TV Review The Great British Bake Off

In my experience, there’s no such thing as a bad cake.

It’s a view I inherited from my mother, one of the generation who refused to allow anything edible go to waste.

I was reminded of her determination to use even the most forlorn baking specimens as we watched the contestants attempt a tiramisu cake.

Using their best bricklaying skills they gamely layered scraps of sponge before smothering it in mascarpone to hide the gaps.

Given the level of perfection we’ve come to expect on this show, it was surprising to see the bakers struggling with something as basic as making a sponge cake rise then slicing it into layers.

As far back as I can remember my mother never served us tiramisu, in cake form or otherwise, but I do remember my amazement the first time she served us baked alaska, which is what the contestants had to produce as their showstopper.

She would produce this miracle of still-frozen ice cream covered in baked meringue in a fraction of the time they had. Mind you, she didn’t have to create all the elements from scratch.

Some took their search for new flavours into unexpected directions.

When Iain announced that his ice cream contained sesame seeds, Paul responded with an unconvincing ‘nice’ while a look of alarm spread across Mary’s face.

Sadly, we never got to see them taste his creation.

Even the allotted four and a half hours wasn’t enough for Iain, whose ice cream failed to set round his cake, prompting him to throw it all in the bin and flounce off the set. With nothing to taste, Paul and Mary were left with no choice but to select him to leave the show.

My mother never flounced and she certainly wouldn’t have thrown away a cake. If she could get it on the table, she would. It’s a lesson Iain learned the hard way.