Last night’s final of The Great British Bake Off, viewed by an impressive but unsurprisingly high 13 million people, was a splendid one. The culmination of a series which has revelled in an array of chic jackets worn by judge Mary Berry and more unpronounceable technical challenge titles than you can shake a stick at, Bake Off crowned its sixth champion on Wednesday night, reminding us why it has become such a cultural phenomenon.
The show’s first section, the “Signature Challenge”, required the baking of two different types of iced bun. Nadiya, who has since the start of the series become more and more of a success story, made buns that “ticked all the boxes” for judge Paul Hollywood, whilst travel photographer Ian and trainee anesthetist Tamal were criticised on technical grounds. Round one, it seemed, went to Nadiya.
Then came the show’s “Technical Challenge”, which challenged the three contestants’ Achilles’ heel: pastry. They were asked to bake Mille Feuille, a complicated type of French patisserie. Ian’s red eyes conveyed a week of nocturnal baking, which sums up the atmosphere of contention in the tent during the final. According to the judges, none of the contestants achieved perfection in this challenge, but to the untrained eye, all three batches at least looked scrumptious.
Finally, Tamal, Nadiya and Ian were asked to make a Classic British cake for the “Showstopper Challenge”. All three bakers proved their worth in the tent, with Mary pronouncing it “the best tasting final we’ve ever had”, and the three showstopper cakes certainly appeared indicative of that.
Bake Off’s true emotive power was apparent in the announcement of the winner, Nadiya, with Mary Berry, amongst others, shedding a tear. A celebration of amateur baking the show certainly is, but with controversy swamping it in the run up to the final, this series will stand out for more than baking prowess alone.
When the show’s final line-up of Ian, Nadiya and Tamal was announced, the BBC was plunged into a political correctness controversy. On hearing this, one would be forgiven for supposing that the famously ‘British’, middle-class, middle-brow programme had failed to include contestants from a range of backgrounds in this series. On the contrary however, the show’s producers have been criticised for trying too hard to be representative of “Modern Britain”; of focusing too much on engineering a politically correct façade and too little on actual baking ability.
However, if the selection process and consequent eleven weeks of highly pressurised baking are as gruelling and arduous as they certainly seem, quite how anyone other than a highly accomplished amateur baker could make the lofty heights of the final, 15,000 initial candidates, several rounds of telephone interviews, technical exams, screen tests and personality screenings should surely sort the wheat from the chaff.
Consequently, this drama all seems to me like a mountain is being made of a molehill. Even if it is true that Love Productions, the team that makes GBBO, has in some way engaged in positive discrimination in order to end up with the three contestants who have made the final, does it really matter that much? Many ardent Bake Off viewers would surely argue that Tamal, Nadiya and Ian have all proved themselves worthy of the final, so can we see it as anything other than a bonus that these three bakers are as ethnically and culturally diverse as they are? Although the show arguably stands for so much more than baking, it is perhaps unfair to judge the contestants before we judge their bakes.
Nadiya, the first hijab-wearing contestant that Bake Off has seen, but more importantly the owner of three “Star Baker” titles, is now being hailed as a local heroine in her hometown of Luton. We should certainly champion her for reaching the same prestigious heights as “New Man” Ian and gay doctor Tamal, and be judged alongside them, not for her cultural status but for the culinary masterpieces she has produced. Far from seeing her as the response to a show panicking about its representativeness, I see her as a highly proficient baker and then a young Asian woman, not the other way round.
The general public as much as the viewers should regard these three finalists as exponents of unity and commonality. All three can bake and have come together with that very notion in mind. Their social and cultural backgrounds, however disparate, are united by a shared interest in baking. Whilst that may sound cliché, it’s true that Britain’s baking tradition is something that can bring people together whilst being molded to encompass new ideas.
The Guardian interestingly asserts that “we exist in a world where the difficult words “Great” and “British” cannot safely be applied to much. But they can be applied to a baking contest”. This seems relevant to the argument that the Bake Off does more than just showcase amateur baking talent. As Bangladeshi Nadiya, among others, has proven, this tradition of baking is not exclusive. It can in fact serve to integrate people from diverse backgrounds. Where some may look for a reason why three such diverse people have arrived at the same destination, others may choose to discard labels to rejoice in the wonder that is British baking.
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