Welcome to Paul Hollywood Overconfidence Week, also known as Bread Week. Actually, this season, it was pun week. The only things English people love more than mushy peas and colonialism are absolutely terrible puns. This is on full display in the opening, when Noel and Alison talk to us about their upcoming album Bake It Til You Make It, featuring such jams as “Loaf on Mars,†“Purple Grain,†and “You Knead Me I Don’t Knead You,†by Bread Sheeran.
Oh, but our hosts (doing an even better job than usual) are just getting started, because the signature challenge is buns, the double-entendre cousin of the famous soggy bottom. They compliment each other’s buns, they talk about Paul Hollywood’s buns, and Alison says she’s looking forward to seeing some unusually shaped buns. I have seen a lot of buns in my time, but don’t they always look a little bit the same? Round, juicy, just waiting for you to take a bite out of them … see! I can play this game too.
For once, it seems like everyone knows exactly what they’re doing, and everything goes according to plan. Yes, that is very nice and heartwarming, but we need a little bit of drama, don’t we? This plays out in the judging as well with Paul — because really, only his opinion matters this week — saying it’s one of the strongest Bread Weeks in the long history of the show.
Ever since the premiere, I’ve been dying to catch a glimpse of Dylan’s buns, and they do not disappoint. He uses a Korean fermented chili paste called gochujang to give them a hot and spicy flavor. Yup. I knew it. Of course Dylan’s buns are hot and spicy. When Paul finally tries them, he is absolutely effusive with praise. He says more words talking about Dylan’s buns than he did during all of season 14. (Relatable. I could go on about his buns all day as well.) “I haven’t been surprised by a flavor in a long time,†Paul tells him, and compliments the shape, size, color, and uniformity of Dylan’s buns. Yup. Same, Paul. Same.
It’s not surprising that Dylan gets a handshake after everything Paul says, and Georgie comes close as well for her Italian Chelsea buns with pesto, sun-dried tomato, and mozzarella. He tells her all it’s missing is some shaved Parmesan on top, so instead of a handshake, she gets a pat. Oh, that’s the last thing we need. We already have a Hollywood Handshake; we were ready for a Prue Pat, and he stole that from her as well. Does he even need a co-judge during Bread Week?
Everyone is a bit of a triumph, but John whiffs with his Greek-inspired creation. The filling was too wet, so it left a deep pocket in the center of the roll. Usually deep pockets will get you whatever you want, but not on Baking Show, darling. Gill is very pleased with her black pudding (gross!) and chorizo buns that she tops with “mustard custard.†This makes me think that Colonel Mustard from Clue should invent a wonderful dessert. Yes, I’ve had Sara Lee, but have you had Colonel Mustard’s Custard? Sumayah, who is usually aces at all of these bakes, creates some nice sunflowers that the judges don’t love, but at least they’re the unusually shaped and colored buns Alison was hoping to see.
The technical is a Baking Show first with Paul requesting the bakers make a seven-stranded braided bread wreath. (In England they call braids “plaits,†and, next to Celsius, it is one of the most annoying things about this country.) Rather than trying to tell them how to do it in a recipe, Paul puts on a little demonstration for the bakers. This seems like real life, because if I didn’t know how to do this, I wouldn’t read about it, I would watch a video on YouTube. These are the little changes that continue to make the show exciting. We don’t need the bakers to make a life-size model of their favorite member of the royal family out of cookies, we just need there to be something a little out of the ordinary but also totally approachable. So much better. At the end of his little display, Prue says, “Paul, it was such a pleasure watching you plait a loaf.†Did she mean plait or pinch? Are we still playing the pun game?
Most people figure out the plaiting, but Dylan can’t, probably because he was still thinking about Paul putting his mouth all over his buns. Andy also puts the egg meant for the egg wash (a combination of egg and/or milk to make bread brown and crunchy on the outside) in his dough, meaning he needs to make it a second time, which puts him behind the rest of the pack. But he does well enough that second time that he ends up in the top three with Sumayah and Nelly, who wins. It’s such a pleasure watching Nelly listen to Paul praising her wreath. You can tell she just wanted to bust out in song or praise for her imaginary lover Noel, but she kept her face under control. At the bottom is my boy Dylan, Christiaan, and John, who is not having a good day at all.
The showstopper is to make a cornucopia out of bread with at least two different kinds of bread inside. Cornucopia, as anyone who had to make one out of construction paper in kindergarten for Thanksgiving can tell you, is a horn of plenty. All these horns and no one even made a joke about being horny. Are we punning or are we not? I am especially disappointed in Nelly, who is definitely horny for Noel — one of the many things I adore about her.
John is making a “Horn of Pride,†and let me tell you how many horns I have seen at Pride. Lots. The only problem with Pride is that everything is rainbow. What did we, as an LGBTQIA+ collective, ever do to deserve being saddled with the rainbow, the ugliest, most garish collection of colors known to (gay) man or lesbian? He’s making bagels to go inside his cornucopia, but when he goes to boil them, they sink to the bottom of the pan. (Since we’re doing puns, it is taking everything in my power not to make a bottom joke about the gay cornucopia.) He says they have never done this before, so he knows they’re not going to rise.
John goes out for a little cry in the garden, and sis, it’s okay. We’ve all been there. Alison comes out and tells him that when she was on Strictly Come Dancing (the U.K. version of Dancing With the Stars), she knew she was going home because of her performance and how everyone else did. “[My partner] Alijaz said, ‘She could still fall over,’†she tells John. Wait. Why am I crying? Why is this the sweetest thing anyone has ever said to someone in (or slightly outside) the tent? God, this show is so wonderful and wholesome, and how did it take 14 seasons to get national treasure Alison Hammond on as a judge?
The showstoppers all seem complicated enough but attainable, which is exactly the sweet spot for a good challenge. Sumayah’s, unsurprisingly, looks like something you would see on Instagram with roses and leaves decorating the outside and little pink rolls spilling out. (Too bad Paul says the rolls are boring.) Gill’s summer-holiday inspired creation is a little bit loud, with different colors and squiggles on the outside, but it looks delicious and the judges say it is simple but perfect. Georgie’s is also a miracle with its own fair share of decorations, and Paul calls her chocolate-and-hazelnut rolls “luxurious,†which is a word usually reserved for extra-soft toilet paper.
As soon as Dylan plopped his black-and-white-striped cornucopia down on the desk, we all knew he was taking home star baker. As Noel pointed out earlier, it looks like a Tim Burton creation, and it’s a shame they had to cut into it to sample it because I would have loved to include the whole thing in the shrine I’m building to Dylan (and his buns) in my spare room. They try his amaretto doughnuts, and both start purring like the cat that inspired Dylan. Then they turn to his maple bacon knots, and Paul says they’re expensive and indulgent. (There we go with TP adjectives again.) Paul tells Dylan he’s a “good little baker,†and you can see that is how he flirts.
But not everyone does such a great job. Andy makes a creation inspired by a trip to New York, but his cornucopia falls apart in the oven. If it’s inspired by America, then it needs to be big. (In the U.K., they sell appliances they say are “American-style,†and that just means they’re fucking gigantic.) He makes pizza, focaccia, and pretzels, and Paul and Prue tell him that everything he made is not bad, but it doesn’t taste like the thing he described it as. Even his pretzels, Paul says, are like a cinnamon loaf. Andy is free to bake another day because it is John and his buns that are going home. He’s crying, but he says that they are tears of pride, because he’s so glad that he got as far as he did. I have cried tears at Pride before as well, but it was because I still have yet to taste Dylan’s buns.