Wednesday 16 November 2022 01:53 AM ROLAND WHITE reviews last night's TV: Oops! Bake Off's summer pud bombes ... trends now
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The Great British Bake Off: The Final
Rating: ***
Louis Theroux Meets - Bear Grylls
Rating: ****
The final of The Great British Bake Off (C4) was billed as a celebration of 'our beautiful planet'.
Let's hope the planet was grateful, because it certainly wasn't a celebration of dazzling bakery skills.
For the technical round, finalists Sandro, Abdul and smiley scientist Syabira — the eventual series winner — were asked to produce a summer pudding bombe.
'I've never heard of a summer pudding bombe,' said Sandro.
As it turned out, that wasn't much of a disadvantage. The resulting bombes looked like they'd exploded prematurely: a collection of ingredients on a plate still waiting to be assembled.
It was surely Syabira's adventurous mix of flavours throughout the series that landed her the title
Abdul won that technical round, because his bombe was slightly less of a disaster than the others. 'There is a sort of shape,' said judge Paul Hollywood with admirable restraint and diplomacy.
Whatever happened to Paul as Mr Nasty, the Simon Cowell of patisserie? Perhaps the tasks were simply too ambitious. For the showstopper round, the judges ordered an edible sculpture on the theme of Our Beautiful Planet.
Abdul chose a bee theme for his cake. He produced a beehive made from elderflower and almond biscuit, plus bee-shaped macarons. Not that I'd have known it was a beehive if he hadn't told us.
