The Great British Bake Off recap: The final four

It’s Patisserie Week, which is just a posh way of saying it’s a week about fancy cakes and pastries. We have just four bakers left, and all are thrilled and a little in disbelief that they’re made it this far. Dan is “over the moon” to be there, and Tasha is “so proud of how far” she’s come and has a boost of confidence. Josh “never in a million years” thought he’d be in the semi-final, while Matty thinks it’s “so bizarre.” I’m sticking to my prediction of a final with Tasha, Matty and Josh (sorry, Dan!). So let’s bake!

Signature

The signature is to make two batches of 12 financiers, of any flavor, in two hours. A financier is a tiny sponge cake that has the shape of a gold bar, and usually they contain ground nuts and brown butter. Paul says they should be moist but light, and it’s “quite tricky” to get them right. The judges want the cakes to be well decorated, even though financiers are usually just a largely plain sponge.

As they begin baking, Josh points out that the tent is very quiet; it feels eerily so both because there are only four contestants in the space now, and Alison is off as she is ill. (Get well soon, Alison.) There are some lovely flavors going on this week, starting with Dan, who is going for pistachio with matcha and pink peppercorn for his first batch, and vanilla and orange for his second batch. Paul does not agree with me; he famously hates matcha.

Josh is going quite classic, with one batch taking inspiration from Bakewell tarts, and the other being flavored with chocolate, hazelnut and orange. Both Matty and Tasha are using coffee. Matty’s first batch will be coffee with a center of chocolate ganache, and his other is mango, lime, and coconut. Tasha is going for hazelnut and coffee, and pistachio and raspberry.

Prue kindly points out to Josh that he’s the only person in the tent who hasn’t won Star Baker twice, which will either inspire him or make him curl up into a ball of insecurity. I’d do the latter, but I think Josh will rise to the challenge. Last week’s Star Baker Matty says the accolade was a“nice confidence booster in preparation for this week,” but Tasha’s rough performance the previous week is still bothering on her. She says she’s trying to redeem herself with patisserie.

Financiers cook quickly because they’re quite small, but Josh and Matty are courting trouble by using deep mold, which means they could underbake their cakes. The perfect financier has a crisp eggshell-like exterior; too long in the oven and they’ll become dry.

The final step is the decorations, and while they all look lovely, I think the beauty of financiers is their simplicity. These now just look like fussy, oblong cupcakes in my opinion.

Matty is first to be judged, and worried that his financiers are underbaked; he has the opposite problem, with Paul informing him that his coffee and chocolate cakes are actually overbaked. They taste good though, as do the mango, lime, and coconut one, but both Prue and Paul think there’s too much topping and not enough cake.

Tasha’s coffee and hazelnut financiers are “absolutely delicious” according to Prue, who tells us they melt in the mouth. Paul thinks the flavors are spot on and they’re baked perfectly. Her raspberry and pistachio ones are also good, but they’re slightly overbaked.

Josh used too much essence in his Bakewell-inspired financiers, although they are baked well, unlike his chocolate, hazelnut, and orange ones, which are “delicious,” according to Paul, but too dry.

Finally, Paul is forced to taste Dan’s tonka bean, pistachio, and match financiers. And guess what? He loves them, calling them beautiful. On a winning streak, Dan’s peach, orange, and raspberry cakes are so good that Paul gives out a handshake. At this rate, Dan will be making it to the final.

Technical

Prue has set this week’s technical challenge, and she and Paul are, she tells the bakers, looking for “exquisite presentation.” They’ve been tasked with making a tarte aux pommes—short buttery pastry, with a smooth almond frangipane and apple puree, and topped with apple slices. They have two and a half hours to do so, and although an apple tart sounds straightforward, there’s a lot that can go wrong.

The tart has to go in the oven three times: first to blind bake the pastry, then to bake the frangipane, then finally to bake with the puree and apple slices. The hardest, and most time-consuming, thing here will be slicing those apples into thin slices and then arranging them in a beautiful pattern.

The bakers put their pastries in for the blind bake, and Tasha and Matty opt for putting it in for ten to 15 minutes; this case will take, we’re told, around 25 minutes. Eek. Tasha’s looks a bit pale and still wet when she brings it out, and although she realizes this she doesn’t pop it back in. Matty’s is also looking a little pale, and both he and Dan manage to crack theirs slightly.

Everyone’s cutting their apples by hand, but surely this is the time for a mandoline. Come on Bake Off, surely you can provide these. Once the slicing hurdle is cleared, the bakers then have to decipher the instructions on how to arrange their apple slices. Tasha and Dan definitely decide to freestyle it, while Matty and Josh are producing something that looks how it’s supposed to (like a rose made out of apple slices).

I know Tasha had a decent first task, but I’m really afraid that she could go this week. Her taste aux pommes looks ropey going into the judging, with the apple slices quite thick and her pastry falling apart. When Paul says it’s a “disaster” just by glancing at it, the heavy feeling in the pit of my stomach increased.

