Oh, what a lovely pastry week. Usually, the chefs have to make all sorts of savory pies filled with sausage and haggis and Liz Truss’s wilted lettuce head, but this week they got to make fruit pies, delicious, soupy, frangipane-y sweet pies, and I couldn’t be happier. It was a tough week for several of the bakers though, but with two going home, the peril was higher than ever. Were the evictees a surprise? Not really. But it was still a fun hour.
The signature is to make 12 individual savory pies so, yes, we’re going to have to wait a little bit for our sweetness. Not only a savory pie but one made with hot-water crust. This is when you dissolve lard in hot water and then add it to flour and butter. Yes, there is something strangely barbaric about it, but how else are you going to bake a pie where the crust will hold up to being taken out on a picnic?
The flavor profiles are pretty common for an English savory pie, things like sausage, lamb, mushroom, and others. Hottie gym teacher Matty is making a pie inspired by Spanakopita, which he can’t even say and certainly can’t spell. For those who don’t know, it’s a Greek dish with spinach, cheese, and filo dough. When the judges go over to Dana’s bench our favorite Essex girl says she’s making a pie with Dauphinoise potatoes inside, which is sort of like boiled potatoes in cream. It’s a French thing. I wouldn’t mess with it. Paul says, “It sounds like a Humberty Gumberty.” That’s not exactly what he says, but the vowels and consonants sound so mushed up in his mouth I think that he poured boiled lard all over them.
There aren’t many disasters during the baking, even though Nicky is speed making her pies in their little tins. Noel goes over to Matty, who has two tiny little oven mitts for his fingers for getting his pies out of their muffin tins. Noel says that he once saw Paul Hollywood wearing only those two tiny fabric sacs. “On his fingers?” Matty asks. Yes, on his fingers. I love Allison and she has been a great addition to the cast, but do we really need a host other than Noel? He does it all on his own. God save the Noel.
Naturally, Nicky’s pies, which look like little almonds, are the grossest of the bunch. Prue actually says they’re “gluey” and both judges decide they’re a disaster. There were plenty of bad pies on display. Josh’s pickle, pork, and apple pies not only have roasted Cheddar on top but also what looks like caramelized onions. It’s a lot. They’re also leaking more than the Trump White House. Rowan took inspiration from Pigs in a Blanket. (In England, this dish is a sausage wrapped in bacon because there is nothing more English than meat on meat.) Too bad the pies are terrible. Paul finds one without a top. Then he finds one without a bottom. It’s like the worst gay sex party you could imagine.
Speaking of gay sex parties, Daddy Dan doesn’t have a great first showing, with his lamb keema pies all lumpy on the sides. Both judges think they are far too dry and stodgy, just like Mary Berry’s knock-knock jokes.
Really the only two good ones are Tasha’s Christmas stuffing pies, which are nice and neat, and Prue likes that they have mustard on the bottom. But the real victor is Cristy, a woman whose name and face I did not remember until somewhere around last episode. Now here she is getting a handshake for her overstuffed cream, leek, and mushroom pies. Paul says he is impressed with it being moist inside with an intricate lattice top. Where has this Cristy been all this time?
For the technical, the bakers have to assemble a Dauphinoise Pithivier, which is what Paul was saying when we thought he was saying Humberty Gumberty. It turns out he was giving Dana — and all of us — a hint of what was to come. It’s basically a mound of creamy potatoes inside a rough puff-pastry case, and it has a stinky blue-cheese dressing. Last week, I admitted that I firmly believe white chocolate is garbage, and … I got a lot of support from you, my darling readers! This week, I am going to admit that I hate cheese and think it is disgusting, and not only would I not eat that sauce, I wouldn’t even make it. I do not expect the same support.
The biggest challenge, other than the usual faff of laminating the dough over and over, is getting the pastry to rise. Cristy’s, Nicky’s, and Josh’s are all flatter than Joe Rogan thinks the earth is. Rowan gets right to it and says that he has seen better turds than his Humberty Gumberty. (Sorry, it’s just easier to spell.)
