Cast your memory back, if you will, to the year 2009. Obama was in office, Kings of Leon were in the charts, Woolworths was in administration. You probably had a side fringe. And on BBC2, a cosy six-parter about baking aired to a smattering of polite applause.
A whole decade on, GBBO has swelled from a cosy, low budget schedule-filler to bonafide Event Television with the weight of the nation’s happiness on its backs. The show has weathered storms, created stars, betrayed us all and then won our affection back again with little more than a sticky bun and a wink. After all, we need Bake Off. It’s a barometer for our times and a blueprint for how much better things could be. These people can concentrate on one thing for four hours without checking their phones! It is utopia.
And every year, as the country feels increasingly fractured and the end of summer begins to feel more like the End of Days, the onus is on Bake Off to glue us all back together again with good cheer and royal icing. This year’s final will fall two days before the Brexit deadline – and I’m not saying 10 weeks of kind-faced people sobbing over collapsing biscuits could save us all from uncertain doom, but you just never know. Here we go then.
Currant affairs
The unofficial theme for series 10, as far as I can tell, is ‘adorable young boys’. Look, there’s one! There’s another one, with dimples! One with statement brows, one in a strong floral, one who may or may not be the kid from Love Actually engaged in another gutsy scheme to woo Joanna. The women are adorable too; bright of eyes and sharp of haircut. With an average age of 31 this is the tent’s youngest lineup ever – though notably still older than Paul Hollywood’s Tinder inbox.
“I’d say I achieve certain things, in the same sort of way you can achieve a hangover,” says Henry, 20, an actual choirboy. They’re right, A levels are too easy these days.
Paul and Prue are trolling the youths from the off with the signature challenge: fruitcake. Traditionally millennials don’t like fruitcake, though in fairness this may have changed since we all started pretending Naked bars are ‘cake’. Nearly everyone is using a family recipe, meaning a lot of Dead Nan cards are being played early this year. A reminder: contestants are allowed one Dead Nan card and one only. It behooves them to choose wisely.
The gorgeously vampiric Helena is letting her goth flag fly, with a Halloween cake bedecked in bats and filled with prunes. I love her, but she will be Helena Bonham-Farter in my head for the rest of the series. Nurse David is also keen to keep everybody regular with his healthy fatless cake, while Dan, an artist’s impression of a ‘hipster’ as described by somebody who’s never met one, has doubled his fruit quantity at the last minute. This spells certain disaster. He’s also contravening the rules by smuggling in a bun he made earlier – on his head.
Once the cakes are out of the oven, it’s a race against time to cool them down in time for icing. Having already cut himself three times, Michael is in danger of having his knives taken away and replaced with something plastic from the Early Learning Centre. Meanwhile poor Henry drops his exquisite miniature sugar house in the final minute, and ends up with a derelict shack.
“The word infuriating does not sum up that feeling,” he groans. Henry studies English Literature.
The first judging is a gentle one; everyone’s more or less nailed it, with the exception of Michelle’s tough texture, Alice’s ginger overdose, Rosie’s “sad” tea loaf and Dan’s mound of raw dough, which Prue brands “a bit rustic.”
I’m not sure Dan will register that as a criticism, Prue. He could be down a farmers’ market flogging it as ‘probiotic craft batter’ as we speak.
Angel delight
Fuelling my theory about a covert #sponcon deal with Mr Kipling, the technical challenge is angel cake slices. They look delicious, albeit odd without a Capri-Sun chaser. This is no pincic – the recipe involves three layers of notoriously fiddly Genoise sponge, sandwiched with notoriously fiddly Italian meringue buttercream and topped with notoriously fiddly feathered icing.
“It could go brilliantly, or it could go horribly!” says Michael. It’s almost like he’s seen the show before.
The bakers must take their cue from Sandi’s hairdresser, and pump up the volume. They whisk eggs and sugar over heat until they reach optimum thickness and then fold them into the mixture, taking care not to knock out all the air again. Why anyone can be arsed with all this when you could just use baking powder is a mystery, but 10 seasons-deep it feels a little too late to ask now.