Dan’s is clumsy, says Prue, although his pastry is properly baked. Matty’s pastry could have done with longer in the oven, but his tart looks beautiful, while Josh’s melts in the mouth and is just very good all round. He takes first place, Tasha is last, and Dan and Matty are third and second, respectively. It’s the first time Josh has come first in the technical, which I am stunned by.

Showstopper

As everyone prepares for the showstopper, the judges discuss how the bakers are doing. I think Tasha will go home unless she produces a phenomenal showstopper and someone else mucks up seriously. Paul says “you just can’t call it” between the four, but I think he’s being generous (for once), perhaps because as well as being showstopper day, it’s also Tasha’s birthday. Eek.

The final task is to make a millefoglie, which is an Italian version of the millefeuille. The contestants have four hours to produce a highly decorated pastry with buttery, flaky layers. Prue wants at least four layers of puff pastry, and she wants the real stuff, not some cheat’s rough puff. The trick—and we all know this after years of Bake Off—is to keep chilling the pastry in between rolling and folding it.

Dan is doing a take on a tiramisu, in the shape of an electric guitar. I love how Dan is always going all out for a theme, even when there isn’t really a theme. Tasha is staying true to form and making life a little bit more difficult for herself by making an inverse puff pastry. Usually, a layer of butter is encased inside dough and then rolled out; in inverse puff pastry, the butter goes on the outside of the dough and is then rolled out. This is a much, much riskier method to be using in the tent, but if it pays off, the layers will be stunning, as it produces a flakier pastry. She’s going for a mango mojito flavor for her millefoglie, and is not the only one using alcohol.

Matty is going for a whopping three different kinds of alcohol across his three tiers of millefoglie, and the judges are concerned; if Prue is worried about alcohol levels and flavors, you know it’s something to be worried about.

Josh is making his showstopper in honor of his nan, going for lemon, blackberry, and blackcurrant flavors. Somehow, though, Josh has forgotten to turn his oven on, even though we’re in week nine.

While the others are putting their pastry in, Tasha is still rolling and folding because her butter was too hard when she tried to do the initial wrapping. As things progress, Tasha realizes she can’t see any layers in her dough so worries it won’t puff and then genuinely fears that she might not finish the challenge. Oh, Tasha. Noel tries to give her a pep talk in Alison’s absence, saying you never know what happens in the oven; he’s actually right, since once it starts baking the layers appear. Tasha is rushed in her finishing though, and while the others produce something fairly sophisticated looking, hers is definitely on the rustic side.

Josh’s bake looks so gorgeous. Prue says “it’s a thing of beauty,” and Paul claims the lamination is great. “I want to clap, it’s so perfect,” adds Prue. Paul thinks he’s done an amazing job on the pastry, although he’s overbaked it by a minute. Prue disagrees, and I’m going to go with her judgment on this. Josh for Star Baker, surely?

Dan’s guitar looks like a guitar, but his cream is oozing out of the bottom layer because the top layers are heavier. “The flake’s good,” says Paul, and the “flavors are fantastic.” But Prue thinks the mirror glaze doesn’t work as it’s too rubbery.

Matty used a cake tin to cut the pastry into rounds, which is why it’s sealed at the edges and risen in the middle. It’s what has perhaps also made the pastry rubbery and Paul doesn’t like it, although the flavors are good.

Tasha’s bake is the most basic of the four, as she didn’t have time for cutting and finessing. However, her “lamination is incredible,” says Paul, and Prue thinks it looks delicious. But her mango curd is grainy where it should be smooth as silk.

I do think, even though Matty’s pastry wasn’t great, that Tasha is going home today. She was last in the technical and didn’t do well in the showstopper; and I’m not sure her financiers are enough to save her. I think it would be wrong not to make Josh Star Baker this week; his final bake was incredible and worthy of it on its own.

In the judging discussion, Paul calls Josh’s bake “epic,” and Prue says Dan’s was “original.” It’s between the two of them for Star Baker. In the end, it goes to Josh. Rightly so.

Going home is Tasha. I wish Alison was here this week to give her pep talks and some hugs. I honestly thought Tasha was a shoo-in for the final from the first week, so it’s really sad to see her just miss out that. But getting to the semi-final is incredible, and I am sure Tasha has a great future ahead of her. I’ll be surprised if she’s not snapped up for a recipe book or two quickly.

The three finalists are all delighted with their triumph. Josh is crying, Dan is “so excited,” and Matty is laughing. “Who’d’ve thought it?” he asks.

Next week: the final!

Stray observations

• You know it’s serious when there’s no sketch, although that likely has more to do with Alison being absent than the show realizing the sketches are awful.
• Despite Alison not being around, Noel is a delight. He’s clearly picked up some of Alison’s optimism and joyous attitude.
• I love how week after week it really feels like Matty is in the competition just for the laughs, not realizing just how amazing a baker he is.
• We’ve known them for nine weeks, but there are still new things to learn about our bakers. This week, Josh tells us he has titanium mesh on his forehead from where he fractured his skull playing rugby.
• A few people in the comments last week mentioned the similarity between Josh and Paul Hollywood. I looked very, very carefully and while I don’t think they look like father and son, I can see the resemblance.