Nicky, Josh, and Matty end up as the bottom three while those who got theirs to rise perfectly managed to, ahem, rise to the top. Tasha is third and Dana is second, which isn’t surprising considering she basically made the same exact dish earlier in the afternoon. But it’s Daddy Dan with his perfectly domed Humberty that takes the day.
Now everyone just needs to hold on for the sweet, sweet showstopper. They need to make a display of decorated sweet pies that include at least three different pies with lots of ornate decorations on top. This is actually a great challenge because making a good pie is hard but attainable, same with making a good-looking pie. They want them tied together, but it’s not like three anti-gravity pies with anti-matter custard and a black-truffle spaceship, which is probably what the task would have been last season.
Everyone is taking their inspiration from different places, some literally because they’re doing pies based on their travels. Tasha is making apple and ricotta, blueberry and chestnut, and pecan pies one to depict the sea, one to depict the mountains, and one as a signpost between the three. Dan is turning his pies into a tree for some reason, but they also represent South America. He has a cherry pie for Chile, a grape pie for Argentina, and a “tropical fruits” pie for Brazil. My girl Saku is making a pineapple pie inspired by her native Sri Lanka and also an apple pie with apples from her adopted homeland of Herefordshire. (No, hobbits don’t live there.)
Both Josh and Nicky are doing displays inspired by their grandmothers, which is very sweet and also the most fitting of tributes for grandmothers. Rowan is getting his inspiration from some older ladies, Patsy Stone and Edwina Monsoon from the classic sitcom Absolutely Fabulous, or Ab Fab to the middle-age homosexuals who are still in love with it. That reminds me? How old is Rowan? Both of his pies are lemon and blueberry and they have frangipane, which wasn’t an essential ingredient but it seems like it is because almost every baker is using it. Was there a sale at Tesco’s or something?
I’m worried about Rowan from the start when he tells us that when he practiced his pie at home the bottom fell out of it. I hope Troye Sivan didn’t get hurt when he hit the ground. (JK, he’s vers.) As he’s preparing his pies, it just looks worse and worse. He has to ask Allison to help get it out of the pan, but as they do it the soupy interior starts to collapse the whole thing. She tells him to serve it in the case or else he’s not serving anything at all. It’s clear he is going to be one of the two to get the chop, but who is going to join him?
While the field for the worst seems to be wide open, there are really only two contenders for star baker. Josh’s tribute to his grandmother is a giant sunflower where two apricot and pineapple pies make up the flowers and two apple, blackberry, and coconut pies make up the leaves. It is absolutely gorgeous, with the fruit in the “flower” pies cut to look just like petals. This is the kind of masterwork we expect on the show, and I’m glad that Josh got over a horrible week last week and a slow start this week to get back where he belongs at the top of the rugby scrum.
Cristy has turned out a gorgeous woodland display for her autumnal latticed pies. There are little flowers of different colors and different kinds of latticework in each. I don’t know why, but I feel like these look exactly like one of Drew Berrymore’s wedding dresses. Paul also says he’s never thought of combining raspberries and frangipane before but loves the result. Between this and the handshake, it’s clear she’s taking the trophy, and she does.
Rowan’s fate is already sealed, and, yes, he does go home. The three candidates to join him are my girl Saku, whose pineapple, cherry, and rum pie featured entirely raw fruit. Dana also made a tree display, but it sort of looks like a hurricane just blew through town. She made a mulled wine pie that is so tart Paul Hollywood grimaces and makes a noise that sounds like joy but is definitely not. When Nicky brings her pies up, they at least look gorgeous, covered in tiny flowers and ready for a sophisticated tea party. Paul says her apple pie is the only dry apple pie he’s ever had in his life. Only one of her pies, made with frangipane (again!) and plums, is to the judges’ liking.
And with that, Nicky joins Rowan on the train back to Scotland. Well, Rowan is not from Scotland, so I hope that Nicky at least gives him a place to crash until he can figure out how to get back home. You can tell that the leaders are starting to separate out, and it was clearly time for these two. Now let’s just see how much longer my girl Saku and Dana can hold on.
