Great British Bake Off Final technical challenge

Great British Bake Off Final technical challenge – Millefeuille

This week saw the final of the Great British Bake Off and I was very excited – of the three finalists I didn’t know who I wanted to win because they each bought something special to the table – Nadiya and her stunning, beautiful and flavorsome bakes, Ian and his originality and daring flavours inspired by his day to day life and Tamal, who seems like one of the loveliest people around. What I was sure of was that we were in for a visual treat, and probably a fairly tricky technical challenge and Millefeuille did not disappoint. Genuinely, whenever I head to a bakery this is one of the treats which tempt me the most, all of that yummy cream and jam sandwiched on crumbly layer rough puff – either that or an éclair!! So, the day after the final, to forget that Bake Off is over, I have decided to try the challenge.

The recipe is one of Paul Hollywood’s and it is on the BBC Website here.

Now, I have never made rough puff before, although I have made proper puff pastry, and it has been a long time since I made jam so it was a bit of a challenge, but here is my finished result:

This took in total about 2 hours from start to finish, although I did have to pop to the shops (to buy some extra raspberries) whilst the pastry was in the fridge. After making it I can say even more so that the three finalists were very impressive – these are not the easiest things to make, and like Nadiya I had to think a little when working out what size my pastry should be and how to cut it. I had the full recipe and still found it tricky, so tops marks to all three for producing fab bakes.

The other two bakes in the final also spoke to me – I am a cake baker in my heart and I loved all three showstoppers, and I think Tamal’s was my favourite flavour combination, and in the iced buns signature challenge Ian’s Elderflower buns stood out for me, but over-all Nadiya was such a good baker and finisher and I think she is a very worthy winner. Now I am sad it is over and will have to find something new to fill my Wednesday evenings!

Comments

Pasteils de nata - custard tarts

Pastry week on the Great British Bake Off saw Paull Hollywood set custard tarts as the technical challenge and I thought I would give them a go, seeing as I have never attempted them before! I own Paul's cookbook which has the recipe in, and it can also be found on the GBBO website. These two recipes vary slightly - in the book Paul doesn't make the rough puff pastry but uses shop bought (which I would normally do.) This being a Bake Off challenge though I decided to use the recipe they followed in the tent. The result - delicious buttery pastry filled with golden creamy custard. I ate 3 in one sitting! The tarts are quite fiddly and leaving the pastry to cool between rolling is essential to get the decent lamination and signature swirl on the bottom, so you will need to set aside a good couple of hours in total. As a side note, I found that I had a lot of left over custard - either I didn't make my tarts big enough or the recipe is rather generous with the por...

After Eight minis by Fantasy Cakes

Father Christmas clearly knows me well, as under the tree I had a new cake recipe book waiting; Fantasy Cakes by Angela Romeo and it is such a treat for the eyes to browse, and stomach for the wonderful cakes you could bake. It is a very clever book in that it has the standard cake recipes at the start which are used throughout the book. These so far have been so simple to throw together, which is very handy as I can leave the baby playing for 10 minutes to whip the cake up. You can order the book here , and I highly recommend it if you want to try some beautiful centre pieces or show stoppers. The first cake I tried is the After Eight minis, great as all the family were round to gobble up the end result. This After Eight recipe took a while to assemble and create the individual elements however they can all be done in advance and individually rather than sitting down for a good couple of hours stretch. I had to alter the recipe slightly as I ran out of self raising fl...

BBC Good Food Caramel Brownies

Another get together with friends has prompted some more baking (whilst the baby is sleeping) and the salted caramel cover recipe from a BBC Good Food issue from a while back caught my eye. I have been storing this recipe waiting for a good excuse to bake it, and I can say (after scoffing a few), these brownies do not disappoint and will be made again. Brownies are very easy to make, the one stumbling point I often find is the temperature of the oven and the time they are baked for - as ovens vary vastly this is quite hard to write into a recipe, but I have a fan assisted fairly new over which bakes quite hot. They key for baking the brownies is checking after the stated time, and they should still be a little liquid in the middle if you want moist squishy squares. Leaving them to cool completely in the tin is also an essential, as if they are cut too early they may still be too liquid. Time to make batter - around 15 minutes Baking time - 35 minutes depending on your oven I...

Freckled Kirsty

Search This Blog