It’s Week Two mes petit boulangers! And it's raining! Mel’s got raincoat on! Great British summertime my arse.
Never mind though, it’s biscuit week. And, as everyone knows, there’s nothing biscuits can’t solve. Sadly, Sue’s not around this week but, never fear, we’ve got pure, unadulterated Mel on tap.
First up, the bakers are instructed to make 24 iced biscuits; basically just bigger versions of those Iced Gem things you used to have at birthday parties in the 90s. Their texture, explains Mel, must be as ‘crisp as Paul Hollywood’s hair’ which solves the mystery of just who’s been keeping men's hair gel in business since Ross-from-Friends and the rest of the male population hung their crunchy quiffs out to dry in late 2002.
Selasi is back with his half-zen, half-emotionally detached approach to baking. ‘Just take every day as it comes, bake and produce what is required’ he monotonously drones like a beautiful, sexy robot. He’s putting scotch bonnets in his cake which reminds us, A) that he’s hot property and B) of that time we foolishly thought sriracha was ketchup and spent three hours on the loo before finally coming to an understanding of what Johnny Cash’s Ring Of Fire was really about.
Side note: Val, love of our life, is making ice cream biscuits because, as she explains, her family were poor growing up so they only had ice cream as treats if they went to the seaside. ‘Dad always bought us ice creams then to make up for all the other ones he couldn’t buy us.’ Val says. Excuse us, our eyes appear to be leaking.
Kate’s making lavender and bergamot biscuits and Mary and Paul are horrified. Mel says her concoction smells like skincare. Which isn’t ideal. No-one wants their sweet treats smelling like night cream. Unless it’s crème de la mer. Mel’s asking Michael if he cleans behind his ears because he’s the child of the competition. Michael, however is keen to prove he is actually, a full-fledged adult by making biscuits that look like beers, a product he can actually legally buy, just in case you were worried. Louise has had a nightmare, she’s dropped her rich tea sheep on the floor. They’re now more carpet than farm animal, they’re carpet sheep. They’re fucked. Louise is fucked. Val, probably in solidarity, follows suit by upsetting her tray of ice cream biccies while Selasi is strolling sedately around in the background of otherwise frantic shots, nibbling on his leftovers and actually yawning and stretching.
Sue, meanwhile has gone on a mission to find out the history of biscuits with some lady who actually seems to have made a job out of knowing about the history of biscuits. Shout out to my high school careers’ advisor for failing to tell me that biscuit history was a viable path of employment. Thanks Mr. Burlington. Thanks for nothing. Another interesting fact? People used to dunk biscuits in wine. A tradition that has now sadly, and foolishly, died out.
Back in the tent and, for the technical challenge, the team have to make 12 Viennese Whirls. These are biscuits masquerading as sandwiches if sandwiches were sensible enough to shun a tuna mayo filling and instead opt for jam and cream. Mel’s offering her ‘warm hands’ to loosen Rav’s ‘stiff’ creamy mixture (really) while Val’s chuckling in the corner, confused about maths and numbers, which bodes well for the children of Yeovil she still teaches two days a week. The end results of Viennese Whirl morning are pretty disastrous – not as bad as last week’s jaffa cakes but still, not all that. Benjamina nails it, as do Kate and Jane. Selasi though is in a world of trouble for his crumbly undefined offerings.
Before entering the showstopper round, Paul and Mary admit that Val, Selasi and Louise are in trouble. Their chance to redeem themselves is by baking a ‘Gingerbread Story’ with 'at least eight characters in it', a challenge which sounds like Mary has made the move from benevolent judge to sadistic taskmaster. Paul, by way of proving how strong his gingerbread is, mentions that his annual Christmas gingerbread house is usually still intact in February which perhaps says less about his ability to build a good house and more about his sub-par gingerbread.
Val is making a Yorkshire themed 'story' with the Statue of Liberty and the Empire State Building in. Candice is making a pub, complete with a sticky pub carpet, pool table, dartboard and old man sitting propped up at the bar. Mary experiments confusedly with the word 'pub', rolling it around quizzically like it's the first time she's ever heard it. Kate is making a Brownie Camp, further rubbing in the fact that I wasn't allowed to go on Brownie Camp. Something about being too ‘disruptive’. Your loss Brown Owl. I bet playing British Bulldog BY THE RULES was a right laugh.
Tom’s recreating a near-death experience about the time he nearly died on a mountain. Which is cheery. Mel thinks Andrew's bicycle is a platypus. Rav burns his gingerbread ferris wheel and covers it up with icing sugar. Which is a bit like accidentally deleting half of your dissertation but sticking a super cute emoji of a sloth in there to distract your tutor. Kate, meanwhile is referring to her Gingerbread Brownie characters as 'the children', leading to the alarming phrase ‘the children are cooked now’. Val is, sadly, having a a spot of bother. She’s burned her Empire State building and is super duper behind.
The real fun comes when everyone tries to put their gingerbread buildings together. I’ll tell you one thing for free, this lot definitely made the right decision going on Bake Off rather than Grand Designs. There's a veritable bevvy of construction disasters. Louise’s church spire has snapped, Michael’s house won’t stick together, there’s gingerbread trees falling on Kate’s gingerbread Brownies and, just at the last minutes, Louise and Vals’ creations fall crashing to the ground.
Cruelly, in order to be judged, the bakers have to walk their gingerbread creations up to the front while Paul looks on, eagle-eyed ready to delight in any further destruction. TBH, all of the bakers' offerings look a little bit ropey. Especially Michael's Santaland which looks less like a happy workshop where elves create toys to make childrens' dreams come true and more like a Victorian workhouse where there are 12 hour work days, suffocating smoke fumes and gruel served morning, noon and night.
In the end, it's Louise who's sent home, her wedding themed gingerbread church a disaster too far to come back from. This is a crying shame, Louise definitely had a dark-but-also-very-fun side she had yet to reveal. Hwyl fawr Louise. You can come and bake for us any time.
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Follow Jess on Twitter @Jess_Commons
This article originally appeared on The Debrief.