Jamie has screwed up his Genoise mix twice, and has made slime instead. Ah, the kids of today. Meanwhile Phil, clearly feeling the responsibility of being the only person in the tent over the age of 40, is doing a Dad’s Army ‘don’t panic’ gag. For the younger bakers: Dad’s Army was a bit like, er, Riverdale? But with war.
After more hasty feathering than… well, Noel's hairdresser, the angels are called up for the final judgement. There are a lot of bakers to remember at this stage in the competition, so please allow me to summarise:
Henry = hark the herald angel cakes sing. Rosie = heaven must be missing an angel cake. Steph = Angel cake (Shaggy ft. Rayvon). And at the bottom of the heap, Michael = Angel cake by Thierry Mugler, Helena = Buffy vs Angel cake, and Jamie = wiv the angle cakes now. Brutally, his rubbery slices are branded a “failure.” Shhh, we don’t use that word anymore guys. It’s a learning opportunity! A pre-success! An excuse for a long #brave Instagram caption!
“Thank you,” beams Jamie.
Cakey, Breaky Art
For the inaugural showstopper of series 10, the bakers must plunder the depths of their earliest disappointments to create their dream childhood birthday cake. It needs to be “spectacular and sizeable”, a showcase for the bakers’ skills and a telling glimpse into their personalities. Obviously we’re all hoping someone’s invisible childhood friend was a 30cm caterpillar called Colin.
This being a sensitive, imaginative bunch, the selection includes two magical toadstools (Priya used to write imaginary ISBN numbers on her childhood stories!), a Faraway Tree (Henry loved Enid Blyton before she was cancelled!), a pirate treasure chest, a pirate treasure island, a dog (Jamie has a dog!) and the rocket from the 1969 moon landing (Phil is old). We learn that both of Alice’s parents are dentists, which chimes with her pleasantly Hermione Granger-ish vibe. And just to take the heat off Helena’s ‘furry garden’ (don’t you dare shame her Paul, this isn’t Love Island), Phil is destroying everyone’s childhood memories by tenderly caressing what appears to be a Moomin erection. It’s all very jolly.
But as we head into the final hour, things become fraught. Cakes are dropping, chocolate is flopping, dowling rods are flying javelin-like across the tent. Michael may or may not have a stress hernia.
Of course, what we are really seeing here is a powerful statement on the overly performative nature of modern parenthood. Across the country, millions of mums and approximately five dads are mentally reliving the time they tried to carve the entire cast of In The Night Garden out of fondant icing at midnight with a migraine, just so that little Arlo could show the rest of his Baby Parkour class how much his parents loved him.
Anyway, first up: Michelle’s fairytale carrot cake is “faultless”, which – no offence Michelle – feels like excessive praise for week one. And for carrot cake. But she's our first star baker!
David’s snake cake is also spectacular, birthing its own baby snakes in a stunt that Samuel L Jackson himself couldn’t fail to find charming. Helena has trumped Priya in the battle of the chocolate sponges, and Alice’s sweet shop is delicious but “simplistic”. Considering her feedback in the first challenge was “go back to basics,'' she'd be forgiven for giving Paul a swift kick in the bon-bons.
Amelia’s cake is claggy, Phil’s is too sweet, Steph’s a little dry, and Jamie ends up in the doghouse again, after his tribute to his pet Schnauzer is declared overbaked and lacking finesse.
But after becoming embroiled in a frankly embarrassing game of Hunt the Passionfruit with Paul, it’s poor Dan who becomes series 10’s first casualty – before he even got the chance to tell us the meaning behind his tattoos.
We’ll be raising an artisanal kombucha to you tonight, pal.
NEXT WEEK: Helena organises a blood drive and Henry pipes the whole of Beowulf onto a digestive. It’s biscuit week!