rather strange themed weeks, ranging from Botanical Week—really, what was that about?—to this week’s quarter-final Tudor Week. These recipes had fallen out of favour (and out of the public consciousness) for a reason, surely!

The competition really is very evenly matched and following the first challenge, which involved pies, it was too close to call who would finish where by the end of the programme.

The technical challenge introduced us to jumble biscuits—yes we’d never heard of them either—with a particularly stunning Celtic knot design. The beautifully lipped Candice came out on top—is it just me that gets a bit excited seeing which lipstick colour she will wear each week?

The showstopper challenge always separates the wheat from the chaff and this week’s marzipan concoction was no different. This week the judges required some intricate detailing.

The challenges ranged from pies and biscuits to a testing marzipan showstopper. One of the things we love about this hybrid entertainment/culinary/competition show is how we find ourselves learning so much about the wonderful history of marzipan via Mel and Sue while watching the bakers create, ahem, masterpieces.

Bake Off Andrew

From peacocks with blueberry innards (Candice) to knights jousting on horseback (Andrew), at least, we could definitely make out the horse, the knight took a little imagination and once you've made him out his lance looks a little rude. But this is the charm of the Bake Off, its competitive nature really brings out creativity, for better or for worse.

With the dramatic music ramping up the tension it wasn’t until the final judgment of Paul and Mary that we could really get a sense of how the bakers were faring.

Benjamina left the tent in what was probably an expected departure but a very emotional one nonetheless. Twitter went crazy at seeing Benjamina and Selasi separated, as their's was an onscreen relationship worth tuning in for!

Selasi Benjamina Bake Off

On a happier note Candice was bestowed ‘Star Baker’ title for the third time—is it too early to predict that she will take the win?

Watching Bake Off is just like getting a hug, the community spirit of the bakers is a real joy to behold as they help each other through any potential disasters. Whatever will we do without it? Must we really embrace a new format next year?

 